Alan Johnson Racing (AJR) will have an entry at this weekend’s NHRA Four-Wide Nationals. This is the fourth race of the NHRA Mello Yello Drag Racing Series season at zMax Dragway in Concord, N.C. The team is still in a search for a major sponsor after losing its funding a month before the start of the 2015 season.
The Knuckle Sandwich/AJPE Toyota Top Fuel Dragster driven by 2013 Mello Yello champion Shawn Langdon has delivered some knuckle sandwiches to the field. Langdon won the season’s opening race in Pomona, Calif. at the Car Quest Auto Parts Nationals in Phoenix, Ariz. and at the Amalie Oil Gatornationals he advanced to the semifinals. This all resulted in him holding on to the Top Fuel points leading with 281.
Crew Chief Brian Husen has this car running very consistently, qualifying in the top half of the field with two pole starts. As tough as the competition has been in the Top Fuel class, AJR has been delivering so far. They have been showing that they are poised and very capable of winning a championship this year.
Although they have Toyota and Red line oil as existing sponsors they need a major sponsor to continue to race for a spot in the countdown.
“We decided to race the early portion of this season to show potential sponsors that we have a championship caliber race team,” Alan Johnson (owner of AJR) said in a statement this week. “Our marketing staff and our new strategic marketing partner, Guy Fieri and his Knuckle Sandwich group, are working as hard as they can to find the funding we need.”
Hopefully soon they will be able to land the funding that will help them to continue their quest for another NHRA Mello Yello Championship.