Veteran nitro tuner and consultant Lance Larsen has a new project: helping organize a Funny Car team that plans to debut next season in a limited run.

“A group of friends of mine from the nostalgia side of things has decided to race what they a ‘big show car.’ They bought what was left of Tony Pedregon’s car stuff – no engine stuff. They proceeded to go to the Lucases and buy some more stuff. And we’re slowly but surely putting it together. The plan is to finish it toward the end of this year and test and get the licenses done. The two gentlemen who own it are Richard Townsend and Dustin Davis, Central Californians who have raced nostalgia Funny Cars for five or six years. They really have a passion for the sport, and it’s something they want to do,” Larsen said.

“When it’s done, it’ll run a very limited season. The deal is to grow into a team that runs all of them, which requires a lot of funding,” he said. “Six would be pretty aggressive for these two guys. We’re building the team with what we consider to be the best equipment – I’m not going to say ‘the best equipment we can afford’ – the best equipment, period. They bought all new clutch-management equipment, all new superchargers from the Lucases. Everything they bought is first-cabin. We’re juts not going to have the depth of the bigger teams, and were going to have to go out and run and then go back home and fix it. And we’re not going to do what West Coast teams do, only run up and own the West Coast. We’re going to try to run once a month or every six weeks at the longest so that every time you run you don’t have to retrain yourself.”

The operation is based in Oakdale, Calif., hometown of John and the late Eric Medlen. “It’s 120 miles east of Oakland in the foothills of the Sierra Nevadas, on the road to go to Yosemite [National Park],” Larsen said. “It’s a really nice area, very friendly town. It’s pretty big – 20,000 people. I’m enjoying it there – really great people. The crew guys have been with Richard for a while. They’re coming over from the nostalgia side. It’s all volunteer.”

Larsen, who’ll serve as crew chief, has worked with such NHRA favorites as Clay Millican, Chris Karamesines, Jeb Allen, Rhonda Hartman-Smith, John “Bodie” Smith, Richard Hartman, Joe Amato, Dean Skuza, and Bobby Baldwin.