Bob Vandergriff, Jr. confirmed his team will soon make an announcement regarding a second Top Fuel dragster but quickly pointed out this expansion could merely be scratching the surface of things to come. The driver of the United Parcel Service dragster admitted a third and fourth dragster is already in the works.

“We will be running a 2nd team next year and we'll probably have an announcement out on it next week,” Vandergriff said. “We'll then probably have a little more details for everyone at the Las Vegas race.  If things go according to plan, we might have not just the second car but a third and fourth one as well.  We'll see how things shake up in the next couple of months but we have some opportunities and if they go as planned then we could have those extra teams next year.”

Did Vandergriff all of a sudden find the fabled pot of gold at the end of the rainbow? Not quite, but close thanks to a few NASCAR connections. Bob Vandergriff, Jr. confirmed his team will soon make an announcement regarding a second Top Fuel dragster but quickly pointed out this expansion could merely be scratching the surface of things to come. The driver of the United Parcel Service dragster admitted a third and fourth dragster is already in the works.

“We will be running a 2nd team next year and we'll probably have an announcement out on it next week,” Vandergriff said. “We'll then probably have a little more details for everyone at the Las Vegas race.  If things go according to plan, we might have not just the second car but a third and fourth one as well.  We'll see how things shake up in the next couple of months but we have some opportunities and if they go as planned then we could have those extra teams next year.”

Did Vandergriff all of a sudden find the fabled pot of gold at the end of the rainbow? Not quite, but close thanks to a few NASCAR connections.

“When you meet the right people that think the same way you do when it comes to marketing and sales, things happen,” Vandergriff explained. “Then you have success with a company like UPS and probably for the first time in my life I go places that people are seeking me out, which is a welcome change.  People want to talk to me when I go hang out with my buddies at NASCAR races. 

“There are times I get word sent to me that so and so company would like to meet with you.  For me that's a different route instead of Vegas for 5 minutes on somebody’s time, somebody’s sending for me because they'd like to have a meeting to see if I could do the same thing for their company that I've done for UPS. 

“It's an interesting dynamic, a lot of years of hard work and hopefully you'll see over the next few months some of that coming true to where we'll have some major, major companies coming into drag racing because of it.”

Vandergriff wouldn’t say on the record who his leading candidate for the second ride is, but pointed out his decision will be based on the sponsor’s desires.
 
“We're talking realistically to six or seven different companies right now and depending on the company and their demographic is who we're going after,” Vandergriff said. “There are some programs that lend themselves to certain drivers because of the way the company operates and what market their going after.  We'll identify which companies like to be involved and then we'll go ahead and set out and see what kind of drivers we need to put in there.”

No need to send resumes to Vandergriff yet as his first driver may be one with current driving experience. The next two will likely come forth from the Top Alcohol ranks.
 
“We've talked to Art Gallant about using his A/Fuel dragster as a  driver development thing to where we can put people in there and give them a year's worth of going up and down the race track in a car similar to this before we plug them in,” Vandergriff said. “I think you'll see us looking into some younger drivers maybe in the Sportsman categories that we feel could actually meet the marketing goals of some of the companies and could be around for the next 10 to 20 years.”

Vandergriff is adamant he’ll be slow to advance a driver until he’s sure everyone’s best interests are served. 

“Maybe we’ll put them in an A/Fuel car for a year and see what that leads to for them.  I really think it's something that we need to do in this sport instead of just plugging people into these things in January, trying to get their license and sending them to the Winternationals in February.  I don't think that's fair and I think we need to find out if these guys are capable of driving these cars firstly and secondly we need to find out whether or not they're capable of servicing the sponsors properly. 

“I don't think you want to just plug somebody into this car and five races into the season you realize you made a mistake and that guy isn't the right guy for the job.  Then you've done no service to the sponsor.  It's hard to go back and tell them 'Hey, we picked the wrong guy' because that makes us look bad. 

“With the A/Fuel program I think we can put them in there and let them run.  After a year we could go okay this is the right person or after 4 or 5 races you know this ain't gonna work out let's plug somebody else in.  We're just really trying to take our sport to the next level and try to develop something that will be a feeder system into these cars.”