When Justin Swanstrom was looking for a place to race, he figured the No Prep Kings was the perfect place to plant his flag. After all, it was made up of a fraternity of drag racers who shared similar attributes.

"I love to race, I love to gamble, and I love to talk s***," said Swanstrom.

Blame it on his roots. He grew up in boots -- the flame-retardant kind.

Swanstrom was never one of those racers who preferred the black-tie affairs of racing in sanctioned events. His best gigs have always been off the beaten path, where he feels the blue-collar drag racers and racing fans always hang out.

"I've done all types of racing -- Radial Racing, Pro Mod racing, from X275 to Ultra Street, Limited Drag Radial, Outlaw Drag Radial, Pro 275, to Radial vs. the World," Swanstrom explained. "So, I've worked my way up through the years, and just kept changing, and was able to get faster cars and stay competitive."

You'll notice that Top Sportsman or any of the Super categories leading up to Pro Stock and the fuel classes weren't part of the line-up.

 

 

"I've never been in NHRA," Swanstrom said. "I didn't think I ever had the wallet to do it, and just listening to a few people on how much it was per race, and most of those guys rent vehicles and stuff, it just didn't make sense for me. I'm not knocking them -- that's on them -- but they don't own anything at the end of the year. And so, for me, I've always raced out of my own pocket and had my own program."

Given a chance to race a fully funded fuel program, Swanstrom admits he'd say, "Nah, I'm good."

Swanstrom first took notice of the No Prep Kings program while working his day job, long before "drag racer" and "social media icon" became his occupations. He became enamored with the presentation.

"There I was ... watching it on a Tuesday afternoon while I was at work," Swanstrom said. "I wanted to be a part of it. I didn't know anything. I knew some of the guys, as in Daddy Dave and Kye Kelley. I knew them prior because they came over and ran some radial stuff, but I didn't know anything about Street Outlaws, or the show, or what was going on.

"I watched that race, a $200,000 race they ran on a Tuesday, and I was just hooked on it. So at that point in time, we were trying to figure out exactly what route we were going to go racing. We had just come out of grudge racing, was pretty dominant over there."

Swanstrom took the idea to his dad, Corey, who wasn't as enthused about running with the No Prep Kings. But after three months of continuously selling the idea, the plan, and the vision, Justin talked him into getting aboard.

"I do social media and all that. I knew that it could possibly turn into something big, and it'd be different for my career and my program," Justin admitted. "So I finally got him talked into it, and we went out and bought a car and started to go to the races. I had gotten in touch with the right people."

Swanstrom knew that no matter how good a racer was or what level their gift of gab was, everyone had to earn their spot in the show.

"They've got this thing called the Future Street Outlaws, where basically it's like an audition-type deal where people go out there, and they can run. Anybody can be a part of it," he explained. "You basically run, and if you're good, not necessarily good as in racing, because that's where some people get it confused. Yes, it is a race that you're at, but it is a TV show first, so it's all about personality. It's all about making good content and making a show. We just so happened to race while we're doing the show."

Swanstrom knew that to get to the next level, he and his team had to be next level, too.

"I told all my guys online, 'Don't anybody be talking s***, don't say anything, because we'll possibly go over there and we might get our ass beat,'" Swanstrom said. "We'd never run on big tires. We were always from a radial background. Never been on big tires and (wheelie) bars until I went over and experienced that deal, especially it being on No Prep."

Swanstrom bought a car to run the series and made his debut in 2019. He made a splash when he called out Kelley, one of the show's regulars, and beat him in a $5000-to-win grudge race.

Still, he was in the Futures with an uncertain future. Corey was on his son to go in a different direction, and Justin still believed he could have a place in the show. He knew he was a right fit for the program whether or not anyone else did.

"My dad's like, 'We're not going to no more. It is what it is; we tried it," Swanstrom recalled. "I was telling him, 'Just got to give it time. It'll happen. We just got to keep on pushing forward.'"

Swanstrom sold his car just as a call came in from the No Prep Kings.

"It basically said that if I could be in Illinois in two weeks, I would have the chance to race my way in," Swanstrom said. "I would get out of the Futures class if I won, and I would be in the invitational."

It was great news for Swanstrom, but it posed a big problem at the same time: He had no race car.

"It backlashed on me," Swanstrom said. "So me and my dad, we split it. I took everything that I had been saving up from working and all that, and I put it into a race car. I bought the car from J.R. Gray and had actually bought the whole program, as in the Reher-Morrison 959 nitrous deal. And that car was light enough; I was able to get down to weight. ...

"I had to send it over to Justin Elkes at Modern Racing to get it wired, basically, a week out. And I showed up to Illinois untested, and I had to go ahead and make a few passes, and I got the chance to race my way in."

 

 

Swanstrom soon realized calamity had a crush on him, and the better he did, the more times it visited.

His first race was against Larry Larson, and he won the race only to have the throttle hang, which grenaded the engine. Disappointed and defeated, the Swanstroms went home to fix their wounded engine in preparation for a four-in-a-row race stretch.

With the engine repaired, Swanstrom ran Bobby Ducate at the next event to open the show, only to have the car catch fire and burn up all the wiring. In the third race, Swanstrom once again won but lost as the car caught on fire.

He wrecked the car during the stretch's fourth and final race in Norwalk, Ohio. Swanstrom had become the show's equivalent of Captain Calamity.

"They were asking me if I was going to come back, and I just told them, 'Man, I'm taking the rest of the year off. I've had four races back to back to back, and it's been nothing but bad luck,'" Swanstrom said. "I said, 'I've won, but something's always happened.'"

Sometimes calamity can be a great presentation, and in misfortune, the No Prep producers saw promise in the kid from Florida who loved to gamble, talk smack and drive the wheels off a race car. He was set for the 2020 season.

Then came COVID.

There was no racing. There were no phone calls. At this point, the most significant challenge was keeping his dad at bay, hoping the phone call would come with the invitation. It came two weeks ahead of the event.

Swanstrom decided to go all-in. He sold his Pro 275 (drag radial) car and nitrous engines, and had a purpose-built car prepared for the series.

In grand fashion, Swanstrom made a big splash. He commissioned CJ Race Cars to build a new Lexus, which he dubbed "Prenup."

Three races in, Swanstrom won his first race at a facility he was very familiar with, South Georgia Motorsports Park, outside of Valdosta, Ga.

"That was a big splash for me, basically just saying, 'Hey, this guy belongs here, he's able to do this and be able to make good TV,'" Swanstrom said.

Swanstrom learned quickly from the often seat-of-the-pants world of grudge racing is that the environment for the No Prep Kings events is very much structured.

"NPK is probably the most organized and best part of racing that we've ever been a part of," Swanstrom said. "When I say it's organized, everything is on a schedule because they're there to shoot a TV show.

"Yes, you'll have oildowns or a crash, and that sucks. But for the most part, we are on a schedule. We show up in the morning, they send a text to our phone, they let us know what schedule we're doing: This is the time we got meetings; this is the time we do chip draw; and this is the time that you have a time to make a pass.

"And then we got the first round. So they are all about the schedule, and if you don't meet it, they don't care who you are. Go back to your trailer, we'll see you at the next one. So that's one good thing about it, is that there's structure there. ... They won't let anybody run over the top of them. They'll keep it pushing and keep it moving for the TV show. So that's a good thing."

This kind of structure for a two-day event is Swanstrom's icing on the cake.

 

 

A year ago, Swanstrom left the family's construction business to pursue professional drag racing, funding the racing on money generated from race winnings and monetizing his social media.

"I travel to race, and I still help my parents and my brother if they ever get in a bind," Swanstrom said. "Drag racing has given me a platform to be able to build something and be able to make money. And there's a lot of racing out there that people cannot say that they actually make money off of it. I can say over in NPK if you do it right, and you do well with it and you're good with the business side of it, you can make money over here."

Monetary gain aside, Swanstrom understands it's the fans who remain the key to making all of drag racing work, regardless of the series or format. Without the fans, nothing survives.

"I am big about interaction with fans," Swanstrom said. "I tell people all the time, there's a lot of people, there's a lot of drivers ... and nothing against them, but they have people that run their social media, they have people that comment for them and send messages back. If you see me on social media, it's coming from me, it's coming from my cell phone. I am big on that. I'm on my phone 24/7. I keep up with social media, and I keep up with all the posts and comments, and that's the best thing about it because I get to interact with all the fans.

"I can say that I think I probably do that the best out there of everyone. I've actually gotten a lot of other drivers in the NPK to start interacting more with fans. Like I tell them, there's enough out there that everybody can make it. We just got to make it together. You can't be stingy. You got a few people that are stingy, and they want to do their own thing, and they just get left in the dust. I don't want to toot my own horn, but I think I'm pretty smart when it comes to ideas, coming up with stuff, how to make good content, how to make good TV, keep things active, and moving forward.

"So that's one good thing, a good trait that I have, to be able to do that. I just keep the fan base active with it because, at the end of the day, if we didn't have a fan base, none of us would be anything. The race tracks wouldn't be open. We wouldn't be able to sell merch. So that's one thing I tell fans all the time. Without y'all, I'm definitely nothing; none of these guys out here are anybody. So they're what keeps this thing alive."

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