Drag racing might be a business to some, but Funny Car racer Paul Lee isn't one of them. Lee is quick to point out that driving his McLeod Funny Car is his fun time.

Lee is even quicker to point out that earlier this season he wasn't having fun. 

Enter championship tuner John Medlen, and now Lee cannot wipe the smile off his face... not that he wants to.

"Since we bought John Medlen on board and he's helped Jason Bunker and the guys with lot of details that we basically, frankly, overlooked, and he's really fine-tuned a lot of issues on the car that needed to be addressed and it's really showing progress. 

"I'm back to having fun again because that's why I'm here. I don't do this for a living. This is my fun. I get to go out and promote McLeod, FTI and Silver Sport transmissions, but it's fun. But wasn't until lately. Now we're starting to have fun again."

Lee knew Medlen's mission wouldn't be completed overnight, so there was no need to temper his enthusiasm. 

"We could go out there and smoke the tires in the next run," Lee said. "But you have to look at the big picture. What's the big picture? We're making down the track more than we were before, and that's the direction we want to be in. We want to be able to go down the track. I'm not saying we want to set low et, but we want to go down the track, pull the chutes, and have something to show for our fans and our marketing partners."

Lee said it's not only the crew benefitting in the learning process.  

"He's actually showed me a few things differently about driving the car, fine-tuning the throttle linkage so I can get the best reaction time, little details like the clutch tug and little details of driving the car that he's reminded me about," Lee explained. "He's certainly been around long enough and he showed his drivers the right and wrong way to do things, for sure. I look at the teams that he's tuned over his career, world champions. So if he asks me to do something a certain way, I'm certainly going to do it."

And as Lee puts it, he will smile while he does it. 

Lee was smiling broadly on Sunday at the Menard's NHRA Nationals, the last race at Heartland Motorsports Park, the final NHRA event in Topeka, Kan., before it crosses state lines on the other side of Kansas City, Mo.

Lee faced off against Cruz Pedregon in a battle of part-time, championship-tuning advisors. Lee has long admitted it was the inspiration of what Lee Beard accomplished in returning to assist Pedregon that was the impetus for his hiring of John Medlen. On Sunday, Lee beat Pedregon in the first round leading to his second consecutive quarter-final appearance after a season of being shutout.

Needless to say, Lee was smiling on Sunday in the shutdown.