It’s impressive enough that longtime Funny Car owner-tuner-driver Tim Wilkerson scored a provisional No. 3 spot in the qualifying line-up Friday night at the NHRA Arizona Nationals at Wild Horse Pass Motorsports Park, near Phoenix.

But probably more remarkable is that the one-man-band from Springfield, Ill., has turned into an elite-level drag-racing powerbroker. 

For years he has been considered a privateer, sticking to his own operation that has been funded for nearly a quarter-century primarily by IT consulting and solutions firm Levi, Ray & Shoup. 

But he has evolved into a kingpin in the nitro pro ranks, giving career boosts and tuning guidance to Top Fuel racers T.J. Zizzo, Keith Murt, and Buddy Hull and Funny Car racers Chad Green, Bobby Bode, and son Daniel Wilkerson.   

Wilkerson doesn’t think of it that way, though. He doesn’t puff himself up, equating himself to a Don Schumacher, who built an empire with multiple teams, 19 championships and 366 victories, a major machine shop that sells parts to not only racers but also across a diverse range of industries, and Hall of Fame honors. He isn’t tying to jockey for the best networking for data-sharing. 

He admits that his motive actually sort of plays to the lowest common denominator – making money, but he also takes some pride in knowing that his extra-effort of time investment and knowledge-imparting is helping the sport grow at a time it needs that the most. 

“I mean, basically I had some opportunity to help fund my car by helping other people. And at the same time, it’s doing just that – it’s growing the field. So it's just been a win-win, quite frankly,” Wilkerson said. 

He always has had the reputation of being a focused individual, fun-loving when its’s appropriate but laser-locked on whatever his task at hand might be. And he’s juggling these new obligations with aplomb. 

“I just kind of change my hat and go work on something else and come back,” he said of his method to compartmentalize everything. “I’ve got a great group of guys working on my car [directed by Richard Hartman], so I can be absent a little bit,” he said. 

“But I think it's going to come to a head here before long with it. Those guys can basically take care of themselves. So, my son, Daniel is running Chad Green’s car. They're parked right next to me every day. So that's probably going to be basically a two-car team for the whole year. I'm not physically over there every second, but I'm still helping Daniel try to get through all the ifs, ands, and buts,” Wilkerson said. 

He said he’s impressed with Daniel’s fearlessness in stepping up from driver to crew chief: “He's not afraid. We went from six races last year to 19 this year. That's a big jump. So we had to hire three more guys, so that's taken a transition a little bit. But I don't know, it's going to be exciting. Chad's excited about it. We kind of stole a guy out of Pro Mod and put him into Nitro Funny Car. But that's what needs to happen.” 

Wilkerson said he expects Green to compete in the Pro Mod class at “I think maybe just one or two [events]. But I asked him not to do both, because I don't think he drives well when he does both.

“They are separate. You drive that Pro Mod with one hand, and you drive that Funny Car like you’re wrestling a gorilla. So I just want him to focus on one car,” Wilkerson said. “I told him, ‘I don't care – if you want to just run Pro Mod and the Funny Car once or twice, that's fine.’ But he decided he'd rather run Funny Car the whole season and maybe the Pro Mod once or twice. So we'll see what he ends up doing.” 

Green’s son, Hunter, is planning to drive in the pro ranks a little this season, too. 

“We spent some time and got Hunter a Top Fuel license,” Wilkerson said, “but I think he's going to run Randy Myers’ A-Fuel car at three or four races to just again get more laps under his belt. That was my suggestion to him. So when we went to the test session in the spring, I think he made five or six runs in Randy's car and got better and better and better at it. He made a couple runs in our car [the one Buddy Hull has purchased], and he did well in our dragster.” 

Keith Murt is not in the picture anymore, but Wilkerson still thinks the world of him. 

“I called Keith before all this happened [before Hull bought the dragster and equipment] to discuss that with him, because I kind of felt like I owed him that, because he was the guy that initiated that Top Fuel car to begin with. He was good with all that. He said he's crazy busy and if he wants another Top Fuel car, ‘We will just go buy one.’ I said, ‘OK. Cool.’ He's a really good guy. Always hard to find a better guy than that.” 

Wilkerson continues to offer guidance to Funny Car newcomer Bobby Bode.

“They need very little guidance anymore. They, like everybody, like even me, get off track a little bit, and they'll call me up and I'll go there and spend a half an hour over there, staring at their stuff and figure out what happened,” he said. “I just talk to Bobby. I make him the guy that makes all the calls [and not dad Bob, a seasoned racer, or anyone else]. That works out really well. That way I don't have five people asking me questions. 

“He understands if we make a decision, if we make a change, how it affects the car, and when he drives it he can see how it affects it. He does stuff on his own, and some of it works, and some of it doesn't and we'll discuss that later on. He's real good about it. He takes a good butt-chewing,” Wilkerson said with a laugh. 

“I’m always kidding with him about burning up his dad's money. We giggle about it and on we go,” he said. “We don’t need bad days, right? It doesn’t matter how wealthy you are with one of these cars. Everybody asks, ‘How much does it take to go racing?’ I say, ‘All of it, that’s how much.’” 

Most aren’t aware that Wilkerson helped T.J. Zizzo when he first wanted to race and that he pointed him in the right direction for his IHRA career start. 

“That was a car that I bought a long time ago from a really good guy in Memphis. He sold that car because of his business acquisitions and stuff, and I ended up buying it, and I thought I was buying it for my sponsor. After we got it going, he's like, ‘No, I don't want to do that.’ Zizzo found out about it, and I sold it to Zizzo and helped him get his license and all that. Then he went on and hired Dave Settles to help him when he was running IHRA. 

“Then he had [Rahn] Tobler [who currently tunes Austin Prock’s dragster] helping him the last couple years. I only helped him for a year or two,” Wilkerson said. “But it worked out good. Again, when you find people that are smart enough to listen and not complain and contradict everything you do, it works out pretty good.”