CREW CHIEF JOHN COLLINS LOOKS AHEAD TO NEW ROLE AT CRUZ PEDREGON RACING

by Tracy Renck    Tue, 2020-12-08 11:05

 

Crew chief John Collins, the wrench boss for nitro Funny Car driver Tommy Johnson Jr at Don Schumacher Racing the past seven years, has a new address.

Collins has joined Cruz Pedregon and will serve as the crew chief for the team owner and nitro Funny Car driver.

“Including myself, I brought eight guys with me who worked with me on Tommy’s car at DSR to Cruz’s team,” Collins said. “It is different. The surroundings are completely different. After being here a week and going through all his stuff, with Rip and Ryan, Cruz has done a very good job I think in what he has built. He has great stuff. He has great policies. I’m impressed with how well he has done.”

Johnson Jr. lost his ride at DSR when the Chandler Family "Giving Car Program" came to an end at the conclusion of the 2020 season.

“I’m proud of the success we had with Tommy and that’s why I’m so happy to have all these guys come with me (to Pedregron’s team) because you need to have a good group of guys to surround yourself with to be successful,” Collins said. “As a whole, as a team, these guys are very successful. They have worked together for a long time and we worked really hard to get where we were at and what we did with Tommy’s car.

“That’s our plan, Cruz is going to be the driver and I’m going to control the car and the team. In our eyes, it is going to be the same as what we left DSR with other than Cruz driving the car and being the team owner.”

Collins was the crew chief for Johnson Jr.’s Funny Car the past seven seasons. Johnson Jr. was a championship contender all those seasons and finished second in the 2020 points standings to his DSR teammate Matt Hagan.

“We are coming over (to Cruz Pedregon’s team) and we are going to turn his car into our car (Tommy Johnson Jr.’s car) as much as possible,” Collins said. “I’m going to say 99 percent of his car he’s going to get in will be what we just left DSR with. In fact, we are going to buy some of the parts from the old Don Schumacher car just to make it's the same as what we are accustomed to and what we have built with the program we had the last seven years.”

 

 

Collins worked at DSR from 2007-2020, serving as an assistant crew chief on the Funny Cars driven by Ron Capps, Jack Beckman, and Gary Scelzi before moving over to Johnson Jr.’s Funny Car to be the crew chief.

Now, he’s ready to attack the challenge ahead of him. The 2021 NHRA Camping World Drag Racing Series begins March 11-14 with the 52nd annual AMALIE Motor Oil NHRA Gatornationals at Gainesville (Fla.) Raceway.

“We are not really panicking because actually the chassis (Pedregon has) is a DSR chassis and it was ours at one time,” Collins said. “It only has 40 runs on the chassis, so we are going to strip it down and we are going to build it just like the car Tommy was driving.

It’s not going to be that much of a change. The biggest change is the change of scenery. Cruz’s shop is just around the corner from Schumacher’s (in Brownsburg, Ind.).”

Collins has high expectations for Cruz Pedregon in 2021.

“I expect to win every round, you can’t expect any less,” he said. “I want to win every round, every race and be low qualifier every run. You have to expect the most. Whether that happens is all to be seen, but I expect that we can hit the ground running just like we left DSR.” 

 

 
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