Doug Foley has learned that what interests potential marketing partners these days might not be a racer’s on-track performance. Nevertheless, he said, he’s going to leverage his Top Fuel final-round appearance against eventual first-time winner Tripp Tatum at last month’s Gatornationals as much as he can in his quest to compete at more races.

Foley didn’t expect to go to the Las Vegas event, which was next on the schedule following the Gainesville race – and he didn’t. (“We knew we couldn't go to Vegas. It's another 50% more than any other race for us going that far,” he said) .But that didn’t mean his first-time-finalist momentum stopped. 

“NHRA said the last time they had two cars in a final that had never been there before [that did not] show up to the next race was 1972. That's a pretty interesting stat. As racers, of course, we wanted to go to the next race. You think for some reason you left Gainesville and you did well, that it's going to help you in Vegas. It really doesn't have much to do with anything. But more importantly, the fact that we see this team generating round-wins, working together as a team [counts],” Foley said.

“And I can tell you this: you could have walked in here – now, that's a team that had not gone a round that year – you could have walked in this pit area and you would not have known that they didn't go to the final the last three races. Everybody was just doing their job,” Foley said. “And think about it . . . Almost none of them is a full-time employee. So you look at what they accomplish and what the team's accomplishing, that's what makes me strive to keep investing like [co-team owner] Tim Lewis does: keep investing in what we're building, and see if we can find that one or two partners that can really help us take it to another level.” 

The reality in today’s business climate is that decisions are based on different factors than they were when he began racing Top Fuel dragsters in 2004. 

“Results did matter. When people put a tremendous amount of value on TV time, obviously, the further you go, the more TV time you get, the more interviews, all of that. And not that TV doesn't matter, but people are looking for direct connections to other businesses,” he said. “And that's what we try to focus on. But at the same time, when you can offer them, whether it's half a million dollars of branding to help grow their name, it sure doesn't hurt.

His Gainesville feat, he said, is a fact he does bring up in his pitches. 

“We try to boast whatever we have in our toolbox to try and generate that,” Foley said. At the same time, he said, “we find today, it's more the B2B side than it is how far you went in the race and all of that. But as racers, that means everything to us on how far we get. It's a combination of whatever you can offer a potential sponsor and try and figure out what works for them and make it happen.” 

If nothing else, he said, his Gainesville performance helped him personally. 

“I think it's more perception whether it's internal or external. I don't think it matters. I think when you feel like you're building something that you can believe in, you're going to call twice as many people. You're going to be twice as aggressive. It's going to make you want to go to more races,” Foley said. “So either way, it works. It's the furthest we've ever been in any race. Now all you do is strive to just be the second- to-last guy down the track instead of the last guy down the track on Sunday.” 

Even attending this Houston race “was a question mark when we left Gainesville,” Foley said. “We were able to find some local companies here to help us out. And we go to Charlotte [and] Virginia [the next two races on the Camping World Drag Racing Series schedule]. So we can stay on the tour a little bit longer.” He said he’s “working on something for Epping [the June 3-5 race in New Hampshire] now. And we just keep trying to do whatever we can do.”