Drag Illustrated Issue 113, September 2016 | Page 44
Dirt
By Brandon W. Mudd
H
ailing from Springfield, Illinois, Tim Wilkerson is a one-man
show when it comes to NHRA drag
racing at its highest levels. Wilk is
the owner, crew chief and driver for the Levi, Ray
& Shoup Funny Car and so far in 2016 has had a
season that is, well, pretty odd. On the one hand,
he laid the smack down with early wins at Phoenix
and the 4-Wide race in Charlotte, dominating
the class.
On the other, bizarre starting-line incidents
at both Topeka and Denver, combined with a
series of uncharacteristic first-round exits, had
him in ninth place overall heading into the U.S.
Nationals early in September.
Drag Illustrated caught up with Wilkerson
at Seattle and talked with him about what makes
him the racer he’s become and where the Funny
Car class might be headed.
You’re the owner, crew chief and driver. Which
of those three positions give you the most headaches?
Owner, by far. Driving’s the easy part, tuning’s
the most challenging part, and being the owner,
just anymore, it’s really hard, because as soon as
all the teams moved to Indy, that screwed up the
crew pool. Now they’re all bunched up together
there and they all talk to each other and they all
know each other and it’s made it really hard to
hire good, quality people. I’m blessed that I have
good kids that work for me, but some of them
are local and a couple of them are from a long
way away. But when you get a good one, it seems
like their ultimate dream is to work for one of
the super teams. So that makes it harder on a
single-car team, I believe.
You’ve always been a winner in the Funny Car
class, you’ve always been in the conversation as
far as drivers to watch out for, but what changed
this year with the strong start to the season you
enjoyed?
I don’t know if it really changed, we were just
really fortunate to stumble on to a good clutch
pack that the car liked and it ran good. Again,
going back to my personnel, Richard Hartman
has made a huge difference in how we do things
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44 | D r a g
I l l u s t r a t e d | DragIllustrated.com
Issue 113
PHOTO: NHRA / NATIONAL DRAGSTER
Q&A: Tim Wilkerson