J. R. TODD

the Las Vegas spring race in 2014.

When Todd answered his phone to the tone of Kalitta’ s gruff voice asking if he would fly out to Vegas to drive the nitro legend’ s car, previously piloted by David Grubnic, he couldn’ t have possibly imagined what would follow. He was in the middle of a hiatus after running a handful of races for Bob Vandergriff Jr., as well as a short stint in a supercharged Pro Mod for Al-Anabi in the U. S. and Qatar, so Todd was more than willing to hop on a Sin City-bound plane to drive for the“ Bounty Hunter”.

“ Going into that weekend, I wasn’ t sure what to expect,” Todd freely admitted.“ I just knew that once Connie called and asked if I would fill in, I wasn’ t going to tell him no. When I got there he said‘ We’ ll see how things go and we’ ll be talking.’ One thing led to another and I got hired, and the rest is history.”

The opportunity to work one-on-one with a crew chief, team owner, and former driver with a career as illustrious as Kalitta’ s isn’ t lost on Todd, who also previously drove for Bruce Litton in IHRA competition and Dexter Tuttle at the beginning of his NHRA career.

“ You hear the stories about Connie and how tough he can be, but getting to drive his personal car has been the biggest honor of my driving career by far. He’ s been great to work with. As a driver, if I’ m making a mistake in the car, I want someone to point it out and tell me. He’ ll give me his two cents on how I should do things, but when he comments on how good of a job we’ re doing, that’ s the best kind of compliment that I could receive as a driver, coming from somebody like him.”

The duo of the young, eager Todd and the intimidating, legendary Kalitta didn’ t take long to gel, going on to win a race in just their 12 th race together, coincidentally at Denver, the site of Todd’ s first Top Fuel victory eight years prior. He finished a career-best

second in the 2014 points standings, then won another race in 2015, but 2016 has proven to be the best year for Todd, Kalitta, and co-crew chief Rob Flynn. Todd finished the season fourth in points with a career-best 37 round wins and six

final rounds, including an emotional win at Sonoma.

“ I would definitely say that this has been a career-best season,” Todd stated.“ I don’ t have the wins or the points finish to exactly show for it, but that also just shows how competitive Top Fuel has gotten – having that many final rounds and round wins, then to finish fourth. The way we started the season, you always like to think you have a shot at the championship, but we basically started with an allnew team with all-new crew guys and brought in Rob Flynn to work alongside Connie. The season got off to a slow start for us, but once the summer kicked in we really picked up the performance. I thought we had one of the top cars on tour.”

Todd would be correct in his assessment. His hot summer season kicked off with a runner-up finish to teammate Doug Kalitta in the final round at Atlanta, losing on a holeshot in what was the closest race in NHRA Top Fuel history. The margin of victory was. 0000, a result that Todd says,“ wore on me for a while.” The SealMaster team went to backto-back finals at Norwalk and Chicago, won the Somona race, and reached the semifinals at the U. S. Nationals.

“ Then the Countdown started and we just stumbled and really didn’ t capitalize when we needed to. Antron [ Brown ], when he goes on a tear like that at the first half of the Countdown, it’ s going to be hard for anyone to stop that. Going into the final few races was bittersweet for me. Once again, we had one of the better cars at the end of the Countdown and I wasn’ t ready for the season to end by any means. I think if we could’ ve started off the Countdown the way we finished, we definitely would’ ve been in a lot different position going into Pomona.”

Todd finished the Countdown with runner-up finishes at the final two races of the season in Las Vegas and Pomona. A career-best 3.680 elapsed time on a hot racetrack gave him the number one qualifying position at the Auto Club NHRA Finals, where another holeshot loss to Doug Ka-

PHOTOS: GARY NASTASE