Drag Illustrated Issue 118, February 2017 | Page 44
make the cockpit more padded and safer. You can do so much to pad your
head, but your brain is still liquid inside your skull; there’s nothing you
can do about that. We did what we can to make things as safe as possible.
We went through the trailers and made sure all of the parts and pieces are
just right so we don’t have any more mishaps like we had in Vegas.
Even with all of those improvements to the safety features of the
racecar, a nitro Funny Car is such a violent racecar by nature. Have your
crew chiefs adopted a less aggressive tuning style to avoid stirring up
more concussion-like symptoms?
You can’t really baby these things. You’ve gotta keep trying to excel.
Funny Car is a very competitive class right now. If you’re not going low
3.8s, most likely you’re not going to win a round. You really have to be
within the top five in qualifying to be able to go rounds right now. So
we’re doing a lot of testing. We’re scheduled to test here on Monday, and
we tested in Phoenix. We’re just gonna try to keep getting quicker and
quicker. We’re all running those laid-back headers now, and the guys have
done some things with the weight to keep the front end down, which is a
lot better for driving – you’ve gotta be able to steer these cars. We’re just
going to keep chipping away at it.
Did your husband, [West Coast Choppers founder] Jesse James, or
your father, [Patrón
Spirits and Paul Mitchell
co-founder] John Paul
DeJoria, ever suggest
you reconsider getting
back in the car after
those accidents, even
though they’ve both
been very supportive of
your racing career?
Oh, of course. My
whole family wishes I
would retire today. But
no, they’re good. Obvi-
ously it’s hard when the
shoe is on the other foot
and you’re standing on
the starting line watching
your loved one go down
the racetrack, and unfor-
tunately they might get
hurt. It’s something that
everyone has had to pret-
ty much sign on for when
they supported me being
out here. My dad is com-
ing out today and I have
my husband out here too,
so all hands on deck.
Having gone through
those accidents and
the long recovery
process, did you feel any
apprehension when you
got back in the car for the first time earlier this year?
I wouldn’t say apprehension at all. I would say anticipation after wait-
ing that long. A normal offseason is just a couple months, but mine was
a bit longer than that. I was excited to get back in the car. It was almost
like my first time going down the track, but everything came back, no is-
sues whatsoever. It’s a funny thing when you’ve been off for three months,
when you first go back out there it’s like the first day of school. You’re like,
‘Do I remember how to do this? Oh yeah, OK, that’s how it goes.’
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I l l u s t r a t e d | Dra