Drag Illustrated Issue 140, January 2019 | Page 72

THE CHAMPIONS ISSUE seemed destined for greatness, but that path is usually nowhere near the straight line that make up the lanes Todd routinely rockets down. His story, though, is even more extreme than most, with Todd facing the harsh reality that his time in the sport may be up before it ever even got fully started. That, unfortunately, is the all- too-often tale in drag racing, and out of sight soon becomes out of mind. Todd knew that, was living it and saw his career headed down a path he was starting to dread. It took one phone call to change that. T he story – and the phone call on Friday, March 28, 2014 from Connie Kalitta – is one Todd has already told and now will forever have to tell. By the time Todd is 50 – with what he hopes are several more championships in hand – the tale will have reached legendary status. But truth be told, it doesn’t need any embellish- ing. Just the plain truth and how it has panned out in the past four years would be enough for a studio executive to buy the script on the spot. By 2014, Todd had been through the ringer of professional drag racing. After being named NHRA’s top rookie in 2006 at 25 years old, win- ning three races in the process, sponsorships and opportunities soon dried up. He raced in Top Fuel just 16 times from 2009-2013 – not competing at all in the class in 2010 and 2011 – all the while wondering if the sport was leaving him behind. “At that point, I thought this might be it,” Todd says. “Running those part-time races for Bob (Vandergriff ), that wasn’t cutting it. I wasn’t getting any breakthroughs, I was struggling to pay my bills, everything. I thought I was going to have to suck it up and get a real job. When you do that, you’re out of sight, out of mind, and when that happens people are going to forget about you really quick.” That never happened, though Todd never an- ticipated the opportunity that was waiting around the corner. Todd and his family had just finished used car shopping – at one of Ray Skillman’s dealerships, coincidentally – when they went to Buffalo Wild Wings in Plainfield, Indiana, to have dinner and watch March Madness. Todd then received a call from “Cowboy” Bob Coffman’s phone, but when he realized it wasn’t Coffman on the other end, but rather the legendary Kalitta, Todd’s tone – and face – quickly changed. “I saw the look on his face and I knew it was either really bad or really good. He just said, ‘It’s Connie,’” Todd’s father, Mario, remembers. “He always spoke highly of the Kalittas and Connie. It’s like everything fell into place.” But not without a lot of last-minute chaos first. Revisiting the conversation, Todd recalls Kalit- ta telling him he was making a driver change from David Grubnic and wanted to know if he 72 | D r a g I l l u s t r a t e d | DragIllustrated.com could drive. Not soon, not the next race, but the next day. In Las Vegas. It would mean getting a flight that night across the country, then trying to qualify the next day, having not raced since the previous September. He quickly called Vandergriff to get the OK from him, informed Kalitta that everything was a go and went to work. Todd retrieved his driving gear from Vandergriff ’s trailer in Indy, booked a flight, packed a bag and was headed to Vegas, all without really much idea of what in the world was happening. “At that point, I didn’t care how much (the plane ticket) cost,” Todd says. “It didn’t matter to me. There’s no way I was taking no for an answer from anybody.” In just over 12 hours, Todd went from eating wings and watching basketball in Indianapolis to driving a 10,000-horsepower Top Fuel dragster 2,000 miles away. It would have been under- standable if Todd wasn’t in top form. But he knew it might be his best – and perhaps last – chance to “I got a call from Jim Oberhofer and he said the job’s yours for however long you want it,” Todd says. “For me, it was better than any contract you could get offered. Once I got chosen, I wanted to prove to him he made the right choice more than anything.” land the driving dream he had clamored for since he started racing Jr. Dragsters at 10 years old. He went cleanly down the track on his first pass Saturday, going 3.896 at 310.34 mph and then topping it with a 3.841 to qualify 11th. Todd then upset friend – and future Kalitta Motorsports teammate – Richie Crampton in the first round before falling, oddly enough, to 2018 Top Fuel world champion Steve Torrence a round later. By then, though, the decision had been made and Kalitta wanted Todd as the full-time driver on his dragster – with no expiration date. “I got a call from (then general manager Jim Oberhofer) and he said the job’s yours for however long you want it,” Todd says. “For me, it was better than any contract you could get offered. I never even asked Connie why he chose me. Once I got chosen, I wanted to prove to him he made the right choice more than anything.” Todd’s passion for the sport had always been evident and, from afar, he marveled at guys like Scott Kalitta and everyone in the entire Kalitta Motorsports organization. To him, they embodied what the sport was about: working hard, playing hard, having fun and kicking ass doing it. Todd’s passion was something that stuck out to the Kalitta patriarch, a major reason why he made the call to Todd on that history-changing Friday in March nearly five years ago. Todd was a full-time driver for Kalitta Motorsports by the end of that weekend, and has won at least one race every year for the “Radman” since that life-changing phone call, making 118 straight race starts in the process heading into 2019. “J.R. was someone that we knew had the skills necessary to jump in the driver’s seat and have pretty quick success,” Kalitta says. “I had seen him compete before, and the way he approached each day at the track really stood out to me. We could tell J.R. was a special talent in the driver’s seat, and we knew that if given the opportunity, he would have success out on the track. His passion for drag racing has helped turn him into one of the premier drivers in the sport.” Issue 140