As long as were talking about rules let's talk a little bit about the NHRA management. Do you have an opinion about the NHRA management team since Tom Compton took over?
AC: Seems like he's doing a pretty good job to me. It (NHRA) seems to be a pretty tough sell to the media. While most racers tend to think that NHRA is just the greatest thing in the world, the facts are that drag racing is pretty hard to sell as entertainment because there is just so much time nothing is happening on the track that anybody wants to watch, which makes drag racing a pretty tough sell. The fact that NHRA has created a venue that has kept sponsors reasonably happy with the sport’s TV coverage functioning is a credit to Tom Compton and his crew. If it was easy to do somebody else would probably be doing it, so it's probably not that easy.
What about the PRO organization? Is it a good thing or a bad thing?
AC: No comment.
Are you a member of PRO?
AC: I think so, but I don't personally pay the dues. I think Force signed us all up.
There are a lot of people outside of the pro pits who think Alan Johnson or you are cheating. Do you think there is any cheating going on?
AC: Well, I guess I really don't have a way of knowing what anyone else might do, but myself, I couldn't. My contract states that if I get caught doing anything like that, I'd be immediately disposed of without any further compensation, so I would assume Alan's contract probably reads like that too. So how could a guy do something that was blatant cheating knowing that he would fully take the blame for it all, knowing that the only way the team owner would keep his sponsorship would naturally be to fire the crew chief and replace him with somebody else, claim they had no knowledge of what was going on whether that was the case or not. So (cheating) would be an awful big risk. I don't see anybody that races for a living wanting to take that risk.
Now, as far as trying to find a loophole in the rules and work as close to that as humanly possible, hell, that's their (crew chief/tuner) job. Just as it is with all the NASCAR engine builders and whatever. But to blatantly do something that is prohibited, I'd doubt anybody would do that.