NHRA's 50 Greatest Drivers - No. 7 Warren Johnson (2024)

Fri, 12 Oct 2001, 02:25 PM NHRA's 50 Greatest Drivers

Courtesy of NHRA Communications #7: Warren Johnson

It is deliciously ironic that Warren Johnson, a man who playfully disparages hisown driving ability, should be honored as one of drag racing's 50 greatest drivers.

Johnson's standing as the preeminent engine developer, the predominant team owner,and the deepest thinker in Pro Stock is unquestioned. But a great driver? Not inWarren's world, where drivers are as disposable as spark plugs.

"Driving just comes with the territory," says the man who has won the most ProStock races in NHRA history. "Outthinking the competition is what appeals to me."

That is the essence of this most unlikely of drag racing stars, a 58-year-old,silver-haired grandfather who prefers the intellectual challenge of racing to theadrenaline rush of competition. W.J. is complex, calculating, and cerebral, anengineer/racer who is invariably analytical and occasionally controversial. Dragracing lore does not record who first hung the sobriquet "the Professor" on WarrenJohnson, but the nickname was a perfect fit.

Despite Johnson's objections, the NHRA record book testifies to his considerableskill behind the wheel. He stands at the head of the Pro Stock class in everystatistical category: victories, final rounds, No. 1 qualifying times, low elapsedtimes, and top speeds.

With a professional racing career that spans four decades, Johnson has achievedthe status of senior statesman in the sport. He is a racing encyclopedia who hascompeted in 84 percent of the Pro Stock races contested in NHRA history. He hasqualified for every race since the 1987 Gatornationals - a remarkable 15-yearstreak. In a class where horsepower reigns supreme, Johnson is the undisputed kingof speed, having recorded the fastest run in more than half of the races since1982.

"This isn't rocket science," Johnson declares with his characteristic candor."It's about racing for 1,320 feet. Drag racing is an engineering exercise in itspurest form; you either win or lose."

Johnson's steely determination and his relentless work ethic were forged as ayoung man growing up on a hard-scrabble farm in Minnesota's aptly named Iron Range.

"What we were doing wasn't really farming; it was more like moving rocks around,"Johnson recalls. "Growing up on a farm was a great education for a youngster withan interest in mechanical things."

Long before he became the most prolific Pro Stock driver in NHRA history, Johnsonwas an unknown soldier in an army of weekend warriors. He drove his modified '57Chevy hundreds of miles to race on obscure dragstrips while his wife, Arlene,cradled their son, Kurt, in her arms. The Johnsons won their first race in 1963 atMinnesota Dragway. There would be many more victories to come.

Johnson's Pro Stock career was an accident of geography. Insulated from thefuel-racing frenzy of Southern California and isolated from the stock-carstrongholds of the East, Johnson concentrated on engine development during the longMinnesota winters.He took night classes in engineering while working full time in a steel fabricationshop, but his heart was in the tiny garage behind the family home in frigidFridley, Minn.

Johnson made his first foray into Pro Stock in 1971 with a Camaro that he haddriven home from a dealership and stripped in his driveway. He towed his homebuiltrace car to Indianapolis, qualified 28th in the 32-car U.S. Nationals field, andwas promptly defeated in the first round of eliminations.

That experience taught "the Professor" the value of patience and persistence.Eleven years later, Johnson finally won his first national event. Another decadeelapsed before he won his first Winston championship. It was a deliberate,thoughtful process for Johnson to gather the equipment, the resources, and theknowledge to become a champion.

At first, Johnson financed his fledgling racing operation by building engines forrival racers. Campaigning an evil-handling big-block Vega on poorly prepared trackseducated Johnson in the fine art of high-speed driving. In 1975 and at age 32,Johnson made the life-changing decision to become a professional drag racer. It wasa bare-bones family business: Warren, Arlene, and Kurt slept in their truck andtook showers in friends' hotel rooms.

"My plan was to start at the bottom and work my way up," Johnson remembers. "Wehad no sponsorship money, absolutely nothing. In retrospect, I had no choice but tomake it work."

Warren did make it work, finishing as runner-up in the 1976 Winston championshipwith a Camaro he later christened "The Incredible Hulk" after it logged nearly3,000 runs in six seasons of hard racing. He finished fifth in the standings in1977 and seventh in 1978, but he was still winless on the national event tour.

Johnson took a sabbatical from NHRA competition from 1979 to 1981. During these"lost years," Warren won back-to-back IHRA Pro Stock championships and barnstormedhis big-block Camaro on the match racing circuit, where he perfected his racecraft.

"You have to understand how to win; winning doesn't happen by accident," heexplains. "I needed to learn how to race."

The Johnson family migrated to Georgia in 1981 to take advantage of the South'syear-round racing weather. When NHRA replaced its complex system of Pro Stockweight breaks with a straightforward 500-cid, 2,350-pound formula at the start ofthe 1982 season, W.J. returned with a vengeance.

Johnson scored his first NHRA national event victory at the 1982 Summernationalsin Englishtown, defeating reigning champion Lee Shepherd in the final round. Oncehe tasted victory, Johnson's appetite for winning became insatiable. He has won atleast one national event for 20 consecutive years - the longest active winningstreak in NHRA drag racing.

Johnson utterly dominated Pro Stock in the 1990s, winning championships in 1992,1993, 1995, 1998, and 1999. When he didn't win the championship, he finished secondor third. He won 30 percent of the races and appeared in 44 percent of the finalrounds. He claimed four consecutive U.S. Nationals crowns from 1992 to 1995 andended the decade with his sixth career Indy title in 1999. W.J. reached dragracing's last great milestone with his barrier-breaking 200-mph run in April 1997,and in 1999 he made history again by running the top speed at every event on thecalendar.

Mechanical wizardry and technical innovation are the hallmarks of Johnson'scareer. He introduced the Funny Car-style roll cage to Pro Stock and perfected thefive-speed planetary transmission, but internal combustion has always been W.J.'sspecialty. He still prepares the cylinder heads and intake manifolds for hisrecord-setting engines.

When Oldsmobile engineers launched a serious drag racing program to showcase theresurrected Hurst/Oldsmobile in 1983, W.J. was the man they called. Johnsonreworked the venerable big-block Chevrolet V-8 to create a purpose-builtpowerplant: the invincible Drag Race Competition Engine (DRCE). After nearly 20years, the Johnson-designed DRCE remains the foundation of GM's Pro Stock engineprogram.

"The Professor's" most successful student is his son, Kurt, a 22-time nationalevent winner and the first Pro Stock driver to run a six-second elapsed time.Arlene has stood by her man for 39 years, and she is the thread that binds thetightly knit family enterprise.

With a sixth championship in sight, W.J. shows no sign of slowing down. Hedismisses talk of retirement: "I enjoy what I'm doing," he declares. "I'm havingmore fun than one person should be allowed to have."