Rat
Nitro Member
- Joined
- May 14, 2007
- Messages
- 1,867
- Age
- 40
- Location
- Bay Shore, NY
The following is from my out of print book. I own all rights. Enjoy.
Todd Okuhara began his tuning career as an assistant crew chief working under great minds like Roland Leong and Ed McCulloch. He began his career as a crew chief in 2006 and he collected a win with driver Whit Bazemore. In 2007, he was Jack Beckman’s crew chief and Gary Scelzi’s toward the last half of the season and he tuned both cars to top 5 finishes, even getting Gary Scelzi into the countdown just missing a championship win. After a tough 2008, he switched to Top-Fuel in 2009 working with Phil Shuler and together they have become one of the toughest crew chief duos by 2012; winning won 11 times and challenging for every championship down to the wire. 2012 they find themselves in prime position for the championship, already having won 3 times; a championship is not far behind for Todd Okuhara.
PK: What does it take to be a successful crew chief in this class?
TO: You have to have the resources to obviously do what you wanna do and people, I think that’s the biggest thing, the people. The crew and how well they prepare the car, not just at the race track, but more importantly between races. The better your team is, you have more time to tune the car than to troubleshoot; that’s the most important part.
PK: Do you race the track or the opponent?
TO: I would say 95% of the time it would be the race track, but there’s times where you’re a little behind and your opponent has a little advantage you have to chase a little bit. Most of the time I just try to race the race track.
PK: How hard is it to run a 3.728? I was a witness to that pass and you could just tell it was a pass unlike all the others.
TO: You probably get those conditions 2 or 3 times a year and throughout the year I think about what I will do, what I will try, and if you’re in the position to do it. We were qualified real good before that run, so we went ahead and did thing we never done before and it worked. It’s something that you work on a lot, but don’t get a chance to do it a lot.
PK: Can you take me through what you do as a crew chief prior to a run?
TO: There’s weather conditions, track conditions, that you look at hours before a run and you kinda have to guessitmate what the conditions are gonna be like during the run and hopefully you have the setup for that. Most of the changes we make is probably 10-15 minutes before the run.
PK: Your dragster leaves aggressively, wheels up and is always exciting to watch. Does it affect the chassis at all?
TO: There’s always gonna be the fatigue fact in the chassis of our runs the more fatigued it gets, but these cars are built for that type of trauma I guess you can say. We have confidence in 200 runs a year that from the first run to the 200th run that it will be fairly close to being the same.
PK: Over the course of a weekend the goal is to make 8 passes down the strip. Outside of explosions and any major after run engine damage, what is the maximum expectancy of the parts you have to replace due to wear and what and when do you replace?
TO: Every part has specific number of runs that we put on it and no two parts are really the same. If we get 10-12 runs on a crankshaft that would be good, 6 runs on tires that would be good, we restriped the blower every 4 runs. It just depends on the part and everything has a run timeline.
PK: With the 3 Dragster’s that make up DSR’s Top-Fuel operation, what is the deal with the tune. Do you all write you own or does the team have a baseline that each crew chief adjusts how they see fit?
TO: Basically all ours cars have the same parts, but every car has a different personality. How the driver drives, does his burnout and stuff, and we have to take the into consideration; just do what basically our car tells us it wants. Bottom line we have to make these cars perform and Don’s (Schumacher) not gonna want to hear about why it just worked for their car and only their car went down the track, we have to do what the car tells us to.
PK: What is the cost of 1 pass?
TO: I say it’s close to 15,000 dollars a pass.
PK: The price to race in the sport's top class keeps rising and has almost kept the independent team out of racing completely. What do you see for the reason the costs have skyrocketed and what would you do to put a cap on or decrease the costs making it friendlier to small budget teams?
TO: I think if you tried to restrict these cars or put a cap on these cars, I actually think it would be more expensive. We put a specific number of runs on everything and if we ever had a cap, a budget on it where we had to get 2 more runs out of a crankshaft or tires, I think that it might save you a couple races here and a couple races there, but one big malfunction of parts would cost you more than that. I think first to run at the level that we wanna run, doing it the way we run is probably the most cost effective.
PK: I have to say that I do admire how you race heads up all the time against your teammates with no funny business. Is there ever any influence on how you tune based on how your car is running?
TO: For me, yeah. When there’s 2 DSR cars running and I know 1 car is gonna go past that round, I think yeah, you tend to be a little more aggressive with it because you still wanna beat your teammate, but you don’t feel so bad losing to them.
PK: Your talent puts you in a very elite class with only a handful of tuners who have been capable of running successful championship contending programs in Top-Fuel and Funny Car. Your career best in Funny Car for a quarter mile is 4.662/333.66, also the last quarter mile National E.T. and Speed Record, finishing 2nd in the points. In Top-Fuel, your best is a 3.728/332.18, the speed is a National Record, and a 2nd place finish. What class do you personally feel you understand and/or enjoy more?
TO: I like both classes, I tune the Dragster and I still have a hand in some of the Funny Car stuff out there. I like both, but there’s been some rule changes in Funny Car since I moved and I guess I’d be way more comfortable tuning the Dragster because I am doing that right now.
PK: Will you ever transition back to Funny Car and how much of a learning curve is it for you when you decide to switch classes?
TO: I hope I don’t have to switch, I’m happy where I’m at. The Top-Fuel car every race you learn something new, it’s comfortable because you learn one thing and okay what’s the next.
PK: How different is the frame of mind for a crew chief when you have a slow start that turns into almost overnight success in comparison to when you have a hard charging season from start to finish and what type of season do you find more welcoming to your habits?
TO: If you’re in the countdown you get to race the last 6 races, typically with the weather that time of year you go out there and you run your car hard. It’s pretty exciting then to go to races and have it be so hot you smoke the tires. I always told the guys we wanna be competitive during the year, try things, and hopefully by the time the countdown comes around we can just race for it.
PK: Do you feel that the sport is on a good path for the future ahead?
TO: If you look at the racing yes. There’s a lot of good quality cars out there, in my opinion it’s looking good right now.
PK: What are your feelings on the sport’s decision to move to 1000 feet?
TO: Fully support it. We’ve done a lot of research on it, how much safer it is, the cars shutting off at 1000 feet and what the speeds are at 1320 verses racing to 1320 and having to shut off after that. The most shutdown area, the more time for the driver to get the car under control and that’s a big plus.
PK: If the sport was to return to 1320 feet, what steps would you take in slowing these cars down to make sure that a quarter mile return was a safe return?
TO: I would think that going back to quarter mile from what we’ve seen is a mistake, it’s more dangerous with the shutdown and everything that we have. I don’t even think about stuff that would take us back to 1320, I think it’s safer now, I fully support that and I think that’s where we need to keep it.
PK: The move to 1000 feet turned back the clock on the incremental performance in Top-Fuel for a short time, but the E.T. record in 1000 feet is the quickest a dragster has been to 1000 feet in the history of the sport. Your tuned your driver, Spencer Massey to a 3.728 and could add up to being the first ever 4.3 second run. Saying that we will eventually hit 3.6 and 335 MPH in 1000 feet, is there any need for the NHRA to be concerned?
TO: I think when you talk about speeds anyone is gonna be concerned about it. For our job we’re supposed to think about how to make the cars run quicker, faster, better, will it ever get to that? I don’t know, but we went 3.72 and we already think we can go quicker yet. I’m sure the NHRA will be concerned about the speeds.
PK: The move to 1000 feet gave the sport an extra 320 foot window to slow down. If we stay the course with 1000 feet could the time ever come where the increase in performance for these cars ends up that they can begin to greatly diminish the extra 320 feet, thus drivers facing the same possibility of danger that they faced when it was 1320 feet?
TO: I guess it’s always possible, I think that the changes they made with the shutoff devices are huge. In 1000 feet you’re about high 200 at the 1320, where in 1320 feet I’ve seen drivers shut their motors off at 1600 feet. I think it’s safe for a while right now.
PK: Have you had any aspirations to drive?
TO: Not a fuel car no. I see the concepts put together, I don’t wanna drive it.
PK: Do you have any aspirations to be a crew chief, or own a team in another class?
TO: Hopefully I never have to be.
PK: What programs do you run in-house?
TO: I pretty much do all the blower dyno for all the teams here and that probably keeps you the busiest in the shop when I’m not tuning the race car.
PK: What is your favorite race track?
TO: I think Vegas is probably my favorite. Just being from Hawaii that’s the race where I can see a lot of my friends and family.
PK: What is your favorite track in each nitro class?
TO: The Same, Vegas.
PK: What win and single run mean more to you than all the others?
TO: I don’t really have one. I just go out there and try and do more.
Todd Okuhara began his tuning career as an assistant crew chief working under great minds like Roland Leong and Ed McCulloch. He began his career as a crew chief in 2006 and he collected a win with driver Whit Bazemore. In 2007, he was Jack Beckman’s crew chief and Gary Scelzi’s toward the last half of the season and he tuned both cars to top 5 finishes, even getting Gary Scelzi into the countdown just missing a championship win. After a tough 2008, he switched to Top-Fuel in 2009 working with Phil Shuler and together they have become one of the toughest crew chief duos by 2012; winning won 11 times and challenging for every championship down to the wire. 2012 they find themselves in prime position for the championship, already having won 3 times; a championship is not far behind for Todd Okuhara.
PK: What does it take to be a successful crew chief in this class?
TO: You have to have the resources to obviously do what you wanna do and people, I think that’s the biggest thing, the people. The crew and how well they prepare the car, not just at the race track, but more importantly between races. The better your team is, you have more time to tune the car than to troubleshoot; that’s the most important part.
PK: Do you race the track or the opponent?
TO: I would say 95% of the time it would be the race track, but there’s times where you’re a little behind and your opponent has a little advantage you have to chase a little bit. Most of the time I just try to race the race track.
PK: How hard is it to run a 3.728? I was a witness to that pass and you could just tell it was a pass unlike all the others.
TO: You probably get those conditions 2 or 3 times a year and throughout the year I think about what I will do, what I will try, and if you’re in the position to do it. We were qualified real good before that run, so we went ahead and did thing we never done before and it worked. It’s something that you work on a lot, but don’t get a chance to do it a lot.
PK: Can you take me through what you do as a crew chief prior to a run?
TO: There’s weather conditions, track conditions, that you look at hours before a run and you kinda have to guessitmate what the conditions are gonna be like during the run and hopefully you have the setup for that. Most of the changes we make is probably 10-15 minutes before the run.
PK: Your dragster leaves aggressively, wheels up and is always exciting to watch. Does it affect the chassis at all?
TO: There’s always gonna be the fatigue fact in the chassis of our runs the more fatigued it gets, but these cars are built for that type of trauma I guess you can say. We have confidence in 200 runs a year that from the first run to the 200th run that it will be fairly close to being the same.
PK: Over the course of a weekend the goal is to make 8 passes down the strip. Outside of explosions and any major after run engine damage, what is the maximum expectancy of the parts you have to replace due to wear and what and when do you replace?
TO: Every part has specific number of runs that we put on it and no two parts are really the same. If we get 10-12 runs on a crankshaft that would be good, 6 runs on tires that would be good, we restriped the blower every 4 runs. It just depends on the part and everything has a run timeline.
PK: With the 3 Dragster’s that make up DSR’s Top-Fuel operation, what is the deal with the tune. Do you all write you own or does the team have a baseline that each crew chief adjusts how they see fit?
TO: Basically all ours cars have the same parts, but every car has a different personality. How the driver drives, does his burnout and stuff, and we have to take the into consideration; just do what basically our car tells us it wants. Bottom line we have to make these cars perform and Don’s (Schumacher) not gonna want to hear about why it just worked for their car and only their car went down the track, we have to do what the car tells us to.
PK: What is the cost of 1 pass?
TO: I say it’s close to 15,000 dollars a pass.
PK: The price to race in the sport's top class keeps rising and has almost kept the independent team out of racing completely. What do you see for the reason the costs have skyrocketed and what would you do to put a cap on or decrease the costs making it friendlier to small budget teams?
TO: I think if you tried to restrict these cars or put a cap on these cars, I actually think it would be more expensive. We put a specific number of runs on everything and if we ever had a cap, a budget on it where we had to get 2 more runs out of a crankshaft or tires, I think that it might save you a couple races here and a couple races there, but one big malfunction of parts would cost you more than that. I think first to run at the level that we wanna run, doing it the way we run is probably the most cost effective.
PK: I have to say that I do admire how you race heads up all the time against your teammates with no funny business. Is there ever any influence on how you tune based on how your car is running?
TO: For me, yeah. When there’s 2 DSR cars running and I know 1 car is gonna go past that round, I think yeah, you tend to be a little more aggressive with it because you still wanna beat your teammate, but you don’t feel so bad losing to them.
PK: Your talent puts you in a very elite class with only a handful of tuners who have been capable of running successful championship contending programs in Top-Fuel and Funny Car. Your career best in Funny Car for a quarter mile is 4.662/333.66, also the last quarter mile National E.T. and Speed Record, finishing 2nd in the points. In Top-Fuel, your best is a 3.728/332.18, the speed is a National Record, and a 2nd place finish. What class do you personally feel you understand and/or enjoy more?
TO: I like both classes, I tune the Dragster and I still have a hand in some of the Funny Car stuff out there. I like both, but there’s been some rule changes in Funny Car since I moved and I guess I’d be way more comfortable tuning the Dragster because I am doing that right now.
PK: Will you ever transition back to Funny Car and how much of a learning curve is it for you when you decide to switch classes?
TO: I hope I don’t have to switch, I’m happy where I’m at. The Top-Fuel car every race you learn something new, it’s comfortable because you learn one thing and okay what’s the next.
PK: How different is the frame of mind for a crew chief when you have a slow start that turns into almost overnight success in comparison to when you have a hard charging season from start to finish and what type of season do you find more welcoming to your habits?
TO: If you’re in the countdown you get to race the last 6 races, typically with the weather that time of year you go out there and you run your car hard. It’s pretty exciting then to go to races and have it be so hot you smoke the tires. I always told the guys we wanna be competitive during the year, try things, and hopefully by the time the countdown comes around we can just race for it.
PK: Do you feel that the sport is on a good path for the future ahead?
TO: If you look at the racing yes. There’s a lot of good quality cars out there, in my opinion it’s looking good right now.
PK: What are your feelings on the sport’s decision to move to 1000 feet?
TO: Fully support it. We’ve done a lot of research on it, how much safer it is, the cars shutting off at 1000 feet and what the speeds are at 1320 verses racing to 1320 and having to shut off after that. The most shutdown area, the more time for the driver to get the car under control and that’s a big plus.
PK: If the sport was to return to 1320 feet, what steps would you take in slowing these cars down to make sure that a quarter mile return was a safe return?
TO: I would think that going back to quarter mile from what we’ve seen is a mistake, it’s more dangerous with the shutdown and everything that we have. I don’t even think about stuff that would take us back to 1320, I think it’s safer now, I fully support that and I think that’s where we need to keep it.
PK: The move to 1000 feet turned back the clock on the incremental performance in Top-Fuel for a short time, but the E.T. record in 1000 feet is the quickest a dragster has been to 1000 feet in the history of the sport. Your tuned your driver, Spencer Massey to a 3.728 and could add up to being the first ever 4.3 second run. Saying that we will eventually hit 3.6 and 335 MPH in 1000 feet, is there any need for the NHRA to be concerned?
TO: I think when you talk about speeds anyone is gonna be concerned about it. For our job we’re supposed to think about how to make the cars run quicker, faster, better, will it ever get to that? I don’t know, but we went 3.72 and we already think we can go quicker yet. I’m sure the NHRA will be concerned about the speeds.
PK: The move to 1000 feet gave the sport an extra 320 foot window to slow down. If we stay the course with 1000 feet could the time ever come where the increase in performance for these cars ends up that they can begin to greatly diminish the extra 320 feet, thus drivers facing the same possibility of danger that they faced when it was 1320 feet?
TO: I guess it’s always possible, I think that the changes they made with the shutoff devices are huge. In 1000 feet you’re about high 200 at the 1320, where in 1320 feet I’ve seen drivers shut their motors off at 1600 feet. I think it’s safe for a while right now.
PK: Have you had any aspirations to drive?
TO: Not a fuel car no. I see the concepts put together, I don’t wanna drive it.
PK: Do you have any aspirations to be a crew chief, or own a team in another class?
TO: Hopefully I never have to be.
PK: What programs do you run in-house?
TO: I pretty much do all the blower dyno for all the teams here and that probably keeps you the busiest in the shop when I’m not tuning the race car.
PK: What is your favorite race track?
TO: I think Vegas is probably my favorite. Just being from Hawaii that’s the race where I can see a lot of my friends and family.
PK: What is your favorite track in each nitro class?
TO: The Same, Vegas.
PK: What win and single run mean more to you than all the others?
TO: I don’t really have one. I just go out there and try and do more.
