Dick Johnson Racing year’s getting better and better

Jim Beam Racing finds itself leading the V8 Supercar Championship after four straight wins for young charge James Courtney. We spoke to Team Principal Dick Johnson about the team’s success, it’s involvement with Ford and the new regulations.

TcT: The teams had a great run in the last few rounds, winning the last four races at Ipswich and Winton. What’s brought about this increase in performance?

“It’s not any one thing, I think it’s very much a combination of everything. It’s not any one thing that wins races, it’s having everything work for you at the one time.”

“It’s taken a while for James to settle in, where in the past I don’t think he’s had the confidence he’s had in the people around him, but now he has…and the guy has really stepped up to the mark.”

“Besides that, the cars are just getting better and better.”

TcT: The new sprint tyre format has been given by some areas as the key factor in Courtney’s success, how much do you think it’s down to the tyres, or down to the team?

“It’s (the tyre) improved everyone to be quite honest, it just gives the car a lot more flexibility, and because the degradation of the tyre is much greater than the older tyre, it allows people to pass depending on when they stop and change their tyres; ’cos the races are reasonably long, and long enough for the tyres to start deteriorating, so you get different speeds throughout the event, and it’s a matter of managing that as well; and I think that our guys that have managed the pit-stops extremely well indeed.”

TcT: Do you think Whincup, after a bit of a blip will turn it around and be the main threat, or do you think Tander & Lowdnes are the ones to worry about after their recent charge?

“Well it come from any of those guys, and to be quite honest it’s probably a little disappointing that we’re missing the Perth race…because when you’ve got people on the back foot, they tend to make decisions that aren’t right, but unfortunately we’re sort of giving the time to regroup a bit.”

“In saying that, I think it’s also given us time to be able to develop more things, now that they’ve changed the god damn camshaft in the car to a control camshaft, which has thrown another spanner in the works for everyone, and one will just to wait and see how it all pans out in two weeks time in up in Darwin.”

James Courtney and Dick Johnson celebrating a win at Winton

TcT: You’ve got a habit of developing front running drivers, such as Will Davison who’s now at HRT, and now James Courtney – who do you rate as other potential front runners?

“I think the guy that’s starting to show his maturity at the moment is Van Gisbergen from the Stone Brothers, it’s starting to come along fairly well. There are a couple of eyes down he back, but as I say until such time as you put them in equipment that’s capable of doing the job, it’s going to be very difficult to progress these guys. It’s a matter of having all the things working for you at the one time, and some of those guys down the back just haven’t got those bits and pieces.”

TcT: The Gold Coast Round this year has an international flavour – with former Champcar champion Sebastien Bourdais, and two-time Indycar and Indy 500 winner Dario Franchitti joining your team – how do you think they’ll find it jumping from a single seater racing car into the Ford Falcon?

“Make no mistake, these are very difficult cars to drive, irrespective of what you’ve driven in the past, they’re a completely different animal to anything else, and I think that’s been proved over time even when a lot of the European guys have come out here; and it’s really taken them the whole race like at Bathurst, and the Sandown come Philip Island races to get their head round the cars.”

“They are difficult things to drive because of the weight of them, and the tyre size and the brake size and things like that, I don’t think it’s a real good learning ground to be on the Gold Coast track to be quite honest for some of these guys that haven’t driven these cars before, we’ll wait and see how it all pans out but I hope it doesn’t spoil ones championship hopes.”

Steven Johnson in the famous No.17 Ford Falcon

TcT: At the famous Bathurst 1000km race, there are new rules in this year preventing teams from doubling up it’s full time drivers in one car anymore. Do you think these rules will benefit you this year?

“I think all this has done has created a bit of a coup for the guys that are half alright, to be able to come in and demand a fairly significant hand out to run a couple of races, where in the past I think having a real good chance for the second car with two really good guys in it, was always a chance.”

“I think everyone’s in the same boat, it’s obvious that some people are going to fare better than others, but with the way the races have been going in recent years, obviously the lead driver of the car will be doing the majority of the work, so one would hope that the safety car’s and that will take care of any deficit in laptimes in the second driver.”

TcT: Chris Strying, Ford Australia’s Motorsport Manager has said they may be rethinking the allocation of funds amongst the Ford teams next year. Last year, your team was the top finishing Ford team after Triple Eight switched to Holden, and Ford are back with you this year– are you hoping the allocation will favour your team next year if the results continue?

“Oh, one would hope so, I’ve been with Ford for many many years, I’m a very loyal supporter of Ford and have been since the early 70’s. I think for us to jump ship would be commercial suicide, not only for us but for Ford as well, so we intend to be in the Ford group for the rest of our careers. One would hope they see the advantage in what we can offer them.”

“We’ve won five championships and three Bathurst’s under the Ford banner, which I think is probably more than any other Ford team has ever done.”

TcT: So with the car of the future potentially encouraging more manufacturers, there’s no chance that DJR would ever be running under a different badge?

“No, I’d suggest we’d be with Ford forever and a day.”

“I’m not a great supporter of the car of the future, I think if it aint broke, don’t fix it, I don’t think there’s a real problem with what we currently have, and as far as other manufacturers go, the last thing I want to see is our championship or our category which has been developed over many years ending up like 2 litre cars did many years ago when all the manufacturers pulled out, and there was nothing left.”

“At the end of the day, we’ve got to be very mindful of the drama’s other categories have gone through when they get themselves into a situation where it’s basically controlled by manufacturers, and that I would not like to see.”

“I can’t see what benefit it would be for BMW or Mercedes or one of those type manufacturers to get blown of the face of the earth by a common old Ford or Holden.”