Fri, 7 Mar 2003, 06:53 PM His Car Is Running Like A Fine Tuned, Alpha, Omega, Swiss Watch!!

By Bob Frey Photo copyright 2003 Auto Imagery, Inc.

Randy Jones celebrates win in '98.

Randy Jones began the 2003 drag racing season exactly the way that he had planned it, with a win at the K & N Filters Winternationals. Jones, who is the owner of Alpha, Omega, Swiss, a California company that manufactures parts for Hewlett- Packard printers, as well as parts for several medical and dental companies, drove his brand new 2003 Chevrolet Cavalier to the win over Brandon Huhtala to add the ’03 season opener to his win at the same race in 1998.  Throw in a runner-up finish to David Rampy in Houston in 1997 and you have a pretty impressive record for a guy who only races part time. “My business keeps me really busy,” Randy said, “and it means that I have to limit the number of races at which I can compete.” This year, in fact, Randy plans to run a schedule of Division 7 races along with a select few national events. Of course, after the great start that he’s off to, that schedule could always be subject to change.

Randy, who is forty-eight years old, isn’t like a lot of racers, that is, he didn’t grow up around the sport and he hasn’t been involved with drag racing for most of his life. He initially got involved by sponsoring a car a few years ago and then, after watching it compete at a couple of races, he was hooked. “I guess, like everyone, once I saw how exciting it was, I said ‘I’ve got to try that’ and I wanted to drive.” Now that the itch was there, Randy had to find a car, and he had his sights set on a good one. “I watched Todd Paterson run with his car and I knew that was the one that I wanted,” he said. And, sure enough, that was the one he got. “I followed him around and kept hounding him,” Randy said with a smile,” and finally I bought the car.”

Randy took delivery of the car, the C/A Pontiac Formula that Todd had raced, after the last national event in 1995, and, now that he had a vehicle, he decided that he better learn how to drive it. “I went to the Roy Hill Drag Racing School and the first time I made a run in the car it scared me to death and I thought that I’d made a huge mistake,” Randy said with a smile. Well, people who run very successful businesses don’t often make big mistakes, and after a few tries, and after a little help from Gary Pearman (with Roy’s school) and Randy’s crew chief, Han Mogensen, he got comfortable behind the wheel. Of course, when he almost ran into the wall at Pomona in his very first race, even he had to admit that he began to have second, no, make that third thoughts about this drag racing career. Persistence paid off for Randy, however, and soon he began to be a regular fixture in the Competition Eliminator field as well as in the late rounds of eliminations. He lost to David Rampy in his first national event final round in 1997, and then won the ’98 Winternationals to go along with several final rounds on the divisional level.

Any regular follower of the sport knows that the desire is always there in a racer to go faster, and, true to form, Randy wanted to move up the evolutionary ladder, and from the Comp class, the logical place to go is into Pro Stock. Randy bought an old Warren Johnson car and began his career in Pro Stock, and even though he didn’t hit a wall in the literal meaning of the word, he did hit one in the figurative sense. “We just couldn’t seem to make enough horsepower to get in the field,” he admitted. “And after few years of trying and not advancing I decided to hang it up.” Randy is very candid when he talks about his time in Pro Stock, admitting that it’s a lot tougher than he ever figured. “I admire the people in that class so much,” he said. “I know how long and hard we worked and we couldn’t break into the field. We had five engines and they all made about the same horsepower but it just wasn’t enough.” After almost two years of trying to be competitive in Pro Stock, Randy decided it was time to quit, so he sold everything and retired from the sport. That retirement didn’t last long!

Jones launches hard.

At the start of the 2001 season, Randy decided to go to the Winternationals to watch the races, after all, the sport had been a big part of his life for the past few years. “I thought I could back off, you know, just become a spectator, but it was tough watching the races,” he admitted. “I wasn’t a very good spectator.” So, just six weeks after selling his car and “retiring,” Randy Jones was back, not in Pro Stock, but in Competition Eliminator. Randy admitted that the first time he raced in the Comp category, he really didn’t have any idea about which particular class was the best for him, but this time around it was different. “I went to Gary Hansen and talked to him about which class would be best for me, and he suggested that I build a D/SM Cavalier and that’s what I did.” Randy had been friends with Gary for a while and, when he decided to return to the sport, he wanted a crew chief who had some experience and who knew his way around the class. “I picked Gary because he had been with drivers who had won three Competition Eliminator world titles and I needed that kind of experience of my team.”

Gary Hansen always has built some of the nicest machines in the country. A car builder by profession, and a classic car restorer in his spare time, he was with the late Jeff Krug in 1994 when he won the championship, and was an integral part of Andy Manna’s two Competition Eliminator title runs in 1997 & ’99. When Randy decided to get Gary’s help with his newest project, he also allowed Gary to select the perfect car and class for the assault. “I really didn’t have a clue when I bought my first car from Todd Patterson, but this time I actually investigated the classes and the indexes before ordering a car.” The investigative process has, obviously, been a success. “The car really looks like a stock Chevrolet Cavalier. It’s pretty neat, it even has the mirrors on it. Gary did a great job.” Add to that a 347 cubic inch engine built by another long time Comp standout, Johnny Johnston, and you have all of the ingredients for a winning car, and maybe even a championship one. The only thing that may prevent that is the schedule. Randy, who has been married to his wife, Melody, for twenty-nine years, has two sons, Brandon and Ben, and he said that he wants to stay a little closer to home this year than he did in the past.  To that end, he’ll run most, if not all of the Division 7 events and selected national meets in the western part of the country, and then, at the end of the year if a title is a possibility, he’ll see what races his work schedule and family obligations will allow him to enter.

Randy Jones opened the season just like he did in 1998, with a win at the Winternationals, but he’d like to finish a little stronger than he did that year when he finished third in the division and eighth nationally. His current car certainly is capable of taking him to the title and then, maybe, if everything falls into place, he’ll give that Pro Stock class another try. But for now, he’s happy being back behind the wheel, instead of behind the fences, because Randy Jones, like a lot of us, just doesn’t make a good spectator.

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