"When you can have a turn out this huge it is great for the whole community of Brownsburg. The Brownsburg police department and fire department really helped us out and worked hard to keep the event organized and safe. The Ford car club people and hot rodders were great. There were people from all over the country here. I talked to a guy from Alaska. It was unbelievable," said John Force.

"When it goes this well and smooth and everybody is happy you know you did a good thing. I really want to thank Bill Estes Ford for helping us out. They are great partners and made the event special. It was a new event and we learned how to move the crowds through the shop. It went so smooth as slow as it was. Everybody understood that this was a first time opening. We had the new bridge open inside and people could walk across the top of the shop. It was just a great day, huge turn-out, the band was great, and we got to spend some time with our fans at the end signing autographs. It was exciting to see."

Inside the shop fans were treated to a full walking tour of the huge race shop facility staffed by John Force Racing employees and crew members who explained how various machines contributed to the success of the 14-time Funny Car world champion John Force. In addition to the various shop zones fans were able to visit the brand new JFR museum that included Ashley Force's Ronald McDonald House Charity Castrol GTX Funny Car as well as a number of John Force championship Castrol GTX funny cars. Spectacular photos chronicling the successes of all the team drivers covered the walls.

The new John Force RaceStation retail location had cash registers ringing all day as fans were able to pick up their favorite NHRA or John Force Racing t-shirt, die-cast or posters.

"The grand opening of the John Force RaceStation souvenir store was a huge success with thousands of people visiting the store. It was fun to watch the crowd buying up everything in sight," said Ashley Dougherty, RaceStation store manager.

The event wrapped up with all four John Force Racing funny car drivers signing autographs for nearly three hours. Originally scheduled to last one hour the autograph session expanded to make sure every fan had the opportunity to meet their favorite driver.

Finally, the big winners of the day were the Hendricks County Food Bank and Sheltering Wings. Fans donated over five pallets of food for the food bank and almost $1,900 was donated for Sheltering Wings.

"We have had a lot of success in California all summer gathering food for the Orange County Food Bank at our monthly car shows and we wanted to do something for our other 'home' here in Brownsburg. Our fans are the best when it comes to supporting the local charities and we were thrilled to be able to provide this level of support for the Hendricks County Food Bank and Sheltering Wings," said Craig Hoelzel, JFR event manager.

Courtesy of Elon Werner