In an effort to clarify his position about his 2010 outlook, reigning Funny Car champion Cruz Pedregon said, "I have every intention of racing not only next year but beyond that. Our team, we've all worked hard at building something. But the economy is going to dictate that," he said. "My intentions are to come back and race for years to come, but there is no guarantee for any of us. My intentions have never wavered. From one year to the next, everything is subject to be looked upon by scenarios that are out of my control."

In an effort to clarify his position about his 2010 outlook, reigning Funny Car champion Cruz Pedregon said, "I have every intention of racing not only next year but beyond that. Our team, we've all worked hard at building something. But the economy is going to dictate that," he said. "My intentions are to come back and race for years to come, but there is no guarantee for any of us. My intentions have never wavered. From one year to the next, everything is subject to be looked upon by scenarios that are out of my control."
 
"The reality is that people are losing their jobs daily. Hopefully we've seen the worst of it (the economic downward spiral).  I hope the worst is behind us," he said.
 
Pedregon said his smaller, leaner-budgeted operation doesn't allow much sponsorship-procurement activity. "We don't have the infrastructure these other teams do. Unfortunately I haven't been exposed to as many alternative resources," he said. "I need to shift in (marketing) gear. It's just so hard when you try to race for a championship, then you try to stay in the championship, then you miss the championship cut, and now we're just trying to win some races and salvage the year. Time has not been on our side to do other things.
 
He saw a positive side to the situation, too. "For NHRA as a whole and auto racing as a whole, I think some good things are going to come out of this," Pedregon said. "Yeah, we've lost some good, young talent in drag racing . . . But for the most part, the NHRA is reaching out and doing what they can for teams. We still draw the numbers. We're still on TV. We have all these things going for us. We need more companies to look this way. All these fans out here buy the products. We need the drivers we've lost -- we're barely filling the field.  We need each other out here, no matter what happens. We'll pull together. We'll all survive."    
 
Pedregon said he has "some meetings coming up."

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