Dickie Venables understands his newly appointed role to tune Don Schumacher Racing driver Matt Hagan's Funny Car presents an incredible opportunity.

“I’m extremely excited about it without a doubt,” said Venables in a phone interview. “It is an excellent opportunity to be able to join a team of this magnitude that has as many resources that DSR has. They have everything you need to get the job done.”

Venables will make his debut as Hagan’s crew chief at NHRA’s season-opening Winternationals Feb. 14-17 in Pomona, Calif.

This actually will be Venables second stint at DSR as he served as an assistant crew chief to Rob Wendland, Johnny Gray’s Funny Car crew chief, from July of 2011 to the end of that season.

“I’m really excited to be back (at DSR) and working with Matt, no doubt,” Venables said. “Matt and I have spoken and he seems like a great guy. Obviously Matt does a good job behind the wheel since he won a championship (in 2011). We are both really excited and really looking forward to the year.”

Dickie Venables understands his newly appointed role to tune Don Schumacher Racing driver Matt Hagan's Funny Car presents an incredible opportunity.

“I’m extremely excited about it without a doubt,” said Venables in a phone interview. “It is an excellent opportunity to be able to join a team of this magnitude that has as many resources that DSR has. They have everything you need to get the job done.”

Venables will make his debut as Hagan’s crew chief at NHRA’s season-opening Winternationals Feb. 14-17 in Pomona, Calif.

This actually will be Venables second stint at DSR as he served as an assistant crew chief to Rob Wendland, Johnny Gray’s Funny Car crew chief, from July of 2011 to the end of that season.

“I’m really excited to be back (at DSR) and working with Matt, no doubt,” Venables said. “Matt and I have spoken and he seems like a great guy. Obviously Matt does a good job behind the wheel since he won a championship (in 2011). We are both really excited and really looking forward to the year.”

Venables has since been with John Force Racing and then last season he joined Bob Tasca’s nitro Funny Car team and he served as Tasca’s crew chief from the fall Las Vegas race (March 30-April 1) until before the third qualifying session of the Mac Tools U.S. Nationals at Indianapolis Sept. 1 when he and Tasca mutually parted ways.

A crew chief position came open at DSR for Hagan’s team when Tommy DeLago rejoined Kalitta Motorsports in late November as the crew chief for the Tequila Patrón Toyota Camry Funny Car driven by Alexis DeJoria.

DeLago worked as a crew chief at DSR from 2008-2012. DeLago was the crew chief for Jack Beckman in 2008 and was the crew chief for Hagan the last four years.

“It was a welcome phone call from Don (Schumacher) and I have been really excited and looking forward to it ever since,” Venables said about the call he received a couple of days ago.

Venables was the crew chief for Tony Pedregon when Pedregon captured the 2007 NHRA nitro Funny Car world championship.

Although Venables just joined DSR again this week, Hagan’s Funny Car is up to speed since Hagan tested it at Palm Beach (Fla.) International Raceway earlier this month.

“The car was there and was tested and ran very well,” Venables said. “Todd Okuhara and Phil Shuler and their guys from (DSR’s) dragster team were running it. I’m really looking forward to working closely with Todd Okuhara. I’m going to be looking his direction certainly until we can get things rolling. The car has been tested and is proven and it ran some very good elapsed times and speeds. There is an opportunity in Las Vegas (before the Winternationals) to go and test and we talked about that, but since the car ran so well in testing (at PBIR) we figured the best thing would be to go right to Pomona. I’m in the process now of filling a couple of positions as far as crew members and we are putting all our efforts towards being ready to go in Pomona.”

Venables already is setting high goals for 2013 for he and Hagan. Hagan finished 11th last season.

“The first order of business with the Countdown system you definitely want to be one of the 10 cars that is in that and is able to run for the championship,” Venables said. “I also do not want to just be in it, our goal is to be at the top when the Countdown starts. I have to believe if we are in the game, we have as good a chance as anybody to win the championship. That’s our goal to win the championship. That’s what Don Schumacher expects and I do not see any reason why we will not be able to be a strong contender.”  

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