¿Quién es Juan Mota? Who is Juan Mota?

Is drag racing's Mystery Man someone the Pedregon family knew in their earlier days in El Paso, Texas? Is he Cruz' Pedregon's imaginary childhood friend?

Right now, all we know is that "Juan Mota" is the Funny Car owner-driver's alter ego, the crew chief fans seem to expect him to have. He's the influence behind a shift in Funny Car power rankings.

¿Quién es Juan Mota? Who is Juan Mota?

Is drag racing's Mystery Man someone the Pedregon family knew in their earlier days in El Paso, Texas? Is he Cruz' Pedregon's imaginary childhood friend?

Right now, all we know is that "Juan Mota" is the Funny Car owner-driver's alter ego, the crew chief fans seem to expect him to have. He's the influence behind a shift in Funny Car power rankings.

When Pedregon earned his 32nd overall victory two weeks ago at Houston, he took over the Funny Car points lead, marking the first time in 79 events a driver not affiliated with either John Force Racing or Don Schumacher Racing has led the standings. That dates back to the 2009 season.

"There are some stats that have more meaning than others, and that one's a pretty good one there," Pedregon said.

Moreover, Pedregon needs just three victories to tie legend Don "The Snake" Prudhomme for fourth place on the class' all-time wins list. The Snap-on Toyota Camry privateer is Funny Car's first repeat winner this year, with three victories in the last seven races, counting the final event of the 2012 season.

He dominated the Houston race with the No. 1 qualifying position and low elapsed time and top speed of the meet, just two events after leading the field at Gainesville, Fla. He has qualified in the top five at five of the year's six races so far and is the only nitro driver this season to win at least one elimination round at every 2013 event.

According to Pedregon, who's awaiting Friday's resumption of the rain-postponed Summit Racing Equipment Southern Nationals at Atlanta Dragway, "Juan Mota" is the one who has kept him grounded.

After the live-TV exercise at Houston, Pedregon said, "I talked to my crew chief, Juan Mota, and he said, 'Don't worry about TV, man. We're out here, trying to race.' He's always thinking 'race car,' and I'm always thinking, 'We've got to do the PR, and we've got to do what's best for fans.' It's a good thing we have a good relationship [although] we butt heads now and then."

He said later, "I'm sure people are going to try to hire him. He said he's going to be loyal to me, so I'm not going to worry about it."

If it sounds like Cruz Pedregon has gone out of his mind, he hasn't. He's just having some fun, making a joke out of his decision to serve as his own crew chief -- something his rivals might not find all that amusing because it’s working.

Why did he choose the name Juan Mota?

"It goes way back," Pedregon said. "I can't really say, but let's just say it goes way back. There's something to it. One day I'll reveal where it came from. It's fun."

What's fun for Pedregon right now, in a pain-for-gain kind of way, is seeing his gamble to go without a crew chief pay off. While he is one of the few nitro-class drivers who has the skill set to assume a dual role with his team, he said that wasn't exactly premeditated.

"I didn't apply for that. I didn't necessarily go for that. In fact, when [Rahn] Tobler was here, I was perfectly fine with driving," he said. "I drove well that year and we won a championship. But there's only so many of those guys around. In this business, if you get hold of a good one, you'd better have the wherewithal to latch onto them or you're going to have journeymen guys. You're always going to be searching for that guy. It's the best thing that's happened to me ever is that I have the ability to do that.

"My team will be strong, regardless of who they try to hire out from under me," Pedregon said. "I don't like turnover, but I can't control that guy with a lot bigger budget who wants to hire certain guys. It worked out well for me. It's a lot of work, a lot of sleepless nights. But I wouldn't have it any other way."

He finished third in the standings last season with veteran tuner Lee Beard on board. But in the off-season, he and Beard parted ways. They're two strong personalities, certainly, but Pedregon said neither ego nor finances prompted the move. And he expressed amazement that the public made so much of their "divorce."

Said Predregon, "To be honest with you, it had nothing to do with the budget or the financial end of it at all. It had to do with what was best for the team moving forward. I felt like Lee was overqualified. He was a crew chief, and I didn't need a crew chief."

He said he told that to Beard coming into the operation and that Beard said Pedregon had motor issues he could solve.

"We were pretty hard on the motor. We blew it up a few times during the 2011 season," the driver admitted. "So we improved my motor program. And at the end of the (2012) season, we were kind of back to where we were in '11, when we finished third and challenged (for the title). We were two round-wins away from being champion in '11. So to say we were out looking for a crew chief, that's not even accurate.

"Lee came in. He was a good addition. He worked for a year, and that was the end of it," Pedregon said. "People made a bigger deal out of it than it was. If you have two different philosophies on running the car, it's like they say in the NFL: If you have two quarterbacks, you have none. If you have two crew chiefs, you have none. One guy needs to be at the helm, and that guy's me. We went back to not having any input from anybody this year, and the track record speaks for itself.

"We're still friends. It's all good," Pedregon said. "I didn't marry the guy. I just hired him for a year. So that was it. It's amazing how the public views it. It's like, man, did I marry this guy when I wasn't looking? I got a lot of flak over it."

However, Pedregon hasn't spent one second regretting the decision.

"I'll be honest. My car suffered, because I thought, 'Maybe there's a better way to do it than I'm doing it.' I kind of let Lee do some things he wanted to do and the car just didn't perform," he said. "When I figured, 'I got to reel the thing back in, I've got to be involved with every single facet,' that's when the car started to perform better. At the end of the day, it was really for the performance of the team, to be where it needed to be.

"I'd been around Funny Cars nonstop for 20-some years, and Lee -- and Lee will tell you this -- he's a dragster guy. That's his background," he said. "It works out good for everybody."

Beard is making strides as team manager at Rapisarda Autosport International, tuning the dragster for Larry Dixon and mentoring Rapisarda brothers Santo Jr. and Santino as crew chiefs. And Pedregon is humming along with his so-called "No-Name Crew."

They have names -- even nicknames, some of them. They're Chris "Warrior" Kullberg, the car chief; Todd Haas, assistant car chief and supercharger expert; Sterling Van Dusen, the clutch and wheels/tires man; Narciso "Nacho" Bravo, the bottom-end boss; Chris Abbott, who works on the short-block engines; Archie Singleton, the clutch and ignition go-to guy; Ethan Dooling, who services the cylinder heads; and Mike Rodriguez, who looks after the fuel, parachutes, and the body.

And Pedregon will put them up against any other Funny Car outfit in the National Hot Rod Association.

"These guys, I just have a good feeling about 'em," he said.

"People from the outside hear the name 'crew chief' and they think, 'Oh, my God, this guy is a big, important part of that thing.' But with my team, we have my guys and they're all the crew chief," he said. "They all have a role in how the car performs. To say that one guy is head and shoulders more important than the next guy, I don't subscribe to that theory. I believe that everybody that works on the car is important, not just one guy."

He said the Houston victory -- one which left him saying, 'I definitely feel the short-handedness of it. I was wore out. I was on adrenaline the last couple rounds" -- was especially gratifying to his crew.

"They were pumped about the Vegas win, but this one overall had more meaning for them," Pedregon said. "It was nice to enjoy the win with all the guys who worked hard, not that no one else works hard. But it was nice to get that win for the team."

That final round was a coup for the Funny Car independents. He faced Tim Wilkerson, who has been concerned his young and more inexperienced crew might have a tough time with the live-broadcast-caused short servicing windows. But Wilkerson's team, its one exceedingly weary, clutch-dust-covered team member held up on TV as proof, worked fabulously to get to the starting line first for the money round.

And Pedregon's "No-Name Crew" distinguished itself by having the car ready in about 30 minutes, then scrambling and succeeding at the last second to fix a sparkplug-wire snafu and hustle to the line.

"It was really nice to race Wilkerson [in the Houston final]," Pedregon said. "He's been around and won races and been in contention. Other than my brother in the final, it was nice to see an[other] independent making some noise."

He marveled at what his and Wilkerson's teams could accomplish, considering they aren't the giant machine that is JFR or DSR. Said Pedregon of the class' Goliaths, "Between the two teams, they have 11 cars or something crazy like that."

That's something Pedregon isn't going to change, so he isn't going to waste time thinking about it. After all, Juan Mota keeps telling him, "Don't worry about it, man. We're out here, trying to race." And he is confident he has the crew, the car, the experience, and the skills to win a third Funny Car series championship.

"They're pumped up," he said of the Snap-on Toyota Camry crew, who have proven they aren't afraid of hard work.

"That's what it's going to take," Pedregon said. "I told them -- and they know this, [because] some of them have been around awhile -- "It doesn't get any easier. It's up to us how hard we're willing to work, how many hours are we willing to put into this? It takes a lot. There's guys out there who have more staff, more people that are putting in the hours. So if we want to keep doing this, we're going to have to put in the time, and they understand that.

"I know from experience I've had my doors blown off plenty of times, whether it be [when I was] thinking about the last race or -- I just know from my experience you have to be relentless, because that's what the other guys are going to do," he said. "You not only have to match it, but you have to exceed it."

It sounds like a tall order to fill, but it really isn't for Pedregon.

"We have a good car. If we take care of it, it will take care of us," he said. "The car has been fast on fast tracks. We have to be there for the car, because it wants to run and perform. We need to make sure we all do our jobs."

This is his Camry from last year. He said the team didn't make a lot of changes in the off-season, rather "just freshened things a bit." He said, "We do have a new car that's in the trailer that has two runs on it. At some point we may run it on a Monday, then after the [Western] Swing or something, we may put it into service to see how it performs. I'm not a real big believer in that the chassis makes the difference. It's a combination. It's your set-up. It's the engine and the clutch set-up that makes our car run."

Wisely, Pedregon said, "At this point, I don't see a need to change our car. We'll keep track of how many runs we put on it, and if we feel a need to change in the middle of the year, we'll do that. I like to run all my equipment. I do a lot of things different than most crew chiefs. We don't fall in love with one supercharger. If we have three in the trailer we run all three.

"See, the problem with falling in love with equipment is what to do you when you don't have them," he said. "That's why I don't believe in lane choice. What happens if you don't have it? Might as well just stay in the trailer.

"I believe in taking away all the excuses, make the best decisions you can, and win, lose, or draw, it comes down to: Did we make the right decision? Did everybody do their jobs?" he said. "I don't feel we've made every round perfect. I think we still have some improving to do. Hopefully we can continue to do better."

Lest anyone think Pedregon is signaling even the slightest crisis of confidence, nothing could be further from the truth. Take, for example, his remark immediately after winning at Houston: "I'm not myself. I'm humble. Well, maybe not humble -- I'm just tired."

With this past weekend's washout at Atlanta, Pedregon and his crew have had even more time to recharge. And Juan Mota will keep Cruz Pedregon focused.

All articles and photography published in CompetitionPlus.com are protected by United States of America and International copyright laws unless mentioned otherwise. The content on this website is intended for the private use of the reader and may not be published or reposted in any form without the prior written consent of CompetitionPlus.com.