T.J. Zizzo will make his Torco Pro Nitro Top Fuel season debut at the Motor City Nationals in Milan, but his opinions and aspirations are already in mid-season form.

Zizzo has yet to compete this season after finishing second in IHRA Top Fuel points standings last year. He fell 41 points shy of Bruce Litton, who won the title, but his bank account was much further behind than his season points total. Zizzo is a case study in how a sponsorship can go very, very wrong.

He headed into the 2007 season as one of the favorites to compete for the World Championship. He had a new sponsorship with the now-defunct Race News Magazine and things seemed to be headed in the right direction…but things were not as they seemed. The sponsorship soon started to crumble and, by midseason, had completely fell apart leaving Zizzo and his race team with a stack of unpaid bills and an uncertain future. It was a situation Zizzo is still trying to fight his way out of…even to this day.




T.J. Zizzo will make his Torco Pro Nitro Top Fuel season debut at the Motor City Nationals in Milan, but his opinions and aspirations are already in mid-season form.

Zizzo has yet to compete this season after finishing second in IHRA Top Fuel points standings last year. He fell 41 points shy of Bruce Litton, who won the title, but his bank account was much further behind than his season points total. Zizzo is a case study in how a sponsorship can go very, very wrong.

He headed into the 2007 season as one of the favorites to compete for the World Championship. He had a new sponsorship with the now-defunct Race News Magazine and things seemed to be headed in the right direction…but things were not as they seemed. The sponsorship soon started to crumble and, by midseason, had completely fell apart leaving Zizzo and his race team with a stack of unpaid bills and an uncertain future. It was a situation Zizzo is still trying to fight his way out of…even to this day.

“$282,500,” Zizzo said without hesitation when asked how much the unfulfilled sponsorship cost his race team. “On top of that we’ll throw in $100,000, possibly more, of IHRA money if we would have had money to race with last year. Maybe we would have won a championship, but that’s a big ‘if.’ But I look at it as between a $300,000 to $400,000 setback.”

A new approach was needed.

“We were financially embarrassed last year, and we really had to get back to running things like a business,” Zizzo said. “This is a business. Our ego has been in the way for many, many years and we had to stop, look at things financially and decide to run things as a business. If we don’t start running it like a business Zizzo Racing will be extinct.”

When the Race News deal completely fell through Zizzo did not pack it in. In fact, his entire operation moved forward towards what he hoped would be his first career world championship. Peak Antifreeze provided some late-season support but his bid would fall just short. He entered the IHRA World Finals in Rockingham #1 in the points chase. After a first-round loss Bruce Litton would get around him in the points and plucked the title away. How long did it take for Zizzo to get over the disappointment?

“It didn’t take me any time at all to get over it,” he said. “In this sport you get knocked around, and if you can’t understand that it’s probably time for you to quit. You have to understand you are going to get knocked in the jaw, you’re gonna hit the mat…but you have to stand back up and go after it again. That’s what we as drag racers do. If you can’t understand that, walk away.”

After the 2007 season Zizzo worked feverishly to secure a new, stable sponsor for the 2008 season. Though nothing came to pass he does not look at this off-season as a waste. In fact, Zizzo thinks his team learned a few things about themselves that will translate to on-track success.

“We learned a lot over the wintertime, and we were not thorough enough last year on many different aspects with that engine,” he said. “This year we’re coming back with better tooling, better thoughts and more time spent on the details. It just boils down to being a team that, at the end of the season, being all-volunteer we were worn to the nub. That’s what going after a championship is all about. We learned a lot, we learned more last season than we ever could have expected. And if we ever choose to go after a championship again we have learned enough to allow us to do that in the future. Going after that championship was the experience of a lifetime, it was something we’ve always wanted to do and we would love to have that opportunity again. But we had to stop, regroup and get back to running things as a business.”

Now his off-season is over. Zizzo plans on running six total events in 2008. He will drive at the IHRA Motor City Nationals as well as the Northern Nationals in Martin, Mich. He also will compete in two NHRA events and has two match races scheduled. Zizzo is looking forward to getting the party started.

T.J. Zizzo is looking forward to getting back in the driver's seat

“I’m excited to go drag racing, period,” he said. “We’ve had some time off, which we’ve never had this much time off at the beginning of any season, so I’ve been twiddling my thumbs, watching it on television and tuning in on the Internet here and there. It breaks my heart to not be out there but, financially, I had to make the right decision.”

With the rush that comes with driving an 8,000 horsepower Top Fueler down the track, you would think that shot of adrenaline is what Zizzo has missed the most about competing in the Top Fuel ranks. This is not the case.

“Interacting with the fans is something I am good at and it’s something I enjoy,” he said. “Without the fans we wouldn’t be there anyway and interacting with them is what I’ve missed the most. It’s difficult to explain, sometimes it’s not going down the race track that gives you the high, its putting the smiles on people’s faces. That’s what I’ve missed.”

“I also really miss the camaraderie with the other drivers,” Zizzo continued. “That’s what drag racing has more of than NASCAR, IRL or any other major form of motor sports. Drag racers are truly a family.”

Now that he is ready to race, Zizzo has definite goals in place. He has watched as Spencer Massey, the first-year Top Fuel driver, has claimed the first two national event victories of the season…Zizzo wants to do something about it.

“I look at someone like Spencer Massey, driving Mitch King’s car and winning two events and all I can say is it’s outright lucky,” Zizzo said when discussing the current IHRA Top Fuel points leader. “It really seems like he does a very good job of driving the race car, there is no doubt in my mind, but in this sport you have to be lucky, too. Its young guys like him that go out there and are hungry, but our intention is to go out there and kick his ass. That’s our intention… that’s what I want to do.

“My expectation is always to leave my house with enough parts and pieces to win the event. That’s what we want to do, that’s our goal. We want to go and pick up right where we left off last year, if not better because we’ve learned a lot over the winter. We’ve learned a lot about engine combinations and cylinder heads. We’ve learned about attention to detail. The attention to detail is something we thought we had but, to be perfectly honest, we overlooked a lot. You ask who T.J. Zizzo and Team Zizzo had trouble 50% of the time getting down the race track last year…it all boiled down to attention to detail.

“With Mike Kern back running the show and us paying attention to detail we should be able to get a handle on it. And if we get a handle on it everyone better watch out, because we’re coming.”

Zizzo wanted to thank the companies who have supported him in the past as well as this season, Peak Antifreeze, Herculiner Bedliners and O’Reilly Auto Parts

“If not for there companies we wouldn’t be out there this season, period,” he said. “It’s a tough gig and I learned the easy part of this sport is putting a team together and driving the race car. All that stuff is easy. The hardest part is finding those dollars and we’re very grateful to have great corporations in our corner.”