Year Two Will Be Another Big Step Forward For Nicole Johnson

By Scott Douglass
Nov 22, 2011

The crop of rookie drivers who made major impacts during 2011 in Advance Auto Parts Monster Jam® has to make this year’s freshman class one of the best group of newcomers that we have ever seen enter the sport during any given calendar year.  One of those extremely talented newcomers is Nicole Johnson who is making her plans for even greater things in 2012.

Jumping into the Tasmanian Devil truck at the start of this year Johnson showed quickly that she has what it takes to be a major player in the sport. Competing almost exclusively in arena events during her debut season Johnson quickly began scoring wins against her more experienced competition. She was one of the finalists for the highly competitive 2011 Rookie of the Year Award and just last weekend Johnson was honored as the winner of the Rising Star: Driver Award at the annual Fleet Summit populated by many of the sport’s premier drivers and top Crew Chiefs. I got to spend some time with Johnson there and I asked her to reflect on year one in her budding Advance Auto Parts Monster Jam career. “I think that the first year was a lot of learning the ropes,” the native of Ventura County, California explained. “Knowing what the rules are, getting used to how big your truck is physically, where you’re at on the track, how the format works. When you are in the driver’s seat it is a lot different than when you are in the stands. A lot of it for me was just figuring out how this well-oiled machine works. Now I feel like I have a little bit of a running start coming into this next year and I’m really grateful for the chance to have some really cool stadium shows (on the schedule for the upcoming year). I’m kind of glad that I didn’t get those in 2011 because I might not have been ready, but now I feel like I’m there, I’m ready. I’m going to attack it.” Getting to compete in some of the sport’s major stadium events in the New Year is proof positive of how quickly she has made big impressions in this sport.

Right off the bat Johnson grabbed some event victories, putting in performances driving the Tasmanian Devil that quickly turned lots of heads, and the mother of two sons who now calls the Las Vegas area home says that what makes winning even sweeter is the incredible response that she has received from the fans. “It’s really satisfying to have that instant feedback on the track from the crowd, from the fans” Nicole continued. “That makes you feel like you belong, like you are supposed to be out there. I think that the most satisfying part is realizing that I can hang with the big boys that I was up against, that I belong here.”

The attractive, physically fit, health conscious Johnson brings a positive message to each event that she’s at both on the track and during pit parties and autograph sessions, especially for the sport’s young fans. That interaction with the fans has made it clear to her that she is a role model, especially for many young girls who love the sport and want to excel in motorsports themselves. “Oh absolutely, and I even saw that in my rock crawling background,” Johnson told me. “The people that I saw get the most excited were the 11 and 12 year old girls and their moms because those moms have been trying to tell their girls that they can do anything, it’s okay, that those girls can go up against the boys in either sports or academics. Throughout my career I’ve gotten a lot of feedback from women and young girls but it’s also cute when a ten year old boy comes up and asks me for my phone number! That’s really cute.” Along with winning every event that she can Nicole sees showing kids the benefits of a positive attitude and a healthy lifestyle as one of her main missions in motorsports.

Heading into her sophomore season with an extremely challenging schedule in front of her Johnson seems to be really excited about getting a big chance to make an even stronger impression in year two of her monster career. Make no mistake about it, lots of eyes are going to be watching her progress this year and many expect big things, especially because she has found immediate success in the sport and adapted to driving a 10,000 pound, 1,500 horsepower machine so quickly. “I’m not trying to say that this is easy because it’s not, there’s a lot to learn, but honestly I felt really comfortable in my truck right off the bat” Johnson recalled. “I think because I came from a background of being on extreme terrain where those cars are not stable, where the car is always at an angle or you are on some kind of an incline, sometimes even just hammering down to jump over a rock, it feels really similar. So I don’t feel like it is that far of a transition. I think that rock crawling is a really good back ground for Monster Jam, meaning the extreme competition side of rock crawling. The extreme stuff that I was forced to do in rock crawling competition I think has turned out to be an excellent background for this.”

It does seem that her past motorsports experiences have helped her transition into Advance Auto Parts Monster Jam smoothly and impressively. She made lots of fans and impressed many in the sport during her rookie campaign and it would seem that the sky is the limit for her, so expect big, big things from Nicole Johnson as she takes on an ambitious schedule for the Tasmanian Devil team in year two of her Advance Auto Parts Monster Jam journey.