Linsey Weenk In Front of Blue Thunder

 Linsey Weenk is completing his third season driving for the Ford backed Blue Thunder team on the Advance Auto Parts Monster Jam series and the native Canadian has proved to be a perfect fit for the most American of companies that you can think of. Weenk has delivered on the track for a corporate boss that takes its motorsports very seriously, and the popular superstar has proven to be a big hit for Ford off the track as well.

Talking with Weenk he made it clear to me that those other, non-racing functions that he is involved with for Ford have become real highlights for him. “The thing that I like most about running for Ford is the PR work that they have me do,” Weenk explained. “Don’t get me wrong. I love running the monster truck, I’ve been doing that for more years but I enjoy the PR work, some of the side things they’ve had me do like when I got to run the Ford Raptor. I got to do that with Greg Biffle. And they put me with Toby Keith when we unveiled the ‘09 F-150, so you get to run into Toby Keith, Justin McBride, guys like that. So it’s really  that stuff that most people don’t see that is really enjoyable. They treat you like a star there, they treat like you’re part of the family. That’s how Ford works, everyone is part of the family. Once you hit the road doing Ford things that’s definitely what you feel like, part of the family.”

There’s no doubt that bringing Weenk into the Blue Thunder camp has paid dividends for both manufacturer and the driver, and Linsey’s current status is just another chapter in an amazing story of one of the sport’s biggest superstars who never really saw himself in this role until it happened. Weenk’s start in the sport actually came about only because a sibling was forced to give up a seat. “I was playing Junior B Hockey in Saskatchewan and my older brother Kevin was driving Jurassic Attack for Don Frankish. His boy was born four months premature so he had to get out of the sport and he just talked it over with his boss and asked me if I wanted to come drive,” Weenk recounted. “I pretty much left right then for Alberta. I pretty much loaded the truck up by myself so I loaded up the truck and headed for San Diego. So I also learned how to drive semis at that time too. So I started driving Jurassic Attack after my brother Kevin, and then my brother Nathan drove the truck after I did, then he went to drive for Randy Brown. I drove Jurassic Attack for five years and then Jimmy Creten hired me. I drove Scarlet Bandit for awhile and  Bounty Hunter for about half a year, and then they got Iron Outlaw going, and that became my own truck.” And the rest, as they say, is history.

After his breakthrough performances for the 2Xtreme Racing team in Iron Outlaw Weenk got the coveted ride in the Built Ford Tough Blue Thunder in 2008, and has become one of the highest profile shoes for the Big Blue Oval Brigade.  He has continued to win, but since taking over Blue Thunder, Weenk has become a much more balanced performer. Known as a pure racer in Iron Outlaw, the Weenk that drives Blue Thunder still is a threat on the race course but has also become a freestyle winning pilot as well. With all the wins that have piled up in his decade as an Advance Auto Parts Monster Jam superstar I wondered what Linsey himself considers his biggest highlights. His answer included the moments that thrust onto the sport’s main stage, and another that got him featured in a Crash Madness video:  “One is my winning streak in Iron Outlaw, to go undefeated for that long during the first quarter of that season, that’s pretty memorable,” is how Weenk began to answer the question about what he would call his biggest highlights. “Because that was my first season meeting all of the big dogs.  That really jumped me up into what I would call the spotlight. The second is probably that crash in Orlando. That was such a unique moment. I remember going to hit that RV thinking that truck should just blow right through and as soon as I hit I could feel the front tires start to climb the side of the RV and I knew that I was probably in for it. It’s one of those things where you almost start to worry about your health conditions when that thing is coming down. Once it came down and landed and I was alright then I started thinking that at least that was a pretty cool highlight, some pretty cool footage, and if I’m not in trouble for wrecking the truck I should still have a job tomorrow.” His employment status remained secure.

One thing that even serious fans of Linsey Weenk and the Blue Thunder team may not be aware of is that if he hadn’t gotten the call from Frankish back in 2000 his Canadian fans might not like him as much, especially if they have a heavy gas pedal foot on Canada’s highways. “I was pretty much enrolled at RCMP (Royal Canadian Mounted Police) up in Canada before I started driving Outlaw,” Weenk admitted. “So I pretty much had my heart set on being a police officer, that along with farming, one of those two for sure. But yeah, I was already enrolled with the police department up in Canada before I started driving down here. You know it’s crazy what path life takes you down. And it’s not too late yet. I’d still like to pursue that at a later date but for now my heart’s here.” Luckily for fans of the Advance Auto Parts Monster Jam tour, and specifically those who cheer so loudly for the Built Ford Tough Blue Thunder, Linsey Weenk got his opportunity and fell in love with this sport before he could put on one of the most famous uniforms in all of Canada.