WOLFE OUT, ALLISON IN AT FORD RACING

[Get the latest "Truth With Speedzzter" here]

Bangshift.com and others are reporting that Brian Wolfe is out and former Ford Racing Performance Parts helmer Jaime Allison is in as the NEW BOSS at Ford Racing.

Here's FoMoCo's official statement about the change.

Here's TWS's initial reactions at Bangshift:

Revolving door leadership is not usually a positive sign for a business. Even more so when it involves a unit that some green-types and beancounters at Ford don't understand and probably believe is expendable.

But an MBA such as Allison hopefully can talk all the "business case" gibberish that the beancounters spread to oppose just about every fun or high-performance market initiative.

The tooling gig might not be so bad if Wolfe can "deliver tooling efficiencies" with vendors who are SEMA members (e.g. Edelbrock, Honeywell Garrett, TFS). What am I saying! It would totally suck compared to being the racing boss (even in a year as underbudgeted and dismal as 2009). Perhaps Wolfe has his eye on a bigger prize . . . .

A VP that's got a garage-full of drag cars and muscle would be a lot better than what's usually "run up the flagpole." We need more folks like Walter Hayes and fewer anti-fun, anti-motorsports hatchet people in charge at Ford.

Guys like Vince Piggins, Jon Moss, Dan Davis and Michael Kranefuss didn't really obey the "two-year rule" . . . . [The two-year rule is the conventional wisdom that says you've got to change jobs in an automaker every two years or your career is dead]

If I recall correctly, there was a passage in Frank Moriarty's book Iron Fist, Lead Foot: John Coletti and Ford's "Terminator" that taking one of the high-performance niche or racing boss jobs was considered a career killer, the two-year rule notwithstanding.

Best wishes to Brian and Jaime!

Now Mr. Allison, about entering some Coyote V8s in the Car Craft Engine Swap Drags . . . . (see yesterday's post)