Christian Johaanes

"I don't have a problem with anyone out here, but if they have a problem with me, then that's their own business."

- Chris Johaanes, after his run-in with Adrien Devereux at the 2012 Round of England.

Christian Matthew Johaanes (born June 27, 1981), better known as Chris Johaanes, is an American race car driver currently competing in the TM Master Cup Series and ARLA Elite Series. He is known for his indifference to any controversy surrounding him and for his skills on short ovals.

Johaanes, the son of 2-time ARLA Elite Series champion Chuck Johaanes, has 2 championships himself in that series. He currently runs a partial ARLA schedule in addition to a full TM Master Cup Series schedule.

2001-2004
Johaanes made his ARLA debut at the age of 19 in 2001 alongside M&J Racing teammate and cousin Kevin Monroe. He won two races in his rookie campaign, but lost the Rookie of the Year honors to Monroe partly due to a streak of five DNFs resulting from overambitious driving, an unfortunate trait that Johaanes would have for most of his racing career. Many of Johaanes' competitors considered him to be a dangerous driver; Kurt Walker said of him halfway through the season, "The only reason he wins is because people let him by in fear of getting smashed".

2002 and 2003 were considerably cleaner for Johaanes. He made fewer overaggressive moves in this period, which regained him some respect. He also gained some respect by winning 3 races in both years, but he lost the championship to Ryan Baldwell and Kurt Walker respectively as a result of mechanical difficulties at Rockford twice in a row.

Johaanes finally captured the championship in 2004 after winning a staggering six out of the 18 races held that season. He only failed to finish three races, which helped him maintain his dominant lead for most of the year. 2004 is considered to be the height of Johaanes' success in ARLA.

2005-2009
Johaanes' momentum slowed down considerably after winning the 2004 title. However, the overall decline in M&J Racing's success is attributed to his lack of speed. Johaanes went winless in 2005, but he redeemed himself with a victory at Sonoma in 2006.

In 2007, Johaanes was picked up by Ian Cooper to drive his self-owned TM Master Cup car at Motegi. Johaanes drove a quiet and respectable race, and would go on to sign a contract with McCallister Motorsports for the following year.

In the summer of 2008, Johaanes, now racing full-time in Master Cup, started dating ARLA rookie Allie Riggs, who had picked up 2 victories that year herself. Johaanes' new relationship, in addition to his expanded career, may have been a factor in the burst of speed he had this season, as he picked up two wins and took the series title for the second time in his career. One of his wins took place at the New York Autoring in a drag race to the final yellow flag with Allie Riggs. This duel became an all-but mandatory part of subsequent highlight reels for the rest of the year.

2009 would be Johaanes' final full-time season in ARLA, as his TM Master Cup schedule made it much more difficult to run both series in the same year. Unfortunately, Johaanes did not make much of an impact in his last year, as he went winless.

2010-2012
While Johaanes has been competing in Master Cup, he has run a few ARLA races for M&J Racing on the side. He has been rather quick in these appearances, and he even scored a win at Decatur in 2010, a season that M&J Racing as a whole had great success in.

Johaanes was scheduled to run a few races in 2012, but sponsorship fell through before the season began, and Johaanes didn't seem very interested in seeking an additional sponsor. Johaanes has yet to compete in an ARLA race under the current Elite Series technical regulations.

2013 & Beyond
Johaanes has played a major hand in helping Allie Riggs establish her own team for Elite Series competition. He will compete in select races for her team in a car carrying the number 29, which will be his first time driving a car that hasn't had #64 on it.

2008-2009
Johaanes's TM Master Cup career started with McCallister Motorsports in 2008, where he became synonymous for causing collisions and failing to qualify for a number of races in McCallister's famous #12 entry. Despite rumors that he would be dropped at the end of 2008, the team opted to keep him despite the bad press, believing that he could be champion someday. Johaanes was transferred to the #22 car for the 2009 season, carrying the yellow and red Lay's Potato Chips livery. He seemed to get faster in 2009, but he was still involved in numerous crashes. His reputation was not very good by the end of 2009, where he was jokingly called Crash Johaanes for most of the 2009 season.

2010
After two largely fruitless seasons at Garth McCallister's floundering effort, Johaanes switched to Camelot Racing, where he immediately ended his reputation as a crasher and began to show his ARLA promise. Johaanes scored his first win at Carbondale, and looked to be a serious championship contender for most of the season, but fell short as the season wore on. Regardless, he was seen as the most improved driver of the year, and earned a lot of respect from his detractors.

2011
Johaanes's 2011 campaign was even more spectacular, finishing in the top 10 in 11 of his 19 starts, including a controversial win in Japan, but his season was blighted with an embarrassing DNPQ at the Karjala Grand Prix. Despite this, Johaanes rallied to score 462 points in the 2011 season -- but missed the championship by a single point in the final race of the season to Adrien Devereux. Johaanes and Devereux had an intense rivalry on-track, but neither driver seemed to hold disdain for the other and seemed indifferent to each other off the track.

2012
Johaanes stayed with Tremwell for the 2012 season, but moved with them to the Mitchell & Sons Racing team to once again drive car #64. Johaanes seemed to struggle with the handling of the Tremwell early in the year, and caused quite a few collisions early in the season. The biggest blight in Johaanes's season was a clash with Devereux at Brands Hatch that left the Frenchman fuming. While many onlookers expected punches to be thrown, the drivers refused to stoop to that level. Devereux only said that they had been "talking with loud voices", whereas Johaanes did not comment much on the contact.

After the Devereux collision, Johaanes's season has been inconsistent, with reports that the management of Mitchell & Sons were looking for more big results from Johaanes. Johaanes is considered one of the top free agents for 2013, and it isn't known if he will stay at Mitchell & Sons or go to another team. If he doesn't pick up a drive in the TM Master Cup Series, he intends to return to the ARLA Elite Series.

Trivia

 * With the exception of 2012, Johaanes's TM Master Cup series number has changed after every season he has participated in.


 * He is one of two drivers to have carried two of the three sponsors that make up the 73 Rule as primary sponsors, having carried Kleffer Media and The Shafer Group. Scott Steudler is the other. Mike Whitmore carried all three at once when he drove the Name 73 car, but none of those were primary sponsors, so he isn't really counted.


 * He is the J in M&J Racing.