Monsters & Grave Diggers…

Monsters & Grave Diggers…

Photo credit: Courtesy of Feld Entertainment

Feel free to call Pablo Huffaker a monster man – or a grave digger for that matter; he’s been called both most of his adult life, so he doesn’t mind.

“I was a tools kid growing up,” Huffaker told Hollywood on the Potomac when asked what toys he played with as a child.  “I loved taking stuff apart and putting it back together. Then my interest was towards four-wheel drive trucks and things like that. Somehow I managed to gravitate towards monster trucks and made a career out of it. I just did this on my own. No one else in my family is really very mechanical and that’s just where my destiny has taken me.”  Huffaker is one of the sport’s true legends who rates as an all-time great in Monster Jam®.  Huffaker is noted for his over-the-top performances on the track as well as his contributions as a designer and builder of Monster Jam® trucks and parts.

His destiny will take him to the Verizon Center in downtown Washington, DC over the weekend when Monster Jam® rolls into town on Saturday, Jan. 24 for three action-packed shows where fans of these 10,000 lb. trucks will have the opportunity to see their trucks fly through the air, smash & crash cars and race around the track spraying dirt on to fans in the stand.

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“I got started in the monster trucks by being in the four-wheel drive business in Houston, Texas. I had a four-wheel drive shop and myself and a partner built a truck to promote the business, not really knowing that monster trucks would ever take off and become something a person could make a living at or a career out of. The progression was from the very infancy of this sport, of it’s very inception, before people knew what monster trucks were and they would be like, ‘Wow, what’s that?’  I’ve seen every bit of evolvement of the monster trucks from day 1 to what they are today,” he explained.

We wondered if we would run into them on any given street.  “No ma’am,” he replied.  “When you’re talking about a Monster Jam® truck, that is a full competition vehicle. There is no use for them outside of the arena that we perform in, whether it’s a stadium or an arena like in DC.  They are purpose built to perform and to work and do Monster Jam® shows. They serve no other purpose other than that.”

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Don Johnson, (no not that one), of TNT Motorsports was the president back in beginning of the 1980s and discovered them and wanted them to do his Truck N Tractor Pull series. “From there, it’s history. This is all I’ve done since then is grow with the monster trucks from being a side act at Truck N Tractor Pulls to being the main event, to being what Monster Jam® is today; one of the most exciting forms of motorsports you could ever find anywhere in the world. Even though we compete, we’re entertainers. That is first and foremost; we’re there to entertain our fans. Most forms of racing are very sponsor driven and they’re driven in a different way. They’re not so much driven to do whatever it takes to entertain the fans, but to try to win the race. We’re the same way, but our drive to win the race and to win the competitions is for our fans, not for our sponsors.  We’re dare devils.”  Think Evil Knievel on a grander scale.

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How does your family feel about your doing something that appears, at least as an outsider, to be a bit dangerous?  “They support me 100%. After me doing this for 33 years, they pretty much accept that what I do for me is the norm. For other people it might be the extreme, but this is what I do and I try to do well and they pretty much accept that. When they see me wreck and tumble, they know that for the most part that my safety equipment is there and that the trucks are safe and that I’m going to walk away from it and wave to the crowd and move on to the next race.”

Would you have any problems if your own child ended up doing the same?  “Absolutely not. I have a 33 year old son who drives at shows whenever he would like to. He did the very first show this year in Miami when we did it at a big stadium and he’ll probably drive in Houston next weekend.  I have a 7 year old grandson who if he wants to drive a monster truck when he gets older Papa will probably build him one.”  Your wife, she’s not worrying either?  “Everybody’s happy? Everybody is good. My wife actually has even driven the monster trucks just so that she could do it, just because there’s nothing she’s afraid of.  She’s even driven with dragsters – Super Comp dragsters, 180 miles per hour and she’s driven monster trucks. My whole family is 100% behind me.”

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As for their show in Washington:  “Well, we’ll do several different disciplines of competition here. We’ll do probably a wheelie competition where we see if you can go out there and basically jump the cars and get the most vertical air; and, we’ll do side-by-side racing where the first guy that comes to the finish line is the winner. Usually we’ll almost always finish our event with freestyle, which is where I get to go out there and do whatever it is I want to do for about 90 seconds, 60 to 90 seconds, and try to entertain the crowd to the best of my ability and try to win them all over.”

So what’s the prize?  “My prize for winning is the smile on the kid’s face at the autograph line after the show who’s so happy that Grave Digger performed great for him. That’s my prize. That’s why I say we’re different from most racers is that we’re entertainers.”

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On life outside the track?  “Actually, the second thing that I do that I love is to manufacture and make machine parts, build monster trucks parts. I have a machine shop just here outside of Houston, Texas and make a lot of the machine components that you would find on modern monster trucks………purpose built parts that are specific to them. Just about every truck in the industry has components that I’ve manufactured.”

A 24/7 lifestyle?  “It is. I never have to work a day in my life because I love what I do. If I had to have a hobby it would be metal working and that’s what I managed to make a living at, so I’m a lucky guy.”

Tickets are available at the Verizon Center box office, online at www.ticketmaster.com or by phone at 800-745-3000.

Grave Digger 30th Anniversary:

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