In early May, former DI contributor Craig Cook sat down four of the original Street Outlaws cast members for a roundtable interview at Mo-Kan Dragway’s inaugural 405 Shootout. Cook spoke with James “Doc” Love, Joe “Dominator” Woods, Sean “Farmtruck” Whitley, Jeff “AZN” Bonnett to discuss the early days of the show, how it evolved over time, and what the future holds after 15 seasons of the original show and numerous spinoffs.
At the time, many of the drivers were at a crossroads: with no television deal in place and fewer contracts being offered, they had to decide how to proceed moving forward. Since then, Speed Promotions Racing, which took over the No Prep Kings framework, canceled the final races of its 2025 season, effectively ending the Street Outlaws era.
This excerpt of the roundtable, which appeared in DI #196, the State of Drag Issue, in September/October 2025, features Jeff “AZN” Bonnett.
Looking back on when the original 405 show first started, did you ever believe it would blow up and become as popular as it did?
I think Farmtruck says it all. Farmtruck, he was just a friend. I had all but sold my car. I was helping my buddy get his truck down the road, talk crap, and getting races. But the moment the film crew came and legitimately started filming the show, we knew our lives were going to change. We just didn’t know what direction, for good or bad. But we said yes, we committed, and I think every guy or gal on the show in the very beginning was committed. We were all ready to do the job, and that’s the big coincidence in it. All eight to 10 of us were ready to say yes and commit to the entire filming.
You all have done this for quite a while now. Looking back on the show, what’s either a favorite memory or accomplishment that each of you had over the course of Street Outlaws?
That’s a tough one. I guess for us, as hard as it is, it was the places this took us. It took us to Canada, it took us to Australia, it took us to South Africa. For us to be able to look at how other car cultures and countries do this gave us the gratitude to be able to look at how good we have it here in America. Yeah, we filmed a lot. We had a lot of races, we won a lot, we lost a lot, but it was the perspective we were given that we have it pretty good here. Yeah, nothing’s perfect. Other countries do a few things cool and a little bit different, but at the end of the day, this is the greatest car culture on planet Earth. Everyone should go experience something different to gain the gratitude that we should all have here. That’s what keeps us motivated, that’s what keeps us going – because we know how good we actually have it.
As things progressed, it wasn’t just the 405 show anymore. With nearly 20 spin-off shows, you were basically filming year-round. With a cast made up primarily of regular, blue-collar workers, how did you balance your regular jobs and filming full-time?
I think what you saw was an expedited evolution of car guys. We start out racing go-karts, and then we get a little street rod, then big tire, big blocks, and now we’ve got fiberglass bodies. In a 12-year period, you had an influx of sponsors and investors, you had people that wanted to be involved at any cost. And I tell people, these cars were the fastest on the planet because every single manufacturer was waiting to give these parts away. Tires couldn’t get any better, there were no bigger superchargers, nitrous was what it was, and they were just throwing parts at it.
And now, these other events, they’re trying to emulate the culture that this show created to go backwards. You’re seeing all these Top Fuel guys, these characterized athletic type of divisions go backwards a little bit to recapture what Street Outlaws may have created, but at the end of the day, that 12 years was a fast-track on the launch pad to the evolution of a normal car guy.
One of the most popular spin-off shows was No Prep Kings. How did you all balance the idea of being street racers that are now competing at the track, but also giving fans of the show the opportunity to come out and experience what you’re doing?
I’ll be short with my answer. I think Farmtruck and I, at that point, that was maybe the seven- to eight-year mark, we saw the show evolving too fast and we saw the ship growing and we saw it getting out of control. Farmtruck and I took it upon ourselves to say, “OK, I don’t know if the other guys are into this, but we’re going to at least try to throttle it down. We’re going to try to throttle-stop this. We need to start going backwards, guys. We need to start capturing the audience that was paying attention, because they’re not catching up with us. They don’t understand how fast this is going and they can’t relate.” So we tried to bring relatability back, first with Daily Driver and then Locals Only. It didn’t work a hundred percent, but Farmtruck and I at least gave a valiant effort to reel back the evolution a little bit.
With the evolution you talked about – the never-ending desire to continue going faster combined with big-money teams jumping in – do you believe it eventually went too far from what made it popular to begin with?
I have to look at it from a business perspective, so it has gone beyond fun. It has gone beyond recreational weekend activities. It’s now a business, and so the question is can you maintain a level of redneck loyalty with a business? That’s to say have monster trucks gone too far and should return back to being trucks? Hell no. They can’t have boring caricatures. They can’t turn into NHRA where it’s like, “I’m Scott and I’m sponsored by A&A Attorney Company. It’s been a good run this year.” You got to lose this monotone; you got to reinvent the wheel a little bit. The cars have got to be fast, they’ve got to be safe, but they’ve got to be relatable in some regard. They’ve got to find a lane outside of what NHRA is. Don’t be NHRA; be something different.
Looking ahead, with Speed Promotions Racing taking over what was formerly No Prep Kings, and no television show currently in place, what are your plans moving forward? Will you continue with SPR, or focus more on match races and paid appearances?
Farmtruck and I, we’re the zebras in the horse pen. We don’t know exactly where we fit into that program. I have no doubt that Speed Promotions would open the gate and treat us well, but at the end of the day, we just don’t know where we fit into that, and I don’t know if they do. I’m sure they’d reserve us a pit area, let us meet the fans, and sell the merch.
We found that in the past few seasons of being involved, the Farmtruck can’t compete, so we’re out there doing exhibition races. It’s just tough for us, and we really rally for those guys to do well and we want that series to do well, but until we find our own lane in that series, we’re just going to keep setting up garage sales across the nation and selling our wares, so we’re cool with that. And if it don’t work out, we’re going to start an OnlyFans.
The post DI Interview: Jeff ‘AZN’ Bonnett Reflects on Global Car Culture, ‘Street Outlaws’ Evolution & What Comes Next first appeared on Drag Illustrated.
