(This is an excerpt from the Jimmy Owens book, The Newport Nightmare.)

When I began racing super late models in 2004 it wasn’t long before I was winning a few races. Then I teamed up with Mike Reece in 2007 and we won some big races, almost right off. By 2011 we won our first Lucas Oil Late Model Dirt Series title and ultimately scored three consecutive series titles.

That was great, and it’s always good to be on top. You don’t have to be at the very top; but if you’re among the top few guys around the country that’s a pretty good feeling.
But from 2016 to 2019, we weren’t on top. Our number of wins was down quite a bit during that period and we were not among the top two or three in Lucas Oil points.

You know what comes next: people started to talk.

“Jimmy has lost it.”

“He’s done.”

“Wonder why he’s fell off so bad?”

“I guess Jimmy ain’t got it anymore.”

That talk never fazed me, and I’m being real honest here. It didn’t.

I didn’t question myself or my ability during that time, not once. Think about it: I never said I was great. Why would you question yourself if you never thought you were great to begin with?

Early on, after we won our first super late model race, we got better every season. Our results proved it. 2008 was better than 2007; 2009 was better than 2008. It kept going, for several years.

And then one year we didn’t trend upward.

 

I knew the upward trend would stop someday. It HAS to stop, because nobody in history has trended upward forever. But our good trend lasted for many years.

When we were trending upward, I didn’t hear too much criticism from people. Oh, there were a few times; “Boy, you should never have got out of the Bloomquist cars.” Stuff like that. But overall, people just said nice things about us.

When we began to struggle in 2016 and beyond, we began to hear it from people.

“What’s wrong, Jimmy?”

“How come you ain’t running as good?”

“Why aren’t you winning?”

Let’s face it…people can be blunt.

That’s a lot of negativity, and you don’t have much choice but to listen to it. The whole deal made it not as enjoyable to stand at the back of the trailer after the races and shake hands with people. I like being back there, because I like talking to people and being around them.

But when you have rude people (usually drunk) who come up and lip off that you shouldn’t have done this or that, it turns me off. Real bad.

I’ve been fortunate to win, but I would have kept racing even if I wouldn’t have won any races. Let me say that again: I would have kept on racing even if I didn’t win any races. Because winning is not the only thing it’s about.

Let me clarify something: opinions don’t bother me, but it’s how you express them that can get me going. If somebody politely says I’m not their favorite and they don’t want me to win, that’s fine. No problem! But if a loud drunk yells it out at the back of my trailer after the races, that is not fine. That is very irritating and I don’t like it.

I love racing but I don’t enjoy hearing that crap. It makes me want to not talk to people if they can’t be respectful and courteous.

But does that kind of negative talk and criticism make me question my ability as a driver? Or my ability to keep a team going?

No. It does not.

Man, it isn’t easy to avoid all the negative stuff nowadays. With Twitter and Facebook people are talking all the time, and much of it is just bullshit.

Michael Hayes, who takes care of all of our merchandise sales and marketing, handles our Facebook page. (I have a personal Facebook page, but it is not official and is just close friends and family.)

Michael sometimes has his hands full with the social media stuff. It’s amazing to me that people have the time—and bad manners—to write nasty stuff on other people’s social media.

You know, this stuff ain’t hard: if you don’t like me, don’t follow my social media. Ain’t that just common sense?

But sure enough, people write that I’m no good and can’t race worth a damn. These are people who have never met me (well, I hope that’s the case!) and are throwing rocks from a nice, safe distance. It blows my mind that people have that much hate and anger inside of them.

Michael usually deletes those comments, but I’ve told him he doesn’t need to. People have an opinion and I don’t mind that. However, I draw the line at profanity, because kids often follow my pages. We don’t need them reading a lot of cussing.

I tune most of that stuff out because at the end of the day I’m doing what I’ve always wanted to do. The comments and opinions of other people can’t change that.

Jimmy Owens (20) battles Brandon Sheppard at East Bay in 2019. (Heath Lawson photo)

I look at Facebook a fair amount, but I’ve never got the hang of Twitter. The racing forums caught on a few years ago and everybody was looking at them in the beginning, myself included. When I saw the stuff people were saying about me, I was surprised. I couldn’t figure out what I could have done to get them so worked up against me.

That’s when I realized a couple of things. One, people can be very brave hiding behind their keyboard. Two, those negative comments didn’t impact my feelings, one way or another. I wasn’t hurt, and I wasn’t mad. I wasn’t…anything. Their opinions didn’t register with me, I guess. After a while I quit looking at the forums.

On-line comments I can tune out completely; face-to-face comments are a little more difficult. But I’m still working on that.

There were times when I’ve enjoyed some sweet revenge when people were putting me down. You’re not going to hear me talking trash in an interview after the races, and I’ll never intentionally stir up a lot of fussing or drama. But behind the scenes there have been times when I really enjoyed shutting somebody up.

For example, back when we were touring in the modified, people would post on the racing forums that I wasn’t good enough to win at their track. You know how it goes: “He ain’t beat anybody, so he ain’t that good!”

Then when we went to their track and won…boy, that’s a good feeling. A good feeling.

It’s nice to know you kinda shut people up a little bit. That’s fun!

Early in my late model days I was driving the Harrod Farms car and also still running my modified. We were at Glasgow, Kentucky and I was running both classes. I didn’t have a chance to hot lap my modified and went straight into qualifying, where I flat-footed my lap and was really fast.

After qualifying I walked over to the concession stand and a guy stopped me. I wouldn’t describe him as angry, but he was definitely direct.

“I’ve watched you run many races,” he said, “but I’m just gonna tell you…if you took that MSD box out of that modified, you wouldn’t win another race.”

He was accusing me of using a cheater ignition box. Traction control and all that, you know.

Without skipping a beat I smiled real nice and said, “Well, then, why in the world would I take that box out?”

He stomped off and I’m sure he told his buddies, “He all but TOLD me he was cheating!”
The whole exchange made me laugh.

I said earlier that it’s a terrible thing to be labeled a cheater when you know you didn’t cheat, and that’s true. However, sometimes there isn’t anything you can do about that kind of talk other than trying to turn it into something positive, something motivating, maybe even something funny.

When they are accusing you of cheating, you know you’re in their head. In a warped kind of way, that feels good.

 

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For more information on The Newport Nightmare, click here.

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