Bill Elliott's son Chase making his own name in NASCAR
DAWSONVILLE, Ga. -- For years, Bill Elliott was known as Awesome Bill from Dawsonville.
Now he goes by Chase Elliott's dad.
"I'm thinking of having my driver's license changed to that," he says.
Not that Elliott, a NASCAR legend, or Dawsonville minds. In fact, the surprising success of Chase Elliott, 18, has lifted the spirits of this north Georgia mountain town with a population of 2,255.
Elliott, barely old enough to be eligible for big-league auto racing, has won two consecutive races in the Nationwide Series, NASCAR's second-tier circuit. Furthermore, the victories came in Elliott's maiden voyages at two of the sport's toughest tracks — super-fast Texas Motor Speedway and hard-knock Darlington Raceway.
Just like that, Elliott is NASCAR's Next Big Thing.
He's also all the rage in Dawsonville, or "DawSONville" as the T-shirts read. His father rolled out of the backwoods in the 1980s to talk slow and drive fast. Bill Elliott won 11 Cup races in 1985, a Cup championship in 1988 and 44 Cup races in 828 starts. Elliott, 58, whose last Sprint Cup start was the 2012 Coke Zero 400 at Daytona International Speedway, is essentially retired from driving. But he remains one of the most beloved drivers in history, winning a record 16 Most Popular Driver awards.
"The family aspect of this is cool to look back on, and I have a lot of respect for that," Chase Elliott says. "But the world is different now, and I hope my generation and folks my age are following along. I think some of them are. We want to grow NASCAR."
And NASCAR is happy to have him. Bill Elliott says his son can make a difference not only in his hometown but also throughout NASCAR, where attendance numbers, television ratings and general interest could use an injection.
"I think he can bring it to the next level," Bill Elliott says. "He's so level-headed that he can deal with adults but can attract a generation of his own. That's what NASCAR needs more than anything right now — to rejuvenate the fans."
DAWSONVILLE HISTORY
Dawsonville's racing history is in many ways the story of NASCAR. Illegal liquor was manufactured in the hills and hollows here into the 1970s, and talented drivers with fast cars were needed to sneak it to other towns, including Atlanta 60 miles south.
Skills learned on the Georgia backroads transferred well to the dirt racetracks, and Dawsonville moonshine haulers such as Lloyd Seay and Roy Hall became racing stars in the late 1930s and early '40s before NASCAR was born.
Seay, considered to be the best racer of his place and time, died of gunshot wounds in September 1941 at 21 after an altercation over a liquor shipment. He was buried in Dawsonville Cemetery. His tall gravestone, purchased by his team owner and cousin, Atlanta raconteur Raymond Parks, includes a carving of his race car and a porcelain image of Seay in the driver's seat that still shines.
Eight streets in this town are named for its racing stars, including Seay and Bill Elliott.
Chase Elliott's accomplishments will add to Dawsonville's colorful history of stock car racing, which is celebrated a block from the courthouse at the Dawsonville Pool Room.
The Pool Room's address is 9 Bill Elliott Street, a nod to the No. 9 that Elliott drove for most of his 37-year NASCAR career that is now carried by Chase. The small brick-front establishment, operated for 50 years by Gordon Pirkle, is now mostly a hamburger and meat-and-three diner where people come to celebrate the Elliott racing legend.
Fading newspapers describing Elliott's victories over the years serve as the diner's wallpaper and an encyclopedia of all things Elliott. Trophies, photos and paintings of Elliott and other racing notables decorate the walls and shelves. There is a siren on the roof that goes off when an Elliott wins a race.
On this day, patrons are feasting on fried chicken and cornbread, and there is one other item on the table: talk of Chase Elliott's latest victory and whether he can keep the winning streak going Friday at Richmond International Raceway.
"It's going to be his dad all over again" says Walter Brooks, a longtime Elliott family friend and a resident of Cumming, about 20 miles from Dawsonville. "If he wins another race — oh my goodness, I would not be surprised if sponsors are lining up to be on his car.
"People are already trying to move him up to Sprint Cup. They can't wait. It's the biggest thing, in my opinion, that's happened to NASCAR in 30 years. He has everybody talking. He's young. He's nice-looking. He's well-spoken. He's a person of faith. He's just a good person, period. And he can drive a car. He's his dad and then some."
DARLINGTON DARLING
Although Chase Elliott has driven in only seven Nationwide races, his on- and off-track presence has won the attention of many, both in the stands and along NASCAR pit roads, where the potential of young hot-shoes is graded strictly. He appears to be the full package — bright, personable, handsome, accommodating and bold, as his daring last-lap pass to win at Darlington proved.
The Darlington run left even his father startled.
"I look at him winning at Texas, and that was unbelievable," Bill Elliott says. "But then you look at Darlington, and I was just amazed, shaking my head, at how he went about it. You go out sixth with two laps to go at Darlington, and you don't have a very good chance to win the race. And he did it.
"You have to keep in mind that he had never been to Texas, never been to Darlington, never run a lap at those places. Can you put that in perspective?"
They can at the Pool Room.
"Who would ever expect that at Darlington the first time out?" says Pirkle, who once employed Chase as a dishwasher for $7.35 an hour. "You're supposed to hit that wall when you run that fast on the last lap. I would never have thought he could pass them all."
In Dawsonville, it was like the good old days of the '80s, when people would gather at the Pool Room to watch races because Pirkle had one of the few satellite dishes in town.
"The last two weekends here, I can just feel it," Pirkle says. "It doesn't matter where I go, the first thing I hear is, 'What about Chase?' People I don't usually hear talk about racing have mentioned it."
Bill Elliott hammers his son about how different — and tough — his racing days were, but Chase doesn't want to hear it.
"Everybody is their own person," he says. "I don't care who your dad or granddad or mom is. You're not them, and they're not you. It really doesn't matter at the end of the day. If you don't get the job done, you're not going to be around long."
Still, even down to the way he walks, Chase reminds long-timers of his father.
"Just the way he handles himself shows me his dad's influence," says Dale Earnhardt Jr., who was named NASCAR's Most Popular Driver for 11 consecutive years and whose rapidly improving Nationwide team provides Chase with his rides. "He must have spent a lot of time with his dad and picked up on a lot of things his dad did and the way he made decisions. He's like a carbon copy of Bill."
Earnhardt's Sprint Cup employer, Rick Hendrick, was so taken with younger Elliott that he signed Chase to Hendrick Motorsports' first developmental deal in six years.
"I'd said I wasn't going to do it anymore, but I was so impressed with Chase," Hendrick told USA TODAY Sports in June. "I just felt he was somebody I was willing to invest in and take a chance with, because I felt as strongly about him as the way I felt about (Hendrick champions) Jeff (Gordon) and Jimmie (Johnson)."
The two Elliotts have raced each other once — in a Late Model race last year on a short track in Opp, Ala. Chase won. The old man was fourth. "I followed him around for a while," Bill Elliott says. "When he decided to go, he was gone. I never saw him again."
Chase Elliott will graduate from high school May 17, an occasion that will require a flight home from the Nationwide Series weekend at Iowa Speedway. Then he'll move to Mooresville, N.C., into his first apartment, to be closer to the team's race shop.
The reality of time and place, however, is Chase Elliott always will be tethered to Dawsonville.
Follow Hembree on Twitter @mikehembree