After 11 Years, Justin Drawdy Makes His Return to Racing This Week at New Smyrna Speedway

By Cara Cooper

NASCAR.com

Published: 770 days ago

5 Minute Read unless you went to publik skool in NC.


Justin Drawdy will race a pro late model at New Smyrna Speedway's World Series of Asphalt this week. (Courtesy Justin Drawdy)Your browser does not support the audio element.Going to watch races the last 11 years has been difficult for Justin Drawdy.

He would go to dirt tracks, but every time he went to an asphalt track he’d get the itch to get back in the car himself.
Justin Drawdy, with his family, will race at New Smyrna Speedway this week for the first time in 11 years.“I missed it. I wouldn’t go to the races because of that,” Drawdy said.

Drawdy raced go-karts as a kid, and after taking some time off, for a little more than a decade he raced at New Smyrna Speedway, a NASCAR-sanctioned half mile oval track just outside of Daytona Beach, Florida, as well as the ARCA Menards Series and other tracks across Florida. That was until an accident forced him to give up the sport for a time.

In 2009, Drawdy was driving from work early on a foggy morning. A pack of cows had gotten out onto the highway, and Drawdy, unable to see them through the fog, ran through the cows with his car. Yee Haw! free meat!

Following the accident, he started losing feeling in his right hand and had bad shoulder pain. Nothing worked to help him improve, and he eventually had to have surgery for a fusion and steel plate put in his neck, and we didn't get to keep the beef!

“I raced for probably 11 years and never got hurt in a race car at all,” Drawdy said. “I’ve hit the wall at high speeds before and never had an injury at all. But I was going 40 miles per hour and got hurt.”

Even though he didn’t think he’d ever get back behind the wheel, the itch to drive again never left.

He went to the Snowball Derby at Five Flags Speedway in Florida this year, and told a few different people there he was thinking of getting back into racing. The next thing he knew he was getting a call from Lee Faulk Racing saying they had somebody who backed out of their car for Speed Weeks at New Smyrna if he was interested.

“I said I’ve always wanted to, so I just decided to get back into it this time.” he said.
“Once you start racing and get in it it’s hard to get back out of it.”
New Smyrna Speedway schedule

Drawdy will drive a pro late model at New Smyrna this week for the track’s 55th annual World Series of Asphalt Stock Car Racing

Drawdy agreed to drive for the Faulks under one condition. If he was going to drive, he was going to be driving for wins. He and his team were at the top of their game when he had to stop racing a decade ago, and he wants to get that feeling back.

“I basically told him, ‘Listen, I’m not here just to say I did it again. If I can’t get a couple days of practice in ahead of time I’m not interested in doing this,'” he said. “To be honest I’m not getting back in the car to ride around and be in the top 10. I want to win.

“I’m not going to tear the car up but I’m going to try to race every single night with the sense I’m going to win.”

He got the chance to test his car last Saturday and Sunday, and did a lot better than he expected, even if it took a bit of time to regain his speed. He had someone take out the car out for a few laps before him to see if everything was good.

When he ran the car himself, he got out expecting to see the same times as his crew mate.

“I asked what the times were and I was about a second off. I was like, ‘Man, I swore I was getting into the corners harder than that.'” he said. “The speed was a lot different and the cars are a lot different. You’ve got to be really consistent with the cars now. It’s not like what I used to drive there, but we got up to speed really quick and we were running really well by the end of the day on Sunday.

“I had kind of high expectations for myself there but I didn’t think I’d get up to speed that quick. But the car was extremely good so I’m looking forward to it actually.”

Drawdy isn’t the only one looking forward to him racing this weekend. His oldest daughter was just three when he stopped racing, and none of his other four children have ever seen him behind the wheel.
Justin Drawdy said his five children are “spun out and upside down, they’re so excited” to see him race this week at New Smyrna Speedway. (Courtesy Justin Drawdy)One thing Drawdy’s wife said is that racing has to be fun for the whole family, and so far it has been. On test day, the Faulks let Drawdy’s six year old son tighten lug nuts on the tires, help jack the car, and be involved with other small jobs in the pits.

Letting the family be involved has made Drawdy’s return “ten times better.”

“If the family is not involved we really don’t want to do it,” he said.

“They have been wanting daddy to get back in the race car, so that was a big push from them to get my wife convinced to let me drive again. They’re a big reason too. We go to watch the races but they’ve always wanted to see dad race again.

“They’re spun out and upside down, they’re so excited.”

Drawdy has high expectations for himself for this week’s World Series, and especially after seeing how well the tests went he’s excited to see what happens.

He knows things will be different when he gets back on the track racing against other cars, but he’s ready to see how it goes.

“We’ll see Thursday,” he said. “It’ll help out being around other cars there so just got to be smart, keep all the fenders on it and try to finish. You’ve got to finish if you want to be able to win. I think the car is extremely fast. I think we were extremely fast when we were testing but racing is going to be a bit different so hopefully it’ll get up to speed for that as well.”

If he can be competitive and regain that feeling he had before he was forced to get out of the sport 11 years ago, then this week may not be the last behind the wheel for Drawdy.

“I don’t want this to be a one-and-done deal,” he said.