Brady Bacon names
finalists for Baton Award
Three finalists have been named for the first annual Brady
Bacon Baton Award which will select a young up and coming driver whom Bacon foresees
as a future racing star bound for greater glory. The identity of the winner
will be revealed on November 11 as part of the 2017 Racers Reunion Banquet in
Irving Texas.
Bacon, the two-time United States Auto Club (USAC) sprint
car champion from Broken Arrow Oklahoma who began racing at age five and throughout
his career Bacon has excelled in midgets, sprint cars and championship cars on
both dirt and asphalt race tracks across the country. With over twenty years of experience in
building, working on and racing open-wheel racing cars has provided Brady a
unique perspective to identify and evaluate future racing talents. The three
finalists for the 2017 Brady Bacon Baton Award are Giovanni Scelzi, Logan
Seavey and Tyler Thomas.
Giovanni Scelzi
Giovanni Scelzi started
his racing career at a young age in micro sprints on local California tracks when
he was just 6 years old. Those early experiences and the mentorship of his older
brother Dominic and his father, four-time National Hot Rod Association (NHRA)
drag racing champion Gary Scelzi, has clearly helped the 15-year-old driver’s
career. After he notched a remarkable 24
feature wins and two track championships during the 2010 season, the following
year, as a nine-year old, Scelzi moved up to the restricted micro sprint class
and won another track championship.
In 2015 Giovanni led all 25 laps to claim the “A” class
winged micro sprint main event and the “Golden Driller” at the famed Speedway
Motors Tulsa Shootout held at the Expo Center in Tulsa, Oklahoma. In 2016 Giovanni
made the jump to full-sized sprint cars and collected eight victories and his
first career California Speedweek championship. During the season, “Gio” claimed
the King of Kings Speedway title and recorded a total of twelve top 10 finishes
in 17 winged sprint car races and was voted the 360 Rookie of the Year by the
North American 410 Sprint Car Poll voting panel.
This season, Giovanni has focused on the King of the West - NARC
410 winged sprint car series with the Dennis Roth Motorsports team and as of
this writing leads the championship chase. Scelzi has not restricted his racing
to just the state of California, as he scored a clean sweep at 34 Raceway in
West Burlington, Iowa driving for BDS Motorsports with the Sprint Invaders
series along with three top five
finishes in three American Sprint Car Series National series starts.
Logan Seavey celebrates
his Hockett/McMillin win
The next Brady Bacon Baton candidate, Logan Seavey, also hails from the Golden State. While Scelzi lives
in the central California town of Fresno, Logan comes from the historic Gold
Country town of Sutter in the northern part of the state. Seavey
began racing outlaw karts in 2002 at the ripe young age of 5 years old and won
his first race when he was 6 years old behind the wheel of his box stock kart.
In 2007, just his fifth year behind the wheel, Seavey won
his first championship, claiming the Box Stock title at the famed Cycleland
Speedway in Chico California. Since then Logan has added five more outlaw kart
championships that include back-to-back championships in the Red Bluff Outlaws
Winter Indoor Series in 2015 and 2016 and the 2015 QRC Speed Sport Challenge.
2017 has been a breakout year for Logan, as he has scored
two victories in the POWRi Lucas Oil National Midget League with victories in
the ‘Camfield Memorial’ race at Macon Speedway in Macon Illinois and at Lincoln
Speedway in Lincoln Illinois on the final night of Illinois Speedweek.
As of
this writing, Seavey leads the POWRi Lucas Oil National Midget League
championship chase with nine top five and nine top ten finishes to go along
with his two victories. Last month, Logan
had a dream weekend as he won all three
nights of the seventh annual Hockett/McMillin Memorial race in the Daum
Motorsports 5D with the POWRi Lucas Oil WAR (non-wing) Sprint Car League.
Tyler Thomas in action
at the Chili Bowl
The third Brady Bacon Baton finalist, Tyler Thomas has been a standout for the last several years with
the POWRi Lucas Oil National Midget League. Thomas from Collinsville Oklahoma
began racing at just four years of age and recorded five championships on the
Regional and Club level with 28 wins before he moved to Micro Sprints in 2009. Tyler quickly put together 9 wins for his
first season and quickly moved to the Ecotec Midget division in 2010 and won 6
of the 8 races in which he competed.
In 2011, Tyler debuted in the POWRI Midget Series, and he
became the youngest driver to win a POWRI main event at the age of 15. 2012 and
2013 saw Thomas record more wins and podiums to finish 5th and 4th respectively
in the POWRI National Midget standings. Last year Thomas added another win and
10 top-5 finishes
After he started his 2017 season with a strong fifth place
finish in his preliminary night feature and a 17th place finish in the Chili
Bowl Nationals in Tulsa Oklahoma, Tyler has scored three POWRi Lucas Oil
National victories at Macon Speedway and Jacksonville Speedways in Illinois and
Valley Speedway in Grass Valley Missouri. Thomas won the Sooner Midget
Nationals with the Lucas Oil POWRi West Midget League at Red Dirt Raceway in
Meeker, Oklahoma, and Tyler with the Brian Thomas #91T midget currently stands
12th in the USAC national midget points.
The presentation of the Brady Bacon Baton Award is just one
of the many exciting events on tap for the 2017 Racers Reunion in Irving Texas
on November 11. In addition to the
special tribute to our nation’s veterans for Veterans Day, the banquet will
feature as a special guest, three-time Indianapolis 500-mile race winner, the
legendary Bobby Unser who will share
stories of his many racing victories and times as a racing commentator for ABC
Sports.
Also scheduled for the eighth annual Racers Reunion are
programs that will examine the first 50 years of the International Motor
Contest Association (IMCA) and the life of pioneering Hall of Fame drag racer,
Bobby Langley, and the USAC Hall of Fame induction of the legendary Texas racer
Lloyd Ruby.
Tickets for the eighth annual Racers Reunion Banquet, which
in addition to the feature presentations includes an afternoon guest speaker,
autograph session and an afternoon of bench racing with a large collection of
vintage race cars and memorabilia are available at http://www.radiusnation.net
