BRADENTON — The pint-sized kid sat in a lawn chair inside his father’s garage swinging his feet. His feet never touched the concrete. However, Wyatt Hollifield’s feet can tap a pedal. The Rowlett Elementary School second-grader was recently crowned the champion of the Novice Go-Kart Hi-Point Division at East Bay Raceway in Gibsonton.
The Novice Class consists of racers age 5 to 10.
“I like winning races and having fun,” said Hollifield, with blond hair sprouting from under his black ball cap with his car’s No. 31 on it.
Hollifield has had fun this season. He won 10 races in 16 starts and finished in the top five in every race.
The youngster’s first race was on his fifth birthday. Hollifield began racing at a low rate of speed to get used to the cart and the 1/8-mile tri-oval race track.
Now, Hollifield tops out at 40 mph, but he said he wasn’t too scared.
“The car was kind of slow at first, but when we started putting stuff on, it was getting faster and easier,” Hollifield said.
The youngster probably didn’t understand why racing came easy to him. Racing is in his pedigree.
In the 1950s, his great-grandfather, Bob Hollifield Sr., transformed the family car into a race car and rode the bus to work. Hollifield’s grandfather, Bob Jr., was a driver and is his proverbial crew chief.
Brian races at East Bay Raceway Park, too. Every Hollifield driver races with the No. 31 because that’s the number Bob Sr. started with.
Brian said he was nervous when Wyatt first got behind the wheel, but his jitters wore off after watching Wyatt in action.
Wyatt’s resolve to drive doesn’t waiver when he’s involved in crashes. Brian told a story of how Wyatt was in a crash, and he figured Wyatt would want to bow out of the race, so he shut off Wyatt’s go-cart.
“Wyatt asked me why did I turn the car off,” Brian said with a smirk on his face. “I told him that I thought he didn’t want to finish the race. He told me he did, so away he went.”
Wyatt said he does get scared while racing, but he tries not to let it show.
“Sometimes they break on me,” the kid said. “And I feel like I’m going to crash, but I just keep driving.”
With the season over, Hollifield, who uses an Ultramaxx chassis and Black Diamond and Radical Engines, said he will move up in classification next season, but in the meantime, Wyatt will compete in other races to continue honing his skills in preparation for next season, which starts in March. Wyatt said he was missing racing already.
“He’s pretty focused,” Brian said. “At first, we were fooling around, and now he’s got his game face on and get out of the way.”
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