WILL SMITH, HIRATA MOTORSPORTS RACE HARD AND HAVE FUN

by Thomas Pope    Tue, 2021-03-30 18:06

 

You could consider the Hirata Motorsports team a double threat.

Driver Will Smith, team owner Dave Hirata and crew can go toe to toe with anyone in the Top Alcohol Dragster ranks, and they would be an odds-on favorite to win the party after the Christmas tree is shut down for the night. 

Hirata owns and tunes, and Smith drives, an A/Fuel Dragster that covers the quarter-mile in the low to mid 5.20s at more than 280 miles an hour.

“We work hard,” said Hirata, whose father, Ken, is a member of the International Drag Racing Hall of Fame. “Everyone works hard, but we have fun doing it from the time we leave the shop to go to the track to setting up the pit area to the night-time stuff.

“You’ve got to make it a fun deal. It’s too much work to not have fun.”

Techno music, a light show and more help entertain sponsors present and potential. A full-on adaptation of the “Miami Vice” look for the recent Gatornationals (rather, “Miami Rice,” as Hirata dubbed it in homage to his Japanese heritage). Mullet hairstyles (or a Mohawk, depending on Hirata’s mood). 

It’s an approach that’s right up the alley of Smith, whose full-time job is Director of Marketing for the Professional Drag Racers Association. 

“I get people all the time that say, ‘Man, y’all look like y’all are having fun’ or ‘You guys sure know how to have a good time,’ ” Smith said. “We are, but we’re hardcore racers, too. Dave told me this back before we put our deal together, ‘We’re as serious racers as anybody out there, but we’re going to have fun’ -- and we’ve definitely lived up to that.

“Me being a marketing guy, we’re different anyway. We like to have a good time, and I feel that’s to our advantage. So many people are doing the same things and we’re different, we like to stand out. That’s why we’re rocking mullets, that’s why we’ve got some unique sponsorships. It’s who we are and what we do. A lot of people would have a lot more fun racing if they took the same approach we did.”

The Hirata name in drag racing goes back more than 70 years. Ken’s parents lost their home, land and business in World War II when their family was sent from California to an internment camp in Arizona. About a decade later, in an ironic twist, Ken was told he had to serve his country; drafted into the U.S. military, he spent two years in Korea during that conflict. After he finished his service, he decided to build a life in Lowell, Ill., and set up a business.

He tested his mechanical aptitude in the still-young sport of drag racing, and his cars won some of the biggest races. In 1963, the Hirata & Hobbs entry won Top Eliminator (now Top Fuel) at the U.S. Nationals with Bobby Vodnik driving and Don Garlits in the other lane. Two years later, the team returned to Indy’s victory lane in Top Gas with Phil Hobbs at the wheel. In between, in ’64, Hobbs wheeled the entry victory in the prestigious Bakersfield U.S. Fuel & Gas Championships.

Ken Hirata eventually exited the sport, but returned in 1997 when Dave wanted to follow in his father’s tire tracks. He attended the Frank Hawley Drag Racing School and earned his license in Super Comp, then began stockpiling parts to build an A/Fuel Dragster. That’s right, he started out in that class whose cars are considerably quicker and faster than any his father prepared.

“It was like Christmas for a year, only I was buying my own gear. Boxes and boxes of parts being delivered for six months,” Dave said. “I told my dad, ‘Man, I hope I can drive this thing.’ ”

Dave Hirata assembled a first-class ride, no question. In 2000, he reached the finals of six national events, won three of them and finished seventh in the NHRA standings.

“To this day, sometimes I sit back and go, ‘Y’know, I got to do something I dreamt about as a child in the 70s when I remember my dad racing,” Dave said. “He would have (‘Hawaiian’ team owner) Roland Leong stay at his house, (driver Ed) ‘Ace’ McCulloch and all these other famous racers would come to his shop and work on their cars. They were just people to me then. Now, 40 years later, I’m like, ‘I am actually getting to do what I dreamt about,’ and I don’t think a lot of people get to do that.”

Now 58, Dave Hirata hung up his helmet seven years ago and turned the driving duties over to others. Hirata’s cousin, Brian Inouye, had a stint driving the car (and remains as a crew member), as did Mia Tedesco, the 2016 NHRA Super Comp champion. Four years ago, Hirata selected Smith, a native of Northport, Ala., to take the reins.

“It’s like we’ve always been friends,” Hirata said. “I can’t remember when we met, I just remember that we’ve always been friends. I saw him grow up as a racer. We always kept in touch about what he was doing and when he was working for some other teams. It was a no-brainer that I wanted to help him get his license, but we didn’t know where it was going to go from there. And then the next year was an opportunity he could drive the car if he wanted full-time.”

“We’ve been friends for about 15 years now,” Smith chimed in. “I love the guy, I love his family, I love this team. 

“It all started about six or seven years ago with a conversation about me getting my license. A coupla years after that, we made it happen,” he added. “I’m thankful we’re as close as we are that he lets me sleep on his couch all year. Sometimes I think we’re attached at the hip whether we’re here at the shop, going to dinner or going home.”

Smith, who is approaching his 31st birthday, has been involved in drag racing for more than two decades. He’s worked on Steve Johnson’s NHRA Pro Stock Motorcycle, was a bracket racer and Junior Dragster competitor, and served as team manager for the Awesome Motorsports/Al-Anabi nitrous Pro Mod team. Now he drives one of the nation’s quickest and fastest Top Alcohol Dragsters.

“He did Juniors, this and this,” Hirata said, “so I had no doubt that he wouldn’t be able to do this, too. You just know when they could do it. … I was very confident that he would adapt to it very easily.”

Smith said he made “a lot of mental runs” prior to climbing into the dragster for his licensing runs at Lucas Oil Raceway in Indianapolis. After Smith’s first pass down the track, Hirata and the crew arrived in the tow vehicle to discover their driver in tears. 

“I was thinking, ‘I actually did this. I just drove this car here at Indy and got my license.’ Well, not after one run, but it was kind of a surreal moment for me,” Smith said. “When you pull the chutes down there and you’re coasting off, you’re like, ‘Holy crap, I just did this.’ ”

In 2019, his second season driving for Hirata, Smith powered his way to runner-up showings in the NHRA divisional and national events at Summit Motorsports Park in Norwalk, Ohio. Smith was also a semifinalist at the U.S. Nationals later that same summer.

Last year, Smith earned his first win in Top Alcohol Dragster competition. At Tri State Raceway in Earlville, Iowa, he was the No. 1 qualifier, beat eventual NHRA champion Megan Meyer in the first round, and ousted Dean Dubbin in the final round despite losing power in a cylinder.

“That was the perfect feeling, that’s about all I can say about that -- the perfect day when everything went our way,” Smith said. “We didn’t have any gimme rounds, either.

“I told Dave before the finals, ‘Let’s get close on the tune-up, I’m taking the responsibility on the rest, and if I don’t do the job, then it’s my fault.’ I was confident I could get them a good reaction time, and that’s something I work hard at and pride myself on. That’s part of my responsibility as a driver, to provide him and our team with that.”

Their 2021 season began with outings at Gainesville (Fla.) Raceway. In the divisional meet, they broke a lifter on a solid qualifying run and had to skip eliminations. A week later in the Gatornationals, Smith qualified eighth at 5.25 seconds, or .08 seconds off the No. 1 run. He earned a first-round win, then was KO’d in the quarterfinals by top qualifier Karen Stalba when a cylinder failed 3.3 seconds into the blast after he had beaten her on the launch.

So even though the haul from south of Chicago to Florida didn’t produce the results Hirata Motorsports had hoped for, a good time was had … because that’s how they roll.

The mullets -- business in the front, party in the back -- are a tip-off that they’re up for a good time, any time, and they’re not just ‘props’ or for effect. Smith has wanted one since he was a kid and saw the coiffure on the Kenny Powers character on HBO’s “Eastbound and Down.” His parents wouldn’t allow it, he said, but then he got orders from Hirata to grow one. Yes, boss!

Hirata’s affinity for distinctive hairstyles is nothing new, including the times he’s sported a Mohawk. He was a mullet man when they were first in style, and late last year decided to bring it back. It proved to be a big hit with the many mullet-styled competitors in the Junior Dragster ranks in Gainesville, he said, though “they probably thought their generation invented it.”

“Dave’s hair was a lot longer than mine and he trimmed it” into a mullet, Smith said. “He told me, ‘Next year, you’d better have one,’ so I worked on it all winter.”

That’s just one facet of the party, and Smith believes that the complete atmosphere offered by the team is key to attracting, and retaining, sponsors.

“All of our sponsors are just cool people, so it’s fun to have them come join us,” Smith said. “We’ve got strong marketing partnerships, but it’s fun, too, to see our sponsors come out at night and cut up and have fun with us.

“I can tell you this from my position as marketing director at PDRA and working on all of our sponsorship relations over there: The more personal you become with companies and their representatives and the relationships you build, it helps the partnership grow and become more successful,” he said. “It helps you retain those partnerships moving forward. It definitely makes it easier.”

Smith’s ability to combine his innate marketing skills with his driving prowess likely give the Hirata team a unique edge.

“I had a sponsor of ours pull me to the side in Gainesville and say, ‘Man, i have so much respect for you.’ I said, ‘For what?’ He said, ‘You hustle with this deal, you’re not just a driver. You’re working on engines, you’re doing this and that and updating your results, sponsors are taken care of,’ ” Smith said.

“I'm glad our partners and other outsiders see that from Dave and our whole team. Our partners put out a lot of good things about us, too, and it has attracted new partners and helped solidify new deals just by word of mouth and the cross-promotions we do for our partners or that they do for us.”

Hirata can’t say enough good things about Smith as a total package kind of person.

“I think a lot of people think that Will is just a driver because that’s typical in the pro classes. That’s what drivers do, they drive. Even in our class, there are a lot of cars that the drivers drive and that’s it,” he said.

“Will works his ass off at the track, but he works his ass off here (at the shop), he drives the rig, he helps set up. I think people are surprised he does more than drive a car. That’s one of the things when he started driving, he took responsibility to maintenance things and take care of things. He is not just a wheel man.”

“And I didn’t want to be just that, either,” Smith interjected. “To me, the easiest part of this whole deal is driving. I’m sitting in the staging lanes thinking, ‘We changed this, we changed that, is this or that tight?’ -- thinking about almost anything but driving. 

“But when I back up from the burnout, and Dave and the guys make their final adjustments and Dave pulls me forward, he gets pumped up and slaps the body, we both get pumped up. But that’s really actually a calm moment for us. It’s what helps me drive as well as I do. There’s room for improvement all the time, but it helps keep me calm, and I think I’m able to give Dave consistent results because of that -- or I hope so.”

Smith’s reliability behind the wheel is one of the things Hirata worries about the least.

“For me, it’s about getting the right tune-up in the right conditions and the right situation,” Hirata said. “Will’s the ace in my pocket. For us to be a top-10 car nationally at the end of the year, it’s just being more consistent and trying to find two to four hundredths.

“The Top Alcohol Dragster class, the bar went up really fast. We went 5.25 at Gainesville and were No. 8. Maybe even the beginning of last year, that would get you in the top five, and now it’s top eight. If I can provide a car that will go low 20s consistently, then I’ve got a driver who will definitely give us an advantage.

“We’ve got everything we need to be a top-tier team -- crew, driver, equipment, sponsors, partners -- so it’s really up to me. Out of all the runs I’ve had in four years, there’s never been a time that I went to the line that I didn’t think we couldn’t win the round. We have everything in place to do it, we’re just getting stronger, more consistent. We’re right there on the edge.”

Smith’s dream since he was two years old was to become a Top Fuel racer. In some respects, though, he feels like he’s reached a pinnacle of sorts by being a key component of Hirata Motorsports.

“I never took my sights off of (Top Fuel) and still haven’t,” he said. “But the reality is I’m thankful to be where I’m at, and there were a lot of times in my life I didn’t think I’d have a chance like this. I didn’t come from a wealthy family, so I knew the only way I could possibly have a chance was through hard work and dedication and spending whatever money I’ve got that I can. Hopefully, I could build a brand that people and companies would want to invest in.

“At the end of the day, I guess I’ve accomplished that. As much as I would like to drive Top Fuel or fuel Funny Car one day, it’s a total dream come true to be driving an A/Fuel car, especially for the Hirata family -- such a famed team and wonderful people. Anyone that knows me knows my love and passion for the history of our sport. I know Dave and I share that, and it’s just really cool to drive for such a great team like this.”

Hirata Motorsports is sponsored by NGK Spark Plugs, Lucas Oil, Schepel Buick GMC Cadillac, Asphalt Consultants Inc., Teaco Geophysical, Frederick Line-X, NutScentz, ProThings Apparel, and Race Ugly Speed Shop.

 

 

 

 
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