Veteran sportsman racer and six-time NHRA Division 4 champion Tommy Phillips and his Philco Motorsports team secured K&N Engineering and Tigerflow as their primary sponsors for the 2011 NHRA season and beyond.
Phillips is gearing up for the upcoming racing season and ready to compete in what he hopes is going to become his most successful year yet.
"My goals are the same as they are every season," Phillips said, "which are to win the championship, but this time with more cars. I'm a shoot for the moon kind of guy, even if we miss we'll land upon the stars."
Philco Motorsports has had the financial backing of Tigerflow and K&N for the prior two seasons and secured a multiyear extension with his sponsors. Phillips could not be more excited to have the sponsors remain with the team and is looking forward to a bright future in conjunction with Tigerflow and K&N.
“I’m humbled and excited to have the opportunity to continue promoting two great companies that are extremely committed to NHRA drag racing," Phillips said.
Tigerflow is a company that is based in Dallas and manufactures pressurized water systems for all types of construction. The company is owned by Monroe Guest and Marvin Yoder. Guest is not only a sponsor for Phillips, he is also drag racer who runs his own Top Alcohol Dragster team and whom Phillips has known via racing for quite a few years.
"I sold Monroe a racecar I built a few year back and he subsequently bought two more," Phillips said. "We got to know each other and helping each other out and became friends. He even won a championship in the Top Dragster I sold him."
Phillips and Guest have built a relationship on and off the racetrack. Phillips knows that Guest sees potential in his team, just like Philips sees potential for Guest's racing career to be endless.
"Monroe is a dreamer, very assertive, he's you're typical entrepreneur," Phillips said. "As soon as he won the championship in Top Dragster he was onto Top Alcohol. It wouldn't surprise me to see him racing in the Fuel ranks sometime in the future."
K&N Engineering is one of the most well-known names in NHRA Drag Racing. Phillips recognizes this and knows that he is lucky and blessed to be part of the K&N team. He earned the sponsorship with K&N the same way he earned it with Tigerflow, through his personality and friendship with people in the company.
"Steve Williams is who I know best there," Phillips said. "Just mainly through racing, he bought some cars from me and helped spread the word on the West Coast about my products. Then they were interested in helping out my personal race program."
"Since I'm an under-promise over-deliver kind of guy, it worked out well with them in the first few seasons. Then the following years, I got a little bit more out of them and happened to build a great relationship with the guys over there and they're still helping us out. I think it'll be a great long lasting partnership."
Phillips will also be welcoming back many associate sponsors to the Philco team, many of which have been part of his team since its inception. Those sponsors include CBS Arcsafe, Art and Randy Zunker of B’yond Reason Racing, Tracy Dennis and Sunset Racecraft, Robert and Wynette Hudgins of Lee-A Incorporated (Abilene , Texas), the staff and customers of TNT Supercars, as well as Duane and Heidi Robison, and Brett Patterson.
"The guy at CBS Arcsafe was the first guy to ever even give me a chance to get out there and do this kind of racing," Phillips said. "He was instrumental in getting me started doing this and I'm happy that he's still part of the team today."
Phillips has competed in the NHRA Lucas Oil Drag Racing Series over the past two decades and has accumulated 24 victories in the Lucas Oil series as well as 22 Full Throttle National event victories. Phillips has earned his division championships in Super Comp, Super Gas, Super Street and Stock Eliminator.
Phillips will be fielding a four-car team in 2011 three of which will be driven by him and the one that is going to be piloted by a driver that is yet to be named.
"I'll be driving a Super Comp dragster, Corvette Super Gas Roadster and a Super Stock Camaro," Phillips said. "Since we have great support and involvement of Tigerflow, K&N and many associate sponsors, I felt like I needed to expand the team a little in an effort to increase exposure of those companies."
Phillips is eager to get all four of his cars out on the track and start competing for championships in all of the categories the team will be competing in. Phillips knows that he's blessed to be able to field four cars but knows that it was due to hard work and building life-long relationships with people.
"It's amazing how it all comes full circle," Phillips said. "Like I always say, the deal is never really about the deal, the deal is always about the people involved.
"Right when I was out of college, I did so much to try and attract sponsors and now I'm at the point where I'm lucky enough and have worked hard enough to get sponsors coming back and am able to field four cars."
The Philco team will begin competition at the Full Throttle season opener in Pomona Ca, February 24-27th.
