It’s been a long road back to victory lane for Jeff Mays. However, last Saturday in the classic class at Volunteer Speedway, he earned his first feature win since 2000.
Why the long wait? To start, he quit racing in 2001.
“I’m a firm believer in that the Lord gives all of my abilities,” Jeff Mays, of Limestone, Tennessee, said. “When you do the Lord right, the Lord will do you right. I did some things I probably shouldn’t have done, and the Lord quit riding with me.”
Jeff Mays places a lot of faith in God — and he believes God led him to get behind the seat of a race car in the early 1990s. He always wanted to race, but at the time was making $14 an hour with a wife and four kids. Jeff said he prayed about it and doors started opening.
“Bobby came in one day — he kept his car at my house — and said, ‘I’ve got a Malibu I’ll give you Jeff, if you want to start building your car,” said Jeff. “I’m a fabricator — I started welding in ’81 — I probably built 15 to 20 cars over the years. I got that car built and I had a couple of sponsors that gave me $1,000, which back in the day went a lot further. But I didn’t have a truck or trailer.”
You guessed it, Jeff prayed. Enter his decal maker and letterer, Jerry Honeycutt, who introduced him to Roy Glass, who owned a moving and storage company.
“This is one reason when people ask me why I believe in the Lord, it’s because he always seems to answer whenever I ask him the way you should,” Jeff said. “Roy said, ‘Jerry said you didn’t have a trailer.’ I said, ‘No, sir. I ain’t got no trailer. I’ve been praying that the Lord bring me one.’ He said, ‘Well, I’ve got one sitting over here in the lot. Come over and get it. You don’t even got to put my name on the side of the race car — just put it on the side of the trailer.’”
Jeff expected a small open trailer. Instead, he got an enclosed 24-foot-long one. But what to tow it with? Enter his brother Bobby and Roy again.
“Roy said, ‘Jeff, this is what we’re going to do. Bobby’s been looking at a Chevrolet truck with a 454 in it. I’m going to sponsor him; I’m going to buy him that truck. He’s going to give you his Suburban,’” Jeff said. “You know, it was an amen moment. Amen, the Lord’s good.”
During his best year of the 1990s, Jeff won 13 features.
“I was going to church and living right,” said Jeff. “I’d win a race and them other drivers would say, ‘Jeff, where are you getting all that horsepower at?’ I said, ‘Church on Sunday, brother. The Lord gives it to anybody who wants it.’”
Jeff hung it up around 2000 to 2001. Twenty years later, his son, Marcus, and brother Bobby, convinced him to get back into the sport. Jeff returned to the sport after he got back into the Lord’s graces. Five years later, he’s back to a familiar place — victory lane at Volunteer Speedway. He got to celebrate with his brother Bobby and son Marcus, who with Jeff make up Clay Nation Racing, as well as his grandson Dylan Jones, among others.
“I’ve been blessed,” Jeff said. “The Lord’s done me good.”
The Outside Groove Executive Editor has covered motorsports since 2000. His many awards include the 2019 Eastern Motorsport Press Association (EMPA) Jim Hunter Writer of the Year and the 2013 Russ Catlin Award for Excellence in Motorsports Journalism.
