How far GMS Racing has come in such a short amount of time can be seen when visiting the Statesville, North Carolina, shop.
“Win banners,” NASCAR XFINITY Series rookie Spencer Gallagher says. “It starts out with myself and Grant (Enfinger) running ARCA cars, and you can trace the lineage all the way down to the very last banner right now which is Johnny (Sauter) and that championship.
“Getting to walk into our shop and look at that lineup and just watch the chronology of GMS come along, it’s an awe-inspiring thing.”
GMS Racing is at the top of the NASCAR Camping World Truck Series mountain heading into 2017. Sauter delivered the company its first championship in his first season here. GMS also went to Victory Lane six times in 2016 with four different drivers.
“It really was one of those surreal moments when Johnny crossed the finish line at Homestead, and I sat there and thought to myself, ‘We’ve gone from zero to championship in 36 months,’ ” Gallagher said.
In other words, the organization’s hard work paid off. What started with two trucks and one ARCA car has rapidly expanded to a multi-vehicle operation with entries in two of NASCAR’s national series. Just how did the company go from being just another also-ran to contenders? Gallagher doesn’t hesitate to hand out credit.
“I think it all begins with getting your competition director, Mike Beam, on board,” Gallagher said. “That man is the single best thing we’ve done since we started racing. As my father (team owner Maurice Gallagher) likes to say, you want great people everywhere, but a lot of times organizations are built on three or four really fantastic people in a couple places, and your job is to go find those. You need to find the genius among the geniuses and those are the people you build a team around.”
Beam joined GMS Racing in January 2015 and said the organization just about threw everything away and started over. Maurice Gallagher not only put faith in Beam’s leadership but also followed it with his commitment to making it work financially.
Beam has been nothing but impressed by Maurice Gallagher, calling him a unique man who loves competition, winning and building companies. When he signed on, Beam didn’t have two years to make GMS Racing better off, but he admits the two talked about needing a clear direction in that time frame.
One of the first things Beam wanted to instill in the organization was a sense of consistency in how the shop operated. That meant making sure areas such as the wind tunnel or the aero departments were in line. He worked with getting the crew chiefs and the car chiefs operating in the same way, which translated to having the drivers feel the same thing every week.
“Basically just bring some consistency in the program, and trust me, we’re still working on that,” Beam said. “It’s getting better, but to be where we’re at now, everyone’s come a long way. It’s been a lot of work.”
In 2017, Sauter and crew chief Joe Shear Jr. will defend their title while Justin Haley and Kaz Grala embark on their rookie seasons. Furthermore, Kevin Bellicourt and Jerry Baxter have signed with the organization to crew chief for Haley and Grala, respectively.
While the Truck Series program looks primed for continued success, Spencer Gallagher is moving into the XFINITY Series with Joey Cohen serving as his crew chief. It will be the first time GMS has fielded a full-time XFINITY Series effort, and the organization has set itself up well by purchasing chassis and engines from Hendrick Motorsports.
Beam says GMS will count on JR Motorsports to help them get their XFINITY organization up and running, as well as assist with the wind tunnel program.
“(JR Motorsports’) Ryan Pemberton and his group are doing a great job helping us with that,” Beam said. “The team with them is going to be priceless because those guys have gone above and beyond and they’re racing well. Spencer having, I don’t want to say a teammate, but to have somebody (to lean on) because Elliott Sadler is such a good guy and Justin Allgaier; they’re just really good people.
“I feel like it was best to get aligned with people like that for us to go to the next level.”
Both Gallagher and Beam are eager to see what this year brings, knowing they have just as strong a lineup as 2016. There’s an air of believing “we can do great things” around the shop since they’ve already shown themselves they can, Gallagher says.
Beam is a little more reserved. He preaches every day that one cannot just be involved at GMS Racing but must be committed. There is also the constant reminder that it’s all about winning. Which Beam feels the organization needs to do more of this year because few got away in the past.
However, Beam and Gallagher can both agree GMS Racing is better off now than it was two years ago.
“We’re not going to panic if we don’t get off to a really good start, but I feel like we will,” Beam said. “Everybody’s just got to execute. I feel like our lineup is really good. I feel like everybody seems to work together (well), and I keep telling everybody, this is all about GMS. Everybody works together. And I think everybody’s buying into that.”