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CUP: Remembering Jeff Byrd
Jeff Byrd helped transform NASCAR racing...
Mike Hembree  |  Posted October 19, 2010   Charlotte, NC
Jeff Byrd (Left) was president of Bristol Motor Speedway during a period of tremendous growth. (Photo: NASCAR.com)
A man will be put to rest in the rolling hills of east Tennessee Wednesday, and the region will never be quite the same – ever again.

Jeff Byrd, who grew up on the flatlands of central North Carolina, moved to the mountains of Tennessee in mid-career and turned himself into a NASCAR superstar of sorts. He didn’t drive race cars or build engines, but his ultimate impact on his part of the world would be greater than those who do.

Byrd arrived at Bristol Motor Speedway to take the helm of the race track in 1996 and, in 2003, was named its president. He was part of the Winston mafia, that core group of bright young people who worked for the R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Co. from the 1970s to 1990s and helped transform NASCAR racing. Several – Byrd among them – would advance from public relations and management careers in Reynolds’ sports marketing division to leadership roles at NASCAR speedways.

The people at Sports Marketing Enterprises – Reynolds’ sports promotion arm – knew the game from A to Z, and beyond. The youngsters trained there under the guidance of men like Ralph Seagraves and T. Wayne Robertson had been educated well and were ready for bigger roles in the broader racing landscape.

Byrd was among the best of them. Originally a sports writer in Winston-Salem, N.C., he signed on with RJR and stayed there 23 years, advancing from a garage-level PR job that found him dressed in the somewhat wacky solid red uniforms the Winston folks wore in those days to a management role. When Speedway Motorsports tycoon Bruton Smith took over Bristol Motor Speedway, he called on Byrd to run the show.

And what a show it became.

The Bristol track, a true jewel in the rough, grew from 67,000 seats to 160,000 and took on a Roman coliseum persona during Byrd’s tenure. He also revitalized the adjacent dragway and made it one of the top stops on the NHRA tour.

Although Byrd knew virtually everybody in NASCAR racing, you typically didn’t find him spending a lot of time with movers and shakers and the big-money folks on race weekends. He was an advocate of the average fan, and he backed up his claim that fans were always first at BMS with his own footsteps. He could be seen on race weekends giving rides to spectators in his golf cart, handling problems in parking areas and making sure bumps in the road were taken care of quickly.

Fans who contacted the track with complaints often were surprised to find Byrd himself responding personally to their situations.

He was the face and heart of the track.

He lost a long, difficult battle with cancer Sunday.

A memorial service will be held Wednesday morning at Grace Fellowship Church in Johnson City, TN. On Thursday, the infield at Bristol Motor Speedway will be opened for an 11 a.m. community appreciation service in his memory.

And they will race again next spring and summer at Bristol.

But it will never be the same.

Mike Hembree is NASCAR Editor for SPEED.com and has been covering motorsports for 28 years. He has written several books on NASCAR, including "NASCAR: The Definitive History of America's Sport" and "Then Tony Said To Junior: The Best NASCAR Stories Ever Told". He is a six-time winner of the National Motorsports Press Association Writer of the Year Award.

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