Hollie Smith

For as long as Hollie can remember, Motorsports has been in her family. Her father was a crew chief for a car in the New England circuit for over 18 years. After moving to Florida, her brother began racing at East Bay Raceway. She helped him every chance she could, as she was a golf professional and that took up most of her time. After 3 years of helping Chad, she decided not to be a spectator anymore. She started racing late in the 1998 season, but just enough time to know she wanted to race.

1999, her first full season, Hollie finished 10th in points and was runner up for Rookie-of-the-Year. It was then she realized there was more to racing than getting in the car and driving. Her #60 street stock could be seen every Saturday night at East Bay Raceway, along with visits to various Children's Hospitals, fundraisers and even parades.

For the 2000 season, advertising partners were stepping up wanting to be apart of this team. Her sponsor list included Dave Pletcher Racing, Dayton Andrews Dodge, Causeway Towing and Transmission, AutoZone and Short Track USA radio show. The season started off at Sarasota's "Salute to Racing 2000" where over 25,000 people from all over the bay area saw up close their favorite cars and met their favorite drivers. 

Hollie is known as the "Fan Friendly Ambassador" for East Bay Raceway and was the only car representing her track there. This drew a lot of attention as East Bay is a dirt track and all the other local tracks are asphalt. She gave away T-shirts, bumper stickers, signed pictures and even put in a passenger seat with the safety belts drove kids around in the parking lot. Her kindness with kids didn't stop there. She visited the All Children's Hospital and SurgiKid Center, Florida Elks Youth Camp, Plant City Elks Lodge, East Bay fundraisers, charity events and AutoZone car shows (first Friday of every month). Her car could be seen outside of her sponsor locations each and every weekend before the races.

Along with her dedication and hard work, she has her family and crew that are involved with every aspect of her racing, and there every step of the way. She comments "I would not be where I am today without them." Hollie has strong family values and feels her racing has made them closer and stronger. On the track in 2000, she had 6 heat wins and a best feature finish of 2nd place. Some of her feature finishes.....one-2nd place, two-3rd place, five-4th place and nine-5th places finishes. This was the first time a woman at East Bay Raceway has ever finished in the top 3 during a regular season event. Hollie and her crew have worked hard for their 9th in points final point standing out of 63 cars, even after an injury in September where she was out for 3 weeks. Hollie had a couple articles written about her in various MotorSport magazines, 2 live interviews on Short Track USA where she became a regular on the show giving fans weekly results of the races at East Bay Raceway. The end result for the 2000 season, Hollie was awarded "2000 Sportsmanship Award" and "Driver of the Year."

Along with rebuilding her car, she volunteered her time each night of the WinterNationals at East Bay Raceway. 17 nights of Hav-A-Tampa and STARS late models and the 360 and 410 outlaw STAR sprints, brought a new light to Hollie. Her long term goal is to run in the STARS Sprint division. With your help as a marketing partner, Hollie feels this is the ultimate attention grabber. It is not too often you find an outgoing and caring personality in racing that is 100% dedicated to their sponsors and fans...then add a female driver...and now top if off with a Sprint car. There is no telling how far you can go as partners...it is only limited to your imagination.