Scott Thomas
My name is Scott Thomas, and I live in
Littleton,
Colorado, USA.
Scott and his awesome 1979 Trans Am at the track.
I was born in New Jersey in 1966 and spent the next 8 years at various race tracks. My dad was into drag racing, and road course racing all over the east coast and the racing bug bit me very early on. Then one day my parents heard John Denver’s, “Rocky Mountain High, in Colorado” on the radio and they knew we had to live there. So we became a part of the “John Denver Westward Movement” in 1974 and moved to “Colorful Colorado”. Dad gave up racing, (mom insisted) but we still watched every type of racing we could find on TV. When I turned 14, dad and I rescued a car from the junkyard and started building it from scratch (a 1969 Monte Carlo SS). When I was old enough, dad took me to the local drag strip known here as ‘Bandimere Speedway’, and taught me all he knew about drag racing. I was in love. I raced in the high school drags for the next few years and even won the event a few times my 2nd and 3rd years. Once I was done with High School, I joined the Navy and became a Submariner stationed on the east coast for the next 5 years. When my time serving “King and Country” was done, I came back to Colorado and started building 2nd gen Camaros, a few 1950s Chevy trucks (a ‘55, ‘57 and ‘59) and even a Chrysler K car I decided to drop a small block Chevy into with a 4 speed.
Scott hanging out at the track checking out some of the other cars.
Then one sunny day in 1998, a friend of mine came to me and said he wanted me to build him a muscle car he had seen near his place of employment. He had me take a look at it and as soon as I saw it, I knew it was an 80-ish Trans Am with a 301 Turbo. YUCK! I tried to talk him into a Camaro, or a Chevelle...ANYTHING except a fire chicken with very little fire! But, he had his heart set on it, so we bought it and drove it to his house. We tore that car down to the frame and started over. New suspension all the way up to new paint and a new Pontiac 350 with an 871 Blower to top it off. This was the 1st blower motor I ever built, and I had to learn many new things to really get it setup right. The funny thing was, while tearing this car apart and putting it back together, I realized that I liked the way Pontiac engineered things MUCH better than Chevy. Oh boy. The only constant in the universe is change, right? So I gave up building 2nd gen Camaros, and switched to the Trans Am.
One of Scott's team member's TA with a blower.
A few months later, I found a ‘79 Trans Am with the WS6 package, Olds 6.6 under the hood and she only had 50k original miles on her. I bought her and started fixing her up. I raced her for a few years bone stock, and then decided to try and find some real horse power in that Olds 403. What a fantastic engine to build! Such a short stroke with a monstrous bore. I’ve always been a firm believer in bore over stroke, and the 403 was no exception. The motor was very cheap and very eager to demonstrate what horsepower she was really, truly capable of putting out.
Scott's two young sons, Wes and Will, in front of the 79 TA.
In 2000, this friend with his new blower, and me with my new ‘79 started a drag racing team. We went from a 2 man team to a 12 men, and 2 women team. We won 4 “All Team” Season Championships and several independent events over the course of the next 12 years and even had a member win the Season Championship in 2008.
One of the T'or Drakkon Racing Team shirts.
I’ve been in love with the Trans Am ever since I built that first one with my buddy, and even my wife has switched from loving her Nova to loving the Trans Am (not a difficult move there, right?!) and now we have bought a second one. And wouldn’t you know it, the one we found was an ‘80, 301 non-turbo car. But, we’ll fix that soon enough and turn her into the car she was really intended to be. We’ll put some real fire into that fire chicken!
Scott's two awesome Trans Ams, a 1979 and 1980.
Recently, I found this great club and have found people that love this iconic car as much as the wife and I do, and we’ve made some new friendships that I am sure, will last a lifetime! What a great bunch of folks! And what a great thing it is to surround yourself with people who you share a passion with!
Bo Darville and Scott at the local Rocky Mountain Trans Am Club get together in Lakewood Colorado.
I have two boys coming of age, and we’ll be building our new ‘80 TA together (I’m sure there is a 3rd TA in the cards for us soon) and I will be one proud papa the day I get to hand the keys to my son, as he takes his shiny new TA to do battle at Bandimere speedway in the High School Drags.
Scott's wife Gwendolyn and their 2 boys, Wes on the left and Will on the right.
Thanks for reading!
-Scott Thomas
Founder and President of T’or Drakkon Racing Inc.
Some video of Scott at the local car show in Colorado.
Some more video of Scott at the local car show in Colorado.
A video Scott made comprised of Bandit Club member cars.
Another video Scott made comprised of Bandit Club member cars.
