James Tommy Byrd was born on August 8, 1961 in a small town Hendersonville, NC. He grew up watching his father work on race cars. At the young age of 17, Tommy began his own journey in racing. He built chassis in the famous and legendary Banjo Matthews shop. He then inherited the nickname “Brillo” by fellow co worker Stacey Morgan. He went to work for KLB Racecars and helped out Tony Warren, Robert Pressley, Kyle Petty.
Byrd worked for Bill Davis Racing in 1992, when NASCAR superstar Jeff Gordon began his NASCAR career in the XFINITY Series. Byrd became very successful in his young career and stepped up as crew chief for Late Model racer Jeff Caldwell.
“Brillo was a great friend and helped me out a ton, and taught me a lot. We had a lot of awesome memories together,” stated Caldwell.
He then went on to work half a season for Michael Waltrip in the XFINITY Series in 1998. He then spent the rest of the season working for Robert Yates Racing on the surface plates setting up the cars for Dale Jarrett, going on to win the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series Championship at the end of that season. Brillo then worked with Kenny Irwin, Ricky Rudd, Elliot Sadler, and David Gilliland at Yates.
It was in 2007 that Byrd wanted a change of scenery, so he went to work as a mechanic at Rusty Wallace Racing for drivers Steven Wallace, David Stemme, and Michael Annette. He then went to Turner-Scott Motorsports, working there till they shut down, as he wanted to go back to building chassis since it was his specialty.
Brillo currently resides in Sherrils Ford, NC and works at Tri-Star Motorsports which fields cars in the XFINITY Series.
Away from his full time job he helps his son on his race team, Travis Byrd, who is competing at Hickory Motor Speedway in the Limited Late Model division.
“My dad is the hardest working man I know and probably the hardest man to please, he expects nothing but perfection,” Travis said. “I will never forget the night I won my first go-cart race, I was so excited and he just sat there all the way home critiquing me on my driving and what I could do better. He just wants to see me succeed in what I do. It’s really cool because back in my day I watched dad win races with different people now he’s watching and helping me win races.”
Brillo has been on top of the technology of chassis setup for over 35 years – eatting, sleeping and dreaming of new ways on how to improve everything.
