Just eight months ago, Johnny Knotts was running his family’s hardware store.
Now, he is in charge of pit lane at major motorsports events across the nation.
“I don’t usually like change, and I’m not one for inconsistency, so this is new for me,” he said. “But to obtain some things, you have to take a chance, and that’s where I’m at in my life.”
Knotts, the third-generation owner of Knotts Hardware, ran the store since 1987, before coming to the tough decision to close the store last October. He has been involved with racing for the past eight years on a part-time basis. With his responsibilities in his hometown now off his shoulders, Knotts has taken a full-time role as the pit lane manager for the International Motorsports Association, which governs the American Le Mans Series. The series was recently bought by NASCAR, but Knotts will remain involved with IMSA and the ALMS.
“I hope to one day transition over into the marketing and public relations side of things,” he said.
He calls his current role a “dream come true” and that it isn’t all that different from the 25 years he spent in charge of a hardware store.
“The customers I deal with now are really no different than the ones I served at Knotts Hardware,” he said. “You have to treat your customers like people and the way you would want to be treated — whether that customer is a professional race car driver or someone buying a rake from me.”
Knotts will head June 25 (his birthday), to New York, for the Porsche GT3 Challenge, at Watkins Glen. It will be the first part of a three-week road trip.
UNUSUAL SUSPECT
Knotts didn’t grow up in a racing family.
“Realistically, I think I’m a head-coach-of-a-football-team type of guy,” he said. “My brother and I grew up in a traditional baseball-, basketball-, football-type of family.”
Knotts said his new passion didn’t stem from a long love of racing but rather an admiration of sports cars, specifically European cars.
Through that interest, Knotts was introduced in 1986, to his first Le Mans racing experience at the 12 Hours of Sebring.
“I haven’t missed one since,” he said. “I’ve been to every 12 Hour since that day — either as a fan or working.”
After getting hooked at Sebring, Knotts’ former wife, Katrina, bought him a gift to attend the Porsche Driving Experience, which allows Porsche owners to get the experience of driving at a road course of their choice. Knotts chose Road Atlanta in Braselton, Ga., home of the Petit Le Mans, the signature event of the American Le Mans Series.
Knotts later went on to attend the Panoz Racing School. Through that involvement with Panoz, an American car manufacturer headquartered in Braselton, Knotts established contacts with Panoz Racing and Road Atlanta.
He discovered early that he had no future behind the wheel on a race track but wanted to be involved in the atmosphere of road racing.
“I wasn’t the fastest, so I think I would have been a sponsor’s dream, because you certainly had time to read what was on the side of my car,” he said. “I just started getting my feet wet of being in that environment, and it became something that I just clicked with and that I wanted to be a part of.”
Eight years ago, Katrina, a dental hygienist, was cleaning the teeth of a man who happened to be the head of pit lane for the American Le Mans Series. He mentioned that they were looking for another pit official. Katrina immediately called her husband, and, from there, Knotts got one step closer to his new dream.
“I went from sitting on one side of the fence at Sebring one year to working on pit lane the next year,” he said. “That’s a dream come true for someone like me.”
OFFICIAL PRESSURES
As with any official of a sport, Knotts said it isn’t always fun.
“As an official, you learn to overcome things,” he said.
One decision that most impacted Knotts came at the 12 Hours of Sebring, when he observed what he thought initially was an infraction that, if called, would have significantly changed the outcome of the race between the top two teams: Peugeot and Audi. Unlike NASCAR, in the ALMS pit crews are not allowed to work on the cars during refueling, other than wiping the window screen and assisting the driver.
“After eight hours of racing, Audi and Peugeot were around two seconds apart, and it was coming down to pit stops,” he said.
During a Peugeot refueling, a mechanic wiped down a headlamp.
“I was thinking the race was over,” he said. “Audi was going to win, and Peugeot was going to lose by breaking this rule, but something in my gut told me to hold off on assessing it.”
Unlike sports like football and basketball, racing officials are allowed more time before assessing a penalty and can even assess a penalty after the race is over. After meeting with the Peugeot team manager, Knotts discovered a new rule allowing the wiping of headlamps had been added to the European rule book of the governing body of the race but had not made it over to the ALMS rulebook.
“If I had made the call, the race would have been over, and it would have been the wrong call,” he said. “Going with my gut instinct to not call that penalty at that moment saved the race. I’ll never forget that.”