Before the Xfinity Series was littered with entries from some of the top teams in the NASCAR Cup Series, BACE Motorsports could make the case for being one of the last great teams that focused solely on competing at NASCAR’s second tier.
“I take kind of pride that I was probably the last full-time [Xfinity] guy to win an [Xfinity] championship because every guy since me has gone on to Cup,” Randy Lajoiea two-time series champion with BACE, told Rick Benjamin on RaceLine. “I decided to make a living inside the [Xfinity] series and I’m not regretting that at all.”
BACE Motorsports probably isn’t the team it was, nor was LaJoie the Hall of Famer that he’s about to become, without Steve Bird. The long-time crew chief who won four titles in the Xfinity Series passed away last week at 70 years old. Telling the story of LaJoie’s rise and the rise of many other early stars of the Xfinity Series can’t be told without ‘Birdy’. And boy, were there stories to tell.
Bird’s early career included stints as a crew member for New England Motor Racing Hall of Famer Pete Fiandaca and NASCAR driver Ron Bouchardfor his upset win at Talladega Superspeedway in 1981.
Bird got into the Xfinity Series with Rob Moroso and Moroso Racing. He guided the then 19-year-old Moroso to his first two career wins in 1988. In 1989, Bird and Moroso won four races and won a championship battle with veteran drivers Tommy Ellis and Tommy Houston.
His two seasons with Moroso began a career of taking young drivers and putting them in victory lane. In 1990, Bird guided future series champion Steve Grissom to his first career win — one of four that season — at Motor Mile Speedway in Fairlawn, Va.
The next season, he was Kenny Wallace’s crew chief for what would be his first career win at Volusia County Speedway. In a post on X, Wallace credited Bird as, “the reason I made it to the winner circle in NASCAR.”
After a rough start to 1994, Bird, rookie Johnny Bensonand the BACE Motorsports team delivered with a win at Dover Motor Speedway. In 1995, they followed that up with two more wins, 19 top 10s, and a championship with Benson behind the wheel.
“There’s no ‘I’ in team,’” Bird said at that year’s series banquet. “So I want to get my whole team up here.”
Bird then named off his entire team as they walked on stage and gave them their chance to get an ovation from those in attendance.
Benson moved on to the Cup Series, and when team owner Bill Baumgardner went looking for a new driver, the Massachusetts-born Bird offered up a fellow New Englander in LaJoie.
LaJoie went on to win at Nazareth Speedway and collect four more wins in their first season together, setting up for a chance to win the championship in the final race of 1996 at Homestead-Miami Speedway.
Originally leading David Green by 33 points, the two traded the points lead throughout the race. On lap 140, Green went into the pits ahead of LaJoie, but Bird’s crew got the No. 74 out ahead on pit exit with a two-tire stop. The fuel tank survived a 60-lap run and carried LaJoie and Bird to the 1996 Xfinity title.
Bird and BACE Motorsports were in for another tough championship battle in 1997 with Todd Bodine. A turning point in the race came at the Milwaukee Mile where LaJoie jumped from fifth to first on a green-flag pit cycle to win while Bodine crashed on the final lap while in second. LaJoie took a 32-point lead in the standings.
“These guys won it on pit road for us,” LaJoie said postrace. “Birdy and these guys put on a pit stop… They busted a good one, and leaving, I thought I might have lost a cylinder, thought I had a vibration towards the end, but it was good enough for first.”
When the team clinched the 1997 title, their third straight, at Rockingham Speedway later that fall, there was an emotional moment for Bird as he was interviewed on the TNN broadcast.
“I just can’t thank this BACE Motorsports team enough,” Bird said. “I’m getting kinda emotional because three-in-a-row is hard in any sport I guess, Cup or [Xfinity]. I’m just so proud of the guys. What can I say? Bill Baumgardner, the best car owner I’ve ever had. All my friends up at Henry J’s, I know you’ll have a B-52 for me now.”
Bird and LaJoie won one race in 1998 before Bird went on to have stints with Bill Davis Racing and Cicci-Welliver Racing until his racing career, and life, hit a major roadblock. In 2002, he was diagnosed with an aortic aneurysm.
“The docs told me no more racing,” Bird said in a column to Speedway Illustrated in April 2021. “That didn’t work for too long. I was still driven.”
Bird went on to the Hooters Pro Cup Series where he worked with Bobby Gill on a pair of championship campaigns. He also won a race with Jody Lavender at Ace Speedway in 2005. By career’s end, Bird would have 45 Xfinity wins with four titles to go along with 24 Hooters Pro Cup wins and two series championships.
While his health in his final years was rough — he underwent a heart bypass in 2020 — he doesn’t share any regrets about the life he lived in racing.
“I’m more careful now, but I’m also proud I never missed a party, though I do wish I remembered a little more of them,” Bird wrote to Speedway Illustrated. “I often think of something my friend Bruce Cohen, formerly a racing journalist, once told me: ‘You know, Birdie, we lived through the best period of auto racing ever.’”
James Krause joined Frontstretch in March 2024 as a contributor. Krause was born and raised in Illinois and graduated from Northern Illinois University. He currently works in La Crosse, Wisconsin as a local sports reporter, including local short track racing. Outside of racing, Krause loves to keep up with football, music, anime and video games.
