Phil Scott

Phil Scott is not only a racer, when inducted into the NEAR Hall of Fame he was also Governor of the state of Vermont. Scott’s competitiveness started as a young boy racing handmade wooden buggies down the streets of Barre, VT. Throughout his teens he worked on race cars for notables like Joey Kourafas and Robbie Crouch.

By 1980 he had started pursuing wilder days as a top snowmobile racer, racing snowmobiles throughout New England and into Canada. Scott loved to compete, and make things go faster. He won two New England championships and became well-known in the 1980s, he competed at the world-class level where the competition was tough, he will modestly say he was decent, but he wasn’t top of the field. He competed with guys that raced Formula One, on twin tracks that were iced down. He survived a horrific wreck in Skowhegan, Me., where the fans thought for sure he was dead. He went flying about 25 feet in the air out of the track over a fun house landing on the ice. After a trip to the hospital where they found nothing broken, he went back to the races and, and later that afternoon raced with his backup snowmobile.

In 1996, at the age of 38, he won his first late model series race at Thunder Road Speedbowl, and the division championship, which he won again in 1998. From there he went on to win the Thunder Road Milk Bowl twice (1997, 2000). To this day, Scott holds the track record for the most career wins at Thunder Road. He also has nine American Canadian Tour (ACT) late model wins. In 2002, he became a three-time champion, winning both the Thunder Road and Airborne Late Model Series track championships and the ACT championship. He also competed in the 2005 British Stock Car Association (BriSCA) Formula One Championship of the World.

In 2012 at the age of 54 he beat a field of 29 at Thunder Road. Scott has been racing cars for over 30 years. His racing career almost came to an end when he won the governor’s race in 2016. Luckily, he has set a precedent, there are not many governors who have actively competed in auto racing and he continues to race on a limited basis to this day. In 2017 and 2019, Scott won again at Thunder Road and is believed to be the only governor on record to win while in active office. Scott feels racing is similar to politics in several ways– first, you go around in circles a lot. Second, you need to surround yourself with talented people with the right chemistry in order to succeed.