MILLION-DOLLAR WINNERS CLEMENTS ENGINES

CLEMENTS RACING ENGINES has had a long and storied career in building engines for all levels of competitive automotive racing. Brothers Glenn and Tony started on their journey of building engine excellence when they would get home from school and head over to their late father, Crawford’s, auto shop.

“We were probably ten or eleven years old,” Glenn recounted recently. “We were just fascinated with mechanical things. So, we spent all our spare time in that garage. Dad worked on all kinds of cars and we learned pretty quickly we didn’t like climbing around under the cars. Dad would take us out to the races on the weekends and pretty quickly, we decided we wanted to work on race car engines.”

In the late 1970s, Clements Racing Engines was born, and the brothers built a building next to their father’s shop in Spartanburg, South Carolina.

“We were pretty ambitious,” Glenn continued. “We incorporated and started working on engines. Dad kept doing the street car and general repair stuff, and we focused on nothing but racing engines. We had to work our way up and build our reputation, but we had fortune come our way pretty early. There were some very good racers who had some engine troubles and they came to us. CL Pritchett, Johnny Thomas – they were dominating late model racing in the late 70s and early 80s. They had some engine troubles and we helped them solve their problems. They were totally impressed and from their we kind of earned the right to build new engines, and those performed even better. From that point on we’ve kind of kept our heads down and just kept building one after another.”

Clements Racing Engines has been involved in just about every level of racing, from NASCAR cup level on down. With a employee base of about twenty individuals, Clements puts out about 250 engines a year and another 350 cylinder heads. Despite those numbers, they remain focused on quality.

“Racing is very much a team sport. Many things have to line up to win, and we’re just one piece of the puzzle,” Glenn said. “We know our role and with every customer that comes our way, we want them to know that our part is covered. If one of our drivers has a bad weekend, I’ll sometimes interrogate them on what happened. They’re always quick to say ‘I had no problem in the motor department.’ That makes me feel good about it. We do our job so they don’t have to worry about it and can focus on all the other stuff needed to win.”

Victories have come a plenty. Just in 2022, Jonathan Davenport has scored major victories, including the huge million dollar race at Eldora in early June.

Along the way, the components used for their engines play a big part as well. When it comes to Clements’ relationship with Jones Racing Products, Glenn couldn’t be more complimentary.

“They are just the very best folks,” Glenn said. “It’s the type of relationship you want to have with any supplier. They are always open to what we say and what we request or suggest. And they are always striving to get us whatever we need when we need it. As a company, I just hope we can treat our customers as good as Jones treats us. It really takes it all to line up to win at the highest level. They help us do that, and we then help our customers and drivers the same way.”

When it comes to future plans and aspirations, Clements’ focus is a simple one: “We will just keep doing what we’re doing. We would never even have the thought process of wanting to win a specific race or having some goal in racing. I mean, sure we’d love to win them all, but we’re not naïve. We know if we work hard and make a great engine, the wins will come. So, we’ll just keep doing that. In the end, we know we’re truly blessed.”