MT. AYR, Iowa - Compromise, competitor, consistency, champion … four words I think of most when asked about my brother, Dennis Elliott -- the 2006 Mountain Dew Bloomfield Speedway USRA Modified Track Champion.

We grew up busting our knuckles on matchbox cars at local dirt tracks and in the back of racecar haulers following our dad everywhere he went. One summer the two of us pooled together all of our earnings from lawn service and started our very own RC race team. It wasn’t long before two cars became boring, so we organized a series and convinced our friends to buy and build cars to race on an oval track we built in dad’s vacant lot. As we grew out of watching our racecars from the outside we decided riding on them would be more fun. In 1996 we sold the entire RC team and we started racing go-karts. In the first two years, Dennis locked up two track championships and multiple feature wins and later began his pursuit of a degree in Marketing and Management at Northwest Missouri State University.

Compromise: In the winter of 1999 I stopped by my dad’s race shop -- at that time only my go-kart had remained of the Elliott Motorsports team, at least to my knowledge. I came to find out that Dennis had basically sold everything he owned to buy a Modified and, as I scratched my head in disbelief looking at the used chassis sitting on the floor of dads shop, he confidently took the next step in his racing career.

“If you want to do something as bad as I did you just have to go for it,” he said.

A little known fact about my brother is he takes care of his equipment because it’s almost 100% funded by his efforts on and off the track where he’s a counterman at NAPA Auto Parts in Mt. Ayr, Iowa.

“I’ve been around cars my entire life, I’ll always be doing something in the automotive field,” he said one lazy afternoon from a pond dam catching up on some brother-to-brother time.

Racing to Dennis has never been considered a hobby, for him every time the helmet goes on he’s satisfying a need to compete.

Competitor: A word I mentioned above that he and I probably confused with “brother” for most of our lives. Looking back I can’t think of a single time the two of us weren’t trying to out run each other or raise the bar even higher for the next attempt.

Through all of this he’s learned to be fair to his competitors and provides a humble “what-you-see-is-what-you-get” attitude. I’ve never seen him hide any speed secrets from his peers, and if you ask him for advice I’m sure he’ll have you both climbing under and around the car until your head spins.

Consistency: By 2004 Dennis became more and more confident as he continued to log seat time (it also didn’t hurt to have Dad turning wrenches on the car).

Dick Elliott (dad) has been around racing since the ’60s. As a teenager he began racing his own hand-fabricated #29 Late Model. Dennis would later campaign the #29 throughout his career. Dad’s career logged multiple wins and a track championship as a driver. His résumé as a crew chief takes him to another level of respect when you consider an I.M.C.A. National Championship as well as overwhelming success with Sprint Cars at Knoxville (Iowa) Raceway.

Dennis and I joked a lot about how meticulous our dad was with going fast.

“I can’t think of a single thing we bought in pieces or complete that he didn’t disassemble and build his way. It was always faster than before, of course.”

Champion: In his 2005-06 seasons a weird thing happened: no feature wins and no first-place trophies … a drought by most sports writers’ standards. Think again, consistency brought success with two track championships, the most recent collected from the Mountain Dew Bloomfield Speedway. Ironically, Dennis’s track championships have mirrored Dad’s 1975 Adams County speedway track championship in which neither driver won an main event.

What’s new for Dennis in 2007? Everything, including a 2007 IROC Modified.

“I’ve got a completely new car and fresh motors so I’m very excited for this year. We haven’t started a season with this level of equipment before.”

He’s very thankful of his sponsors who pitch in to offset some of the costs: IROC Race Cars, Smith’s Sports & Spirits, Bland’s Heavy Wrecker Service, Specialized Wholesale & Technology, Glendenning Motor Company, A & K Cattle, Advanced Ag, Podium Ink and NAPA Auto Parts of Mt. Ayr. Look for him to compete at Bloomfield again this year as well as tracks across Iowa and Missouri. He’s getting better each year and this year we’ve taken the look of the team very seriously for any inquiring business to market their operations with Elliott Motorsports. However, for the most part … behind the shinny new vinyl from Podium Ink is a car, still funded by the hardworking boy who mowed lawns in high gear and sold all he had to compete fulfilling his dreams as a racecar driver.

I couldn’t be prouder to have a brother and friend like Dennis.