News Director 
RPW Column By: MIKE TRAVERSE / RPW – MOUNT HOPE, NY – Tommy Vigh Jr. ran the entire ARCA schedule in 2019, finishing 6th in points and taking home the ARCA Rookie of the Year honors.
For 2020, Tommy will be switching things up a bit, doing most of his racing on the Hard Clay of the Orange County Fair Speedway.
“I am right now building a Street Stock, but our Big Momma Motorsports team still has a 358 and a Sportsman. I’m leaning towards racing the 358 at Orange County and just tossing around the idea of doing some Street Stock racing on the weeks that the 358’s are off,” Tommy said. “We are still hopeful on racing a few of the ARCA races, we just are not racing the full schedule this year.”
Vigh Jr. had many positive things to say about his full season in the ARCA series.
“It was a great experience. I am proud to now be listed as an ARCA Rookie of the Year and join some of the great names like Davey Allison, Benny Parsons and Frank Kimmel as a winner of that title,” Tommy said. “And I became ARCA’s oldest driver to win it. I felt that we accomplished a lot with the team in 2019. I’m very grateful to Andy Hillenburg and to Sam Burlum of Extreme Energy Solutions for the opportunity to fulfill my dream.”
Tommy has been racing since 1996. He got his start at OCFS in the Street Stocks and later moved into the Pro Stocks. As the Pro Stock era at OCFS was coming to an end, Vigh Jr. was offered a chance to race a Sportsman.
“Cliff Fitzgerald, owner of the Electric Snake company, at that time had 3 Sportsman cars,” Vigh Jr. said. “He asked me if I would like to race one of his cars. I told him that I would love to, but I was afraid to crash it. He said, ‘grab your helmet’. I appreciate that Cliff gave me that chance.”
Tommy showed steady improvement as he gained more experience in the Sportsman. He cracked the top 20 in points in 2016 and climbed up to 5th in the 2018 OCFS Sportsman standings. It was during the 2018 that Vigh Jr. got his first time behind the wheel of an ARCA car.
“Sam and I got together with Andy Hillenburg and we put together a deal to run 3 races. I knew it was going to be a way different experience right from the start when it cost me $1,300 for a physical and a drug test,” Tommy said. “But I gained some valuable experience in those 3 races. We first ran at Madison International Speedway in Wisconsin and I was able to log a lot of laps on the asphalt. Our next two races were on the dirt, first at the Illinois State Fairgrounds and at DuQuoin where we finished the race on the lead lap.”
After the 2018 season concluded, Vigh Jr., Burlum and Hillenburg reached an agreement to race for Andy’s Fast Track Racing team for the 2019 ARCA season.
“It was good, but also trying at times,” Vigh Jr. said. “It was pretty awesome to get a chance to race on some of the legendary tracks that I never thought I would race at. But for a dirt track guy like me, it wasn’t always easy to adapt. At Daytona, I just had to make sure to floor it and not lift, even though the temptation was to do so. I had to make sure not to make any unnecessary moves of the steering wheel. Other parts of the Daytona experience were just awesome. To attend the driver’s meeting and to think that guys like Earnhardt and Allison had been in that room was just an awesome feeling.”
And Vigh Jr. enjoyed the whole experience of being in the garage area with some of the big names in the sport.
“The atmosphere at the races where the Cup, Xfinity or Trucks were competing was just incredible. Stewart Friesen came up to us at Charlotte to say hello and we had a great conversation,” Tommy said. “I’m friends with David Starr and guys like Kenny Wallace would come over to say hello. And Thad Moffitt is a driver to watch. He is going to go places in this sport.”
One of Tommy’s goals for the season was to always bring Hillenburg’s car back in one piece. And for 19 out of the 20 races, that was the case. However, it did not work out that way at Talladega Superspeedway.
“We got turned and they told me that I hit the wall at 130 miles an hour,” Vigh Jr. said. “I had the wind knocked out of me, but I got the window net down right away and I heard that my fans watching in the northeast were happy to see that I was basically okay. I’m glad that Andy had insurance on that car. It was a total write off, but the insurance covered almost the whole car.”
Although Vigh Jr. is not running the full ARCA schedule in 2020, he did not rule out doing it again someday.
“It just didn’t work out for a full season this year,” Tommy said. “But we may come back and do it again in the future.”
The Big Momma Motorsports team that Tommy will be competing with this year is owned by him and his wife, Pamela Van Dunk. Right now, they are doing it all on their own, but they would like to have some sponsors join them.
“We would love to have some sponsorship for our 358 or for any of our cars,” Vigh Jr. said. “Anyone who may be interested can message me on my Vigh Racing Facebook page or on Pam’s page.”
The people that help keep their team on track are Keith, Shawn and Steve Johannessen, Jimmy and Ray Devitt and the Elliott Family.
Tommy and Pam are two of the really great people around OCFS. Tommy is a very personable and easy to talk to driver. And anyone who enters the gate at OCFS gets a very warm and kind greeting from Pam. The fans all become part of her racing family and so many of them treasure her friendship.
Hopefully, good things will happen for their racing team in 2020.
