SVRA: Local hero's brand strikes vintage pose at COTA

ABOVE: Group 1 driver/owner Robert MacKenzie
affixes a Beanitos logo to his G Prod Triumph Spitfire.

If you walk the paddock at Circuit of The Americas this weekend at the Sportscar Vintage Racing Association national championships, you're likely to see decals for the snack food, "Beanitos," on numerous racecars. Product samples abound. SVRA timing and scoring crews munch on the potato chip alternative, and boxes of individual packages are perched on stacks of tires. Analogies to the ubiquitous STP stickers glued to just about everything throughout racetracks in the days of Andy Granatelli are a stretch, but the goal of making brand impressions is the same.

In this case, the man behind the promotion is Austin, Texas resident and vintage racer Dave Foreman. Like many in the paddock 55-year-old Dave spent a good measure of his life building businesses and establishing financial security. Unlike many, it was his wife Betina (with Dave, LEFT, photo courtesy of Dave Foreman) who was the racer in the family and it was up to her to nudge Dave into wheel-to-wheel competition just three years ago.

Until then, Dave's career and life had been exclusively about food. The name of a website he owns offering his food product marketing consulting services says it all: Fooddude.com. The son of restaurateurs, Dave's life destiny seemed to be all about food. He cut his university education short to pitch in at the family business. Later, in 1989, when brother Doug started the company, "Guiltless Gourmet," Dave signed on to direct marketing.

The brothers sold that successful business in 1994 and became food industry consultants. As the dot-com craze expanded, the risk-taking Foreman brothers threw everything they had behind a web service to help restaurant managers and other volume food purchasers find the best prices, complete with an order guide.

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The idea had merit but the timing was a bit off. There were no sock puppets or Super Bowl ads, but the now infamous tech bubble burst and did their business. Picking up the pieces and applying his industry experience as well as a hard-earned network, Dave went to work for other companies selling packaged food. He prospered and in 2008 he and Doug got the entrepreneurial bug again and launched Beanitos.

Dave and Doug are members of an active board of directors but wisely decided to hire professional managers for day-to-day decisions. While Beanitos is still establishing itself as a brand, it is available in most major retailers across the country. The appeal is to a market of snack food lovers looking for low glycemic, non-GMO alternative chips. The brothers saw the market opportunity to develop a product derived from beans and went for the opening.

The next family member to spy opportunity was Dave's wife Betina. Long a racing enthusiast, Betina has competed in autocross and serves as secretary for the SCCA Lone Star Region near their home in Austin. A Triumph TR6 owner she is also region director of the Triumph Stag Club. While she was more interested in an organizing role, the idea of her husband racing appealed to her. For years Dave didn't share her enthusiasm for the sport.

"A few years ago she literally drug me to an autocross," Dave says. "It opened my eyes. Next we entered the Drive Your Dream tour of exotic cars like Ferrari, Lamborghini and Maserati. It was exhilarating."

ABOVE: Dave Foreman in his Beanitos Porsche with the COTA trademark tower looming.

Dave decided a visit to the Rusty Wallace Racing Experience at Thunderhill Raceway in Kyle, Texas would be a good idea. With the construction of COTA and the renewal of the United States Grand Prix in 2012, the hook was fully set. Dave Foreman was going racing.

Using the TR6 he attended Corinthian Vintage Racers Association driving school in early 2013. He later acquired a Triumph Spitfire with the goal of competing in the SVRA's first national championships at COTA later that year. Achieving that goal, continued success with Beanitos allowed Dave to purchase a 1971 Porsche 914 (ABOVE, Don Couch photo), which he says is carefully restored "down to each nut and bolt." He even contacted Dwight Mitchell, the original factory driver, for expert consultation.

Given Dave's business success it is no surprise that once he decided to go racing, he was all in. In addition to the TR6, the Spitfire and 914 he and Betina own a 1993 BMW E36 for SCCA racing. They also have a 914 street car, a 1999 Jaguar and a 1987 BMW they purchased just three weeks ago. He has licenses to run in six clubs: SVRA, CVAR, SCCA, the Gulf Coast Vintage Racing Association, the Porsche Club of America and the BMW Car Club of America. His racing schedule had 26 dates on it this year.

He's a quick learner as well. This year Dave picked off three wins at the SCCA Lone Star GP weekend. He's a podium regular in CVAR and is looking at top three in that group's series championship. He likes winning but insists that is not his primary motivation.

"I am in it to have fun," Dave asserts. "I enjoy vintage racing the most. The cars are diverse and the people are like family. Betina thrives here with all the good friends. If I had understood that before we would have gotten involved long ago."

Two of Dave's most prized racing trophies came off the track. Both recognized the spirit of a driver and the cars they own. One was with the Porsche club with an award selected by the corner workers for a given weekend. Consideration is given to the spirit of the driver. The other came with the "Spirit of Chump" award at a ChumpCar World Series event where Dave and Betina entered their TR6.

"That is the recognition we really appreciate," Dave says. "It's a statement that people recognize your heart is in the right place for our sport."

While Foreman relies on professional garages to prepare his Porsche and BMW racecars, care of the Spitfire is another example of the throwback feel and sense family of vintage racers while at the racetrack. A friend, Robert McKinsey, is very knowledgeable about Triumph cars and frequents the tracks to pitch in.

"There's a group of Triumph owners and we garage together at the tracks," Foreman explains. "We call ourselves the Triumph Ghetto. It's that family atmosphere. You can always find someone with a part or the knowledge who will help."

Another example of the sense of family in the vintage paddock is that the other racers who affix the Beanitos stickers on their cars do it not because Dave sponsors them – he doesn't – but because they just want to help a friend promote his business (RIGHT: Ed Copley poses with his "Beanitos" 1980 Ralt RT-4). Of course, they get bags of chips to crunch on.

In the spirit of racing to be competitive but always remembering the culture of having fun and fellowship in sport, Dave and Benita named their race team, "TLB Motorsports." TLB stands for "Three Little Birds," a reference to a favorite Bob Marley song that contains lyrics that speak to their spirit: "Don't worry about a thing, cause every little thing's gonna be alright..."

It seems things are more than "alright" for Dave Foreman and his racer wife who finally convinced him he had attained a point in life when he had the time and resources to jump into the sport she loves. It's easy to see TLB Motorsports is powered by Beanitos.