Local racing fans are in for a special night this Thursday when the Daniel Pitino Shelter hosts a fundraising event called “Winner’s Circle” featuring local professional motorcycle racers Roger Hayden, Nick McFadden, JD Beach, Hayden Gillim and Jake Lewis.
The event is in celebration of the Shelter’s 25 years of serving the homeless in Owensboro. The shelter website said the format will be a fun, family-friendly night of storytelling for racing fans and friends of the Daniel Pitino Shelter where the racers will share highlights of their careers and memories of their friendships with Nicky Hayden.
The guys will also be available for autographs and photos.
Roger Hayden, who’s sister serves on the board for Pitino Shelter, attended the annual fundraiser dinner last year and says he had a great time. So this year, with it being the shelter’s 25th year, organizers were looking for guest speakers and asked Roger if he and the other local racers would be interested. Roger asked his racing friends and training partners who said they were all “happy to do it.”
“It should be a fun night for people who are interested in hearing about racing but don’t know a lot about it,” Hayden said. “Pitino does a lot of great things for our community so it’s good to help out and give back.”
The organizers of the event worked with the racers to find a night where all of them would be in town, which was pretty impressive considering JD Beach is racing in both series (road racing and dirt track) this year. Beach says he is excited about getting to speak at the Winners Circle event.
“I feel honored to have been picked to come and speak there and it’s really cool that it’ll be a group of Owensboro racers,” Beach said. “It will be cool to help give back to the city of Owensboro.”
Winner’s Circle will be held at 5:30 – 8:00 p.m. on Thursday, July 18, in the Moore Center at Brescia University, 717 Frederica Street. Individual tickets are $25 and table sponsorships are available. All proceeds will benefit the Daniel Pitino Shelter, the only homeless facility in the region serving families.
Winner’s Circle Participants:
Roger Lee Hayden retired from professional racing at the conclusion of the 2018 Season.
He began racing at age 6 and launched his professional road racing career in 1999 at the age of 16. He was named AMA Superbike Rookie of the Year in 2006 and won the AMA Supersport Championship in 2007 (after finishing second in 2004 and 2005). Roger has seven MotoAmerica/AMA Superbike wins and finished Superbike runner-up in 2017. Besides his success in the American championships, Roger also enjoyed racing on the world championship level as a wildcard rider in MotoGP (2007 & 2010) and as a regular in World Superbike in 2010.
JD Beach currently races in the Superbike division of the MotoAmerica road racing series for Attack Performance and in the American Flat Track series for Estenson Racing, a partnership that will enable JD to race for championships in both premier classes of MotoAmerica and American Flat Track. He was the 2018 Supersport champion.
Jake Lewis also races in the Superbike class, riding for Team Hammer, Inc. in the MotoAmerica road racing series. Lewis had a solid 2018 season with 13 top-5 finishes and finished sixth in the championship.
Hayden Gillim and Nick McFadden are teammates this year who both ride for RiCKdiculous Racing in the Supersport class of the MotoAmerica road racing series.
