Stewart-Haas Racing — Kannapolis, NC
Justin Potter is a landscape and motorsport photographer in the Carolinas. If you have seen any of his images, you know the emotion and passion that he puts into every ounce of his work. From growing up in California being surrounded by racing and to racing on his own to now being a photographer for one of NASCAR’s biggest race teams, Justin continues to push the limits and remembers to be unique and finding the emotion that surrounds his daily life. So, how did it all start “My mom was a race car driver and I was surrounded by it all at a young age. We lived in Kelseyville. I’ve always wanted to drive and race one day. When I was 16 a friend of a friend — his son wanted to race too and they had this car and they said we will split the time with you. I did all of the work, and the kid never showed up. I raced in April, May, June and July then he wanted to race in August. Well, I was like third in points my rookie year and they were ready to jump in and I told them to not take me out of the car. The kid didn’t really want to race, so the car just became mine. It was like a 20-year-old car — the car that everyone had passed down. There was a race where I was battling someone for second place and they got loose and clipped me and sent me in the wall. I destroyed a car that had never been wrecked before. So you can check that one off the list (laughs). The next year I moved into street stock and ended up winning the championship. That was the limit that I could do financially so I decided to move out to North Carolina and learn how to build cars myself and move back to San Fransisco and do it that way. Before moving out here I got two offers to drive for other people and it was tough to figure out if I should stay in school and learn or just jump into it but ended up coming out here to learn what I could.”
Was the passion always there? Did you want to be a race car driver? “My Mom was just always into it. She was raised to be around motorsports, and I was always around it. I worked at the tracks, sold brochures, and officiated races — I got that all from her and also the camera passion from her. For a woman coming up in the 90s, she was extremely talented. She won races as a female and set records. It was a big deal.”
“I went to a school in Hickory, NC, and they teach you a lot about NASCAR, the bodywork and motorsports in general. The money out here compared to California was drastically different, and there were more opportunities to learn and work. I got to build cars, which still allowed me to be competitive because you see cars you built to win races.” Was that hard to accept you wouldnt race and be more focused on building the race cars? “It was hard to accept that I couldn’t race; I just can’t put in the time, effort and money. I tell Jenn all the time that if we win the lottery, we are buying a dirt late model or a funny car and drag race, one of those things will happen! (laughs)”
“When I got the job at this independent company, we built cars for Richard Childress, a little bit of work for Joe Gibbs and some work for a lot of the lower budgeted teams. Things got expensive, and he shut down, and then I started working as a body hanger for BAM, and we built cars for a race at Atlanta; we qualified 4th and were running top five, and our motor blew with five laps to go. It was tough. I cried. A few months later they shut down and I came here to HAAS CNC Racing — that’s what it was called before Tony signed on in ‘08 when I started. It’s been crazy just learning and growing in the sport. Whatever they needed me to do, I was willing to learn and do whatever I could.”
Is there an important race you always reflect on that you were a part of? “To me, that Kevin Harvick championship was special. That #4 car, my job was to go to 7-10 playoff races in 2014, and I was hands-on every week. Once the car passed tech, we were in there, cheating it up as much as we could. That championship will forever mean the most to me because of how hands-on we all were and how important the team was to that whole playoff run.”
Where did the passion for photography start? “My first published photo I was five. My mom worked for National Dragster Weekly and a few other magazines out west. She would drive to all of these tracks, and I would play with other kids, and she would just hand me her camera, and I would just click it at nothing. There was a point when she was interviewing this announcer, and I snapped this photo of him pointing at me. That got published, I got this $25 check, and I felt like the coolest kid in the world. In High School I worked at Longs Drugs. They had a one-hour photo place, and I worked there with Mom, she taught me a lot about editing and shooting. When I moved out here, I got a Canon Powershot and took pictures of everything anywhere I went. I think I needed an outlet that was for me outside of racing. In 2016 we were traveling all of the time to races. We would land, and we had so much downtime. People would go out and drink but that wasn’t for me so I started to find places near the tracks to hike and take photos. It just snowballed into every track — I would find hiking spots, and those photos started to get better. A few drivers would start to join us and hike. It was fun and the start of something for me. I had the camera at the track, too and would just start taking pictures of the cars and sunsets at the tracks. For years after, it was just hiking, taking photos at the track and learning as much as I could with shooting and editing. It wasn’t really a big thing for teams to have photographers at the tracks following teams or drivers. After COVID, when folks were starting to be allowed back at the track, there was this guy who was in charge of marketing at the time for the team. He asked if I was interested in going to Daytona to just focus on photographing the race and the team. In true Daytona fashion, it was raining so I was capturing different things, the puddles, the reflections, the fans and teams playing in the rain. I was trying to find something different and something that no other photographer was doing. They asked if I could continue to do it so I would be working here building cars at the shop five days a week and then photographing the race on the weekends, so it was just a constant seven-day-a-week work schedule.”
Justin started to explain an important moment during a photography trip. “I went on a Grand Canyon trip with Nation Geographic Photographer Dewitt Jones. We were floating down this river, and he looked at me and said, “I’ve seen your work and see what you do — just quit. I’m saving you time and money.” That was on day two of this trip (laughs). He said, “If you want to do this, then you need to look at things differently to set yourself apart. If you are going to take pictures of race cars, you need to look at the people around them and the emotion.” Ever since he said that I’ve never forgotten it; never in a million years have I thought I’d get paid to work on race cars, let alone make money to take photos. I’ll never take this for granted.”
What proud moment has shaped you into who you are today? “I want to say standing on stage for that 2014 NASCAR championship. Another would be that I posted photos from the clash, and Dewitt commented on this photo and said this was what we talked about. That got me; he never comments on anything, so it meant a lot to me. Also, Kevin (Harvick) using the photo I took of him walking into the sunset with his family after his last race of his career. It goes back to moments, emotion, that’s what drives me.”
Are you a goal-driven person? “I still would love to have photos in National Geographic Magazine. My grandpa got me that subscription when I was eight, and I used to flip through those all of the time and would just dream of seeing some of those places. That’s my one main goal that I have.”
What lessons do you take with you to keep you growing in your craft? “Always find something that’s beautiful. The moments we go through every day have beauty. Seeing those little moments that you feel like you walk by every day and never look at — those are the beautiful moments we sometimes take for granted.”
