This article first appeared in the September, 2016 edition of SportsCar Magazine. SCCA members can read the current and past editions of SportCar digitally here after logging into their account; To become an SCCA member and get SportsCar mailed to your home address monthly in addition to the digital editions, click here.

From the outside, it seems like Andrew Pallotta’s journey to four Solo National Championships and a ProSolo title has been easy – but looks can be deceiving

Andrew Pallotta speaks as if he owns no trophies; his collection says otherwise. Atop his kitchen cabinets sit a multitude of awards, include three Solo National Championship trophies, a ProSolo plaque and overall title cup, and two crystalline keepsakes, one naming him the 2010 Solo Rookie of the Year and the other the 2014 Solo Driver of the Year. Meanwhile, Andrew finds he’s always trying to prove – to himself, nonetheless – that he’s worthy of any of it.

It’s this mindset that’s resulted in Andrew leaving the five Tire Rack SCCA Solo National Championships he’s attended with hardware in hand. His worst finish coming in 2011, his sophomore year, with a fifth-place trophy; arguably his best finish was in 2014 when he won STX the year the class set the record for the most competitors in Solo Nationals history. This drive also earned him Solo Driver of the Year recognition. He backed that win with another championship, although it came with heavy introspection.

The way he got to this point begins in 2005. “Joe Blaha talked me into going to an event,” Andrew explains of his fist foray into autocross, “but I didn’t get hooked until 2007.” In 2008, Andrew purchased a Mitsubishi Evo and prepped it for STU. “I did the Toledo ProSolo, which was my first National event, and did terrible,” he smiles. “I think I finished second from last. It really showed me how far I had to go.”

Andrew contemplated selling the Evo – something that would become a recurring theme for him. “Instead, I threw a bunch of money at it and fully prepped it for STU,” he says, but a damper problem sidelined the car.

“Going into the year I really wanted to go to the Solo National Championships to see what it was like, but I didn’t have a lot of luck during the season. By July or August, I was talking myself out of it,” he admits. “It just wasn’t working; something hadn’t clicked yet. I was even thinking about stopping autocrossing all together and doing more track days.”

He headed to Nationals anyway, co-driving an STU Evo with Kevin Kent. “I went into that event with no expectations,” Andrew explains. “I figured if I finished mid-pack, I’d be happy.” Instead, Andrew was tossed into the limelight. “Going into day two I was trailing by a tenth and a half, and I was freaking out. I was beating guys who had beat me at Toledo by two seconds.”

By day’s end, Andrew set the fast time for the class and won by just over a tenth of a second. “That was what got me back into autocross,” he admits. “I also met a lot of really cool people.”

Andrew’s penchant for swapping cars saw his Evo sold, and he started running STR in his new Miata. But one thing led to another and come the 2011 Solo Nationals, he was co-driving another Evo, this time in FP. The car was, admittedly, underprepared for the class, but put down power well. “We put in a really good effort despite the soft STU suspension it still had,” he says, breezing over his fifth-place finish.

The 2012 Solo Nationals saw his return in FP, but, as he describes it, “I was leading on day one and blew it on day two to finish fourth,” he says, still visually disappointed by the performance. But while he didn’t know it at the time, this was a pivotal moment.

“I spent a lot of time looking at videos trying to figure out what I did right and wrong; really micro-analyzing my driving,” he says. Along the way, Andrew developed a friendship with perennial Solo National Champion Sam Strano. “We watched video from a co-drive between Sam and I in early 2013 and I noticed that all of our input, the way we held the wheel, where we got on the gas, was almost identical, so I knew I was doing something right.”

In 2013, Andrew made it to the championships in his own car, an STX-prepped Scion FR-S. “At the ProSolo Finale, I went up against Bryan Heitkotter who just destroyed me, but I had enough points, so I got the overall win,” he says. The Solo National Championships, however, was a different story.

“My big thing in 2013 was not to hit cones,” Andrew recalls. “Run one on day two at Nationals I hit three cones, and it put me away mentally. I phoned in the next two runs and ended up two-tenths back. It was heartbreaking. I sat in the car and cried. I couldn’t believe I’d worked that hard and it all came down to two-tenths of a second. It was tough – and I knew it was there. I went home, looked at the in-car video and then immediately deleted it. It wasn’t a good description of how I drive. I knew I lost that championship myself. I had a lot of work to do.”

With that car sold, Andrew decided to push his skills. “I wanted to run SSR because that’s where a ton of talent is, like Gary Thomason, Sam Strano, Jason Burns, and Grant Reeve. I had to prove to myself I could drive at that level.

“Going to the 2014 Spring Nationals, the first day of the Solo Championship Tour I put down some really good times; I don’t think I’ve ever driven better,” he says. “Day two, I was down by a lot because I coned the first two runs. At this point, I didn’t think I could come back from that. But Sam Strano, Matthew Braun, and James Newman came over and told me that when you run in SSR, you can’t ever take a safety run. You have to take risks. You’ll be a lot happier pushing it and finishing eighth than playing it safe and finishing second or third because you would know you left the time out there. That really stuck with me.”

At the Solo Nationals, Andrew borrowed Annie Gill’s FR-S for a solo drive in STX. “It was a crazy year,” he says. “At the end of day one, I was tied with Steve O’Blenes, and between us and the top was a tenth and change – the opportunity was there.

“I went into day two and knew I could make up a tenth. A lot of people were running high 64s, and I went out on my first run and ran a low 63. I blew out the class. People were asking where that time was coming from, and that gave me a boost of confidence. I’d been waiting for this moment since 2010.”

The win, however, was anything but sure. “I remember watching the other drivers; Hietkotter put down a high 63, Mike Yanase, who was co-driving with Steve O’Blenes, put down a 63.0; I knew O’Belenes could run a 63.0. I sat there and watched car after car run until Steve came up. I held my breath and watched – he crossed the line with a high 63, and I finally exhaled. The next thing I knew, people were dumping water on me. I couldn’t believe I’d just pulled it off again. 2010 wasn’t just one fluke moment.”

Despite buying and building a C Street Mazda RX-8 for the 2015 season, Andrew found himself co-driving once more, this time in an E Street Toyota MR2. At the ProSolo Finale, Andrew was down on points, but still made it to the final round of the Super Challenge, facing off against Paul Russell.

“Going through my mind was Spring Nationals in 2013 and everything I’d been told. So I went out, hit all my marks, and then after seemingly forever, the announcer said I’d won by half a second. Somehow I’d managed to beat the guy who never loses at Super Challenges.”

But with highs come lows. “My expectation at that point was that I could win the 2015 Solo Nationals – I got too confident,” he admits candidly. “At the end of the first day I was second, down by a few tenths, but I felt like I was defeated. I didn’t know how I was coming off the Super Challenge and I wasn’t getting all the speed out of the car that I should. On day two, I went out for the first run and ran fast, but coned it. I ended up winning, but I feel like I finished second.

“I’m really hard on myself,” he explains in a humble, honest tone. “I beat myself up over everything. My biggest opponent is myself. But being hard on myself, that forces me to concentrate on a lot of little things that, over the course of 60 seconds, really add up.”

For 2016, Andrew is heading to the Solo National Championships in yet another car, his own G Street Ford Focus ST, and he has a different attitude. Will he win? “I’d like to,” he grins, smiling widely when it’s revealed he’s SportsCar’s pick to win. Andrew openly admits he’s his own worst enemy on the autocross course, but now with three National Championship trophies on that kitchen cabinet, he insists the pressure to reprove that 2010 season is gone. Despite that, on his right wrist he still wears the rubber waiver wristbands from the 2014 and ’15 Solo National Championships. “I think of them as good luck charms,” he explains. “They remind me that one day I was good as this stuff.”

Words and Photo by Philip Royle