As Bobby Thomsen, the director of technical services for the ARCA Racing Series, was building up to the presentation of the 2013 H.G. Adcox Sportsmanship Award at the series' postseason banquet in Indianapolis on Saturday night, it dawned on Mobile's who the winner was.
Him.
"Mr. Bobby started talking," Praytor recounted. "He said, 'He has an unusual nickname. I'm not sure why they call him that.' I was like, 'I wonder who that is.' Then he started saying, 'He wasn't supposed to run the whole season, but he ended up running the whole season.' And I was like, 'Wow. That's me. That's me he's talking about right now.' Then he said, 'And I'd like to present this award to Thomas "The Moose" Praytor.' It took a second for it to register that I was winning that award."
Praytor said he was a bit too overcome by the moment to say what he wanted to say when he received the sportsmanship award. By the time he came to the podium again when the top-10 finishers in the season points standings were introduced, he was ready.
"I tried to give a little bit of a speech, but I wasn't too successful," Praytor said. "It was a very emotional time for me. But I backed up, and when I was giving my speech for being ninth place in the championship, then I gave my speech for getting that award.
"I told them pretty much that this was very unexpected and I couldn't thank everybody enough for all of their support all throughout the year. Everyone knows that at some point everyone in that room I asked for help or asked to borrow something from them just so we could make it through the weekend or to try to get that extra edge at the track we were at.
"It was a huge deal for me. For the ARCA officials and the president of ARCA to think that much of me to give me that award was very gratifying for me and my family. It was very emotional for me when I got that award. It was really, really unexpected."
The Adcox Sportsmanship Award is presented annually "to honor an individual or group that exhibits the ability to show class in competition and truly defines sportsmanship to fellow competitors, officials and fans in the ARCA Racing Series."
An ARCA press release on the sportsmanship award said, "Praytor became known for his friendly nature in the garage area. He also helped raise money for charity." Praytor donated an Alabama football-style racing helmet autographed by Crimson Tide star AJ McCarron to a charity auction for the Alabama Institute for Deaf and Blind.
Praytor said he couldn't say exactly what he did to earn the sportsmanship award.
"Our car owner, Wayne Hixson, he has received that award before," Praytor said. "He'd joke with my dad: 'You know, if you holler at everybody every weekend, we're sure not going to win the sportsmanship award.'
"I was just being myself. I looked at the background on Mr. Adcox, and he was the man back in the day. At the superspeedways, when he showed up at the racetrack everybody knew you were going to run second to him. To get an award named after a man like him, he was such a big deal in ARCA. It set in on the way home that, 'Hey, I actually won that award.' There are a lot of big-name people that have won that award and to be one of them -- I was looking at the winners of the award and I thought, 'You know, next year my name's going to be on there and will always be on there.' That is a very big deal for me."
The award is named for Grant Adcox, a former ARCA driver whose achievements included five victories at Talladega Superspeedway. Adcox was killed in a wreck during the NASCAR Winston Cup Series Atlanta Journal 500 at Atlanta Motor Speedway in 1989.
Like Adcox, Praytor wheels the No. 2 in the ARCA Racing Series. He'll be back at it this week in a Hixson Motorsports car when the series holds testing at Daytona International Speedway on Friday, Saturday and Sunday.
"Mr. Wayne built it probably four or five years ago from the ground up," Praytor said. "It's his baby.
"That's another thing that's been really gratifying for me. He told me, 'You know, Thomas, I've had this car sitting here for four years, and I've had all these different drivers, and I've never had anybody I trusted enough to get in this car and drive it, and I want you to drive it at Daytona.' For him to say that says a lot about the program we've got going. He really believes in me, and I can't thank him and Miss Pam, his wife, enough for giving me the opportunity to do what I did this year and, hopefully, I can do a little bit better next year."
ARCA opens its season at Daytona on Feb. 15. In last year's Daytona ARCA race, Praytor ended up with a 22nd-place finish. But he spent a good deal of the event running with the leaders.
"I think the only way it gets much better than last year is if we just win that thing," Praytor said. "Last year, we took a gamble with fuel. It didn't work out, but we didn't have anything to lose. It was a great experience for me. It's just like winning the Adcox Award: I'll always be able to say that I ran in the top five for a lot of laps at Daytona International Speedway."