Much like the gentlemanly agreement Dale Earnhardt Jr. brokered as a youngster with Rick Hendrick, Coleman Pressley also negotiated a contract to go NASCAR racing on a napkin.

At 8 years old, the third generation racer sat with Tad Geschickter of JTG Racing over dinner and told him he wanted to drive for his team, the same team his father Robert Pressley drove for part of his Nationwide Series career in the No. 59 car.

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My dad and I are best friends. Back at the house we can joke and have more fun but both of us just love racing more than anything, so working on cars is a hobby more than a job.

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COLEMAN PRESSLEY

"We were joking around really, but I told him to sign the napkin and he did. He remembered signing it too and said he has it stored away someplace," said 19-year-old Pressley, who was hired two seasons ago by JTG Racing as a development driver and is battling for NASCAR's Whelen All-American Series national championship.

In his second full season racing Late Model cars in the Southeast, Pressley has seven wins in 18 starts this season running his family-owned-JTG Racing assisted No. 59 Pressley Racing machine.

As a young boy, Pressley started racing Bandolero and Legend cars and later went on to race Late Models at many of the same tracks his father and grandfather, Bob Pressley, hold many records, namely Greenville-Pickens Speedway and Hickory Motor Speedway in the Carolinas.

But the foundation for his future as a racecar driver was laid even earlier in the motorhome lots at NASCAR tracks around the country as his father raced for more than a decade in the Sprint Cup and Nationwide Series.

Pressley grew up in the makeshift, traveling neighborhoods comprising dozens of drivers' motorhomes parked for race weekends. It was here Pressley and his family -- mom Gina and younger sister Shelby -- lived and eventually grew up to love NASCAR racing.

"I played with all the drivers' kids," Pressley recalled. "We'd ride our bikes around the motorhome lot and race our remote control cars. I grew up with guys like Steve Wallace, Kyle Grissom and Brandon McReynolds. We were all best friends on the weekends and now we all race together. We used to race our scooters and watch the races from the behind the fences."

As the development driver for JTG Racing, Pressley took a job as a mechanic in the Harrisburg, N.C. shop Monday through Friday and helps with the Nationwide Series cars of Marcos Ambrose and Kelly Bires.

JTG co-owner Jodi Geschickter said Pressley has a bright future with the team.

"We will continue to watch Coleman's progress as he tours multiple tracks in his NASCAR Late Model. Now that he is a high school graduate, he's at the race shop fulltime and it's great to have him around," Geschickter said. "It's early in his career, but his personality and multiple wins the past two seasons have the team convinced that he will be a winner for JTG Racing for years to come."

Pressley enjoys his job at the shop, because it allows him to interact with drivers Bires and Ambrose, whose cars Pressley may drive in the near future.

"I'm able to see the progress the team has made this year and understand how the cars are running," said Pressley who assembles parts that go on the car, helps install the engines and help with the setups. "It's also a way for me to show how dedicated I am to my career and that I'm willing to do whatever it takes to be successful."

And likely the biggest key to his success is, and will be, his father's coaching, Pressley added.

Not only does his father, a driver development coach for JTG racing, own his Late Model car but he is also his son's coach, spotter, crew chief and manager. Pressley said his father helps him to understand what the car does and what it will do over longer runs; sweet spots on the track and how to be a respectable driver.

"I kind of look at it as being one step ahead of other drivers," he said. "My dad helps prevent little errors other young drivers might do."

At home and away from the track, their relationship goes from driver and crew chief to father and son, but the two are still most often found under the hood of a car.

"My dad and I are best friends," he said. "Back at the house we can joke and have more fun but both of us just love racing more than anything, so working on cars is a hobby more than a job. Whatever we do, basketball or hitting golf balls, we are competitive when we do it."

It's that inherited competitive edge that Pressley hopes will take him into a long, successful career in NASCAR soon.