Meet NASCAR Helmet Designer Jason Beam, Who Creates Lids For Jimmie Johnson, Kyle Busch, Tony Stewart And More

Racing helmets sport some pretty badass designs these days, and most of the cool ones are the handiwork of just one guy: Jason Beam.

Beam designs the lids for Jimmie Johnson, Tony Stewart, Kyle Busch, Kevin Harvick, Denny Hamlin, Kurt Busch and other NASCAR drivers, as well as drivers in other racing series.

As you can imagine, he’s a busy man.

“It’s non-stop,” he said. “There are 100, 120 helmets in the shop at a time.”

Beam has been designing helmets through his BEAMdesigns company for 25 years. His relationships in the NASCAR garage – with both drivers and teams – run deep.

“They know they can just make a phone call to us and say, ‘Look, it’s gotta have Dodge here, gotta have Pennzoil here. Do your thing,’” Beam said. “My job is to make it look good.”

Some drivers have more input into the helmet designs than others. Some like flames; some don’t. Some have used the same logos they’ve had since they were kids. And some of them want Beam to use a conservative design, while drivers like Kyle Busch tell him to “make it as crazy as you can.”

“When it gets corporate, it gets boring,” Beam said. “But when you can be creative like that, that’s fun. Kyle Busch and Tony Stewart are fun, they let me do what I want.”

Asked to pick his favorite design among his recent projects, Beam chose Jimmie Johnson’s Lowe’s helmet from this season (Johnson just wore it for the first time at Fontana).

Johnson had worked with Beam on a unique helmet for last year’s Indianapolis race. That design included images of the Chevrolet brothers’ first car at the Brickyard.

“It was the first time anyone had done something like that,” Beam said. “So what we did is we went back and we researched the history of Lowe’s.”

Beam designed a helmet that includes five Lowe’s-related images: Among them are the very first Lowe’s building in North Wilkesboro and the original Lowe’s logo (see pictures below).

Though the demand for new helmets is never-ending (Beam said Tony Stewart uses a new helmet for practically every race), the artist said he loves his job.

“It’s fun,” he said with a smile. “Hey, somebody’s got to do it, right?”