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When Katherine Wooten joined NAPA as director of partnership strategy and activation in 2021, she not only stepped into a legacy partnership with one of NHRA’s biggest stars, Funny Car world champion Ron Capps, but also into a whole new world.

Wooten was recruited to NAPA from Coca-Cola by former co-worker Marti Walsh, who had left Coke to join the NAPA team. Whereas Coca-Cola was known for its vast and diverse sponsorship portfolio, Wooten was drawn to NAPA’s almost inverse, focused, intentional approach. “It’s about quality, longevity, and authenticity,” she said. “That was incredibly attractive to me.”

Wooten quickly discovered that motorsports — and Capps — were central to NAPA’s brand identity. NAPA, which has 6,000 retail stores and almost 18,000 Auto Care centers within its system, has deep roots in the blue-collar world of automotive repair, and Wooten and the NAPA team, which is now led by Emily Schneider, understand the importance of real connections.��

“We’re a company built on generations,” she said. “Second- and third-generation store owners, longtime customers, and real relationships, and Ron is the kind of guy who remembers the fan who’s been coming to Gainesville for 20 years, and now he’s meeting their kids. That level of connection — you just don’t find it in many professional sports.

“The NHRA world is certainly the closest aligned with the technicians and the automotive enthusiasts,” she said. “It doesn’t matter if it’s someone who loves working on cars or owns a garage or if it’s someone who just really appreciates the raw power and the engineering that’s under the hood of these vehicles. That is the person who is most closely aligned with NAPA as an organization. They’re the ones who are shopping at our stores. They’re the ones who are brand-loyal to our Auto Care centers or maybe own an Auto Care enter themselves.

“One of the unique things about NHRA relative to other motorsports is the diversity of excellence with both male and female drivers,” Wooten said. “In many ways, the NHRA fanbase mirrors the automotive enthusiast that we see in our NAPA customer base every day. And although the automotive space traditionally leans male, we love that the NHRA is a sport where people from all different backgrounds have found success and support. It feels unique in that way, and something that I personally admire a great deal.”

NAPA, which this year is celebrating its 100th anniversary, has been partnered with Capps since 2005, a rare feat of longevity in the world of corporate sponsorships. When Capps decided to go out on his own as a team owner in 2022, Wooten and teammate Maureen Walsh made sure that NAPA followed him.

Although Wooten inherited the Capps and NHRA relationship, she has helped lead the way to expand the relational depth that defines both Capps and NAPA’s approach to motorsports. Capps has become an extension of NAPA’s brand — accessible, hardworking, and loyal. He doesn’t just race. He meets fans, visits stores, and shakes hands with the people who make up the NAPA network.

That human-first approach extends to NAPA’s broader motorsports strategy under Wooten’s leadership. Last year, NAPA deepened its commitment to NHRA by becoming the Official Auto Parts Store of the NHRA and becoming a partner in NHRA’s YES (Youth & Education Services) program, a move that was less about branding and more about building the future.

The YES program connects high school and technical school students to career paths in automotive repair, a critical need as the industry faces a shortage of nearly 800,000 technicians in the next decade.

“I don’t think YES gets enough credit for what it’s doing and the number of students who come through, year in, year out,” she said. “In talking to Bob Tasca III and his Ford dealership connection, he said YES is one of the single biggest talent pipelines for dealerships nationally, and that’s why they keep doing it year after year. When you hear about that level of impact on workforce development, that becomes very attractive for NAPA as well.

“One of my counterparts here at NAPA on the marketing side, Sheonny Harrell, and her team have really taken that partnership and run with it,” she said. “They’ve done so much more than I would have been able to from the sports side and really thought through how to best connect with those students and position NAPA for the future.”

Capps and NHRA were also instrumental in NAPA’s rebranding of its legacy Carlyle Tools line with a special-edition car at the season-opening Amalie Motor Oil NHRA Gatornationals.

“Last year, we really started thinking about which of our motorsports teams made the most sense to try to get some traction with our tools again, and NHRA was the no-brainer,” Wooten said. “We get our Carlyle Tools truck in the [Manufacturers] Midway to put our product in front of people, get some feedback, and generate some sales, and NHRA just checked all of those boxes.”

One of Wooten’s proudest moments came in support of Capps’ decision to run tribute cars at the NHRA U.S. Nationals honoring his legendary mentor, Don Prudhomme. In both 2022 and 2023, Capps’ car ran in historic “Snake” livery, with NAPA’s branding scaled back to preserve authenticity.

“Ron doesn’t ask for much,” Wooten recalled, “but it was very obvious in 2023 when that idea first came to him to honor Don and to honor that specific livery. Ron’s instinct was to have NAPA be a bigger presence on the car so that we weren’t losing any branding, but when I looked at it, it just kind of ruined the throwback, it ruined the homage, so we had them take NAPA off the side and make it more like the original car. Ron’s design team embedded the NAPA logo in between some of the stars on the racing stripe, and as soon as I saw it, I thought it was perfect.”

Her decision underscored a guiding principle in Wooten’s approach: Trust the partners and prioritize the passion.

That same mindset extends to Ron Capps Motorsports’ newest addition, rookie driver Maddi Gordon. “I think she is going to be a star,” Wooten predicted. “She’s going to have as much success as she can wrap her hands around. She’s just like Ron, and you love to see someone who’s passionate about working on the cars and coming up in that way. We’re just absolutely thrilled for what's in store there.”

As NAPA’s motorsports program continues to grow, Wooten is steering it with equal parts strategy and soul. She’s not just placing logos on cars — she’s building legacies, fostering relationships, and helping ensure the future of the automotive workforce.

“Motorsports is about people,” she said. “And people like Ron make it easy to love this job. Ron is NAPA’s employee of the year — every year. He’s the kind of ambassador many brand dreams of. He wakes up every day thinking about what he can do for NAPA, and then he just does it — no asking, no prodding. He’s the real deal, and we’re so lucky to have him.”
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