Remembering Brett Golik

This column originally appeared in the Newton Daily News after the death of Brett Golik. Today marks the five year anniversary of his death and looking back, Brett is still missed and I thought this serves as a good reminder of what to be thankful for today.
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The community of Newton and the Knoxville Raceway sprint car family lost a courageous competitor this past week with the passing of 40 year old Brett Golik. Brett battled brain cancer for two and half years and in that time frame, Brett made an effort to try to right the wrongs in his life. He became an inspiration trying to make people aware of supporting cancer research and his faith.
I didn’t know Brett personally, but as an avid race fan I followed Brett’s career at Knoxville. I respected Brett for chasing his dream. He worked at Maytag in the factory for ten years and found a way to put a yellow numbered 5G sprint car on the famed half mile oval for 18 seasons. It took Brett a few years to become competitive but he was able to pick up three wins in the 360 division. One of those wins was a classic battle with Knoxville legend David Hesmer from Marshalltown who is a four time track champion and is the all time wins leader in the 360 class. Hesmer remembered the night Golik had the better car and beat him to the finish line.

Henderson Wins Two, Knoxville & Jackson Notes

Knoxville Raceway Season Championship night always sneaks up on us too fast at the end of the season doesn't it?  I’m still catching up on racing stuff post-Nationals so I apologize for the lateness of my blog here. I haven't been able to come up with my Nationals story yet. The next few weeks we still have some sprint car racing happening in the Midwest with WoO, ASCS, NSL, Sprint Invaders, so get out there and catch them while you can. The 410 and 360 championships were locked up coming into the night, but the 305 was still up for grabs.

410 Report
26 cars enterted. Top 10 Qualifying:  Justin Henderson set quick time for the fourth time this season with a lap of 14.922. He also set quick time four times in 2014. The rest of the top ten were Dusty Zomer, Brian Brown, Bronson Maeschen, Ian Madsen, Bryan Clauson, Mark Dobmeier, Austin McCarl, Danny Lasoski, and AJ Moeller.

Knoxvlle Nationals 101

The Knoxville Nationals qualifying scoring system is something I get questions about frequently.  The Knoxville Nationals Point System was created by promoter Ray Grimes and his wife Naomi.

A perfect score is 500 points. 200 for time trials, 100 for a heat race win, and 200 for a feature win.

Time Trials: 1st 200 points, 2nd 198, 3rd 196, and drops 2 points per position.

Heat Races: 1st 100, 2nd 97, 3rd 94, and drops 3 points per position.

A-Main: (same as time trials) 24th place = 154 points.

Quick time in time trials earns the same amount of points as winning the A-Main (200).

McCarl Wins 4th 360 Nationals

Studio 92 Photo

Terry McCarl won his fourth career 360 Nationals Saturday night at the Knoxville Raceway. The Saturday A-Main T-Mac drove away and the longer the race went the better his car seemed to be compared to his competition. He pulled away and was out to a four second lead in traffic, which is encouraging for Terry going into next week. Congrats to his team. I know those guys work hard. I’m really happy for crew chief Doug Rankin who has so much passion for the sport, Austin and Carson pitch in as well, a Jayme Moyle engine under the hood, it was a good combination. They had everything go their way with drawing number one in the qualifying order and made it through their heat race. Hopefully next week goes as well for them.

Big thanks to Arnold Motor Supply and Great Southern Bank for their help in putting this show on this year! 

Henderson & Landis Win!

Calvin Landis (Studio 92 Photo)

Candi’s Flowers Night this past Saturday saw one of the best races I’ve ever seen in the 360 class. I applaud the drivers for putting on a good show and for making all 18 laps without a caution. The weather on this night warm and humid with the dew point above 70 once again making for an excellent racing surface.

Visitors on this night were numerous, especially in the 360 class with the ASCS teams racing the two previous nights at I-80 in Nebraska and an off night on Saturday. Jeff Swindell, Aaron Reutzel, Scottie McDonald, Matt Covington, Tony Bruce Jr., Josh Baughman, Johnny Herrera, Wayne Johnson, Bill Balg, Justyn Cox, Jordan Weaver, Lee Grosz, Blake Hahn, and Kris Miller.

Lasoski Wins #106, Zomer Blazin' Hot

Saturday wasn’t a full moon but a lot of crazy things happened on this night. The track received 1.5” of rain around 7:00am and there was a power outage around town, including for two hours at the track. The track crews did their part to get the track and pit area ready and kudos to them. We had several crashes, some of them lengthy delays in clean up, and another power outage that took out several light poles during the 360 heat races. Some weird wild stuff I tell ya.

Drivers going double duty on this night in the 410 and 360 class were Justin Henderson, Terry McCarl, Dusty Zomer, Logan Forler, Danny Lasoski, and Jamie Ball entered in both the 360 and 305 class.

Brown & Zomer Win on Twin Features Night!

Twin Features night is always a pivotal night in the points for the Knoxville Raceway track championship. This year Danny Lasoski is looking for his tenth championship and had a 249 point lead before the night started. A good night for the Dude and his tenth championship is nearly assured with only four weekly nights left on the schedule after this week. With Twin Feature night scheduled on the same weekend as the Kings Royal in Ohio the car count was lower than in some recent weeks, or years past when teams liked to show up for the extra laps in preparation for the Nationals in August. This is good news for the Knoxville Regulars in that there were fewer cars enabling them to have the opportunity to get more points on a night where points mean more than ever. Brad Loyet was the only “visitor” on this night in the 410 class and Billy Alley made his second Knoxville appearance of the season in the 360 class.

McCarl Wins #55

Independence Day at Knoxville Raceway had plenty of fireworks on the race track this past Saturday night! We welcomed back the National Sprint League and it was 360 Twin Features night while the 305 class had the night off. Driver competing in both classes on this night were Justin Henderson, Ian Madsen, Bryan Clauson, Chris Martin, and Dusty Zomer. Henderson does this every week but the other teams were taking advantage of the two features and extra laps to prepare for the 360 Nationals coming up next month. Jake Bubak returned for his second appearance in the 360 class while Ohio’s Paige Polyak entered on this night in the 410 class as she tries to get more laps to improve on her 410 Nationals D-Main finish last year. Polyak is the only woman to win a sprint car race at Eldora Speedway.

The Lasoski Reign Continues

Mother Nature tried to spoil our night with a rain shower just past the 5:00pm hour. After a good 15 minute rain and assessing the situation it was decided to try to get the races in with a pushed back start time to 9:00pm, and cars hit the track around 9:15pm. Thankfully the car count was the lowest of the year and we finished at 12:44am with no B Main’s needed. The track was fast, tacky, and narrow, but we got the race in.

We didn’t have Dusty Zomer or Tim Kaeding on this night, they opted to race with the World of Outlaws in Huron, SD instead of driving to Knoxville with a high chance of rain. We did gain some visitors however with car owner Keith Kunz making his sprint car debut at Knoxville with Christopher Bell. That team might be back this coming week as they try to get some laps in before the Knoxville Nationals. We also welcomed two-time Little 500 champion Jacob Wilson, who competed earlier in the day in the USAC Silver Crown event in Newton. Jordyn Brazier made his Knoxville and United States debut on Saturday, he is the son of Garry who will also be competing at Knoxville later this summer.

Schatz wins Fog Shortened Race

I’ve seen it all now. What a crazy and wacky night of events with Mother Nature throwing more wrenches at us than AJ Foyt climbing out of his car in a rage at Indy. Morning showers, overcast all day, water seeping up from sheepsfoot holes delaying hot laps, the sun pops out during hot laps and time trials and dries out the track quickly, then we have nice wide racing surface after the heats, only to have a pesky shower pop up out of nowhere on the radar and cause a rain delay. The shower popped up about 15 miles southwest of the track, turned west, then back east.  When the rain cleared out a thick attack of moths encountered the raceway. Then we get back to racing after 1:00am and just as the 410 feature pushes off a thick fog rolls in and stops a race just past halfway. In a matter of ten minutes the visibility went from perfect to 1/8 of a mile.   

Donny Schatz won, not surprising. I give credit to our announcers Johnny Gibson and Tony Bokhoven for calling that race, their eyes were better than mine. The track prep crew and push truck drivers put in a long day. We have so many great people at Knoxville, but these people are the best in the business.

Lasoski, Alley, Haase Win on Slideways Night!

Bing Bang Media photo

After last week’s no chance of rain, but pesky drizzle and cancellation, Mother Nature cleared up for a great night of racing this week.  It was another full field with 92 sprint cars entered.  The World of Outlaws event at Lakeside Speedway was rained out early in the morning allowing several teams to drive three hours north to Knoxville to tune up for next week’s Mediacom Shootout. Shane Stewart, Kerry Madsen, Paul McMahan, Jason Sides, Kraig Kinser, David Gravel, Logan Schuchart, and Jacob Allen all made the tow. For $15 fans were able to see eight of the thirteen full-time Outlaws. And for $30 you can see all of them this coming Saturday!

Weather conditions at 7:00pm Saturday were 75° and overcast with 65% humidity, winds out of the SE at 11 mph, and a dew point of 62°.  The track widened out quickly and the lap times were slow in time trials but the track was awesome all night long and plenty of room to race.

Henderson Wins Two!

Three weeks in a row with racing at Knoxville, we are on a roll!  Mother Nature gave us a scare with a storm approaching from the southwest so we were in rain mode from the get go, expecting rain to hit us around 11:00pm. Fortunately the storm system dissipated as it approached Knoxville and the rains held off until 3am. Watching the radar all night on my laptop for the second week in a row wasn’t much fun, but necessary to help race officials.

Great to see another full field of cars with 91 sprint cars entered.  The big surprise of the night was Kerry Madsen’s Keneric team rolling into the pit area with a pickup and open trailer.  With no World of Outlaws race on this night they had a night off. The team flew back from Charlotte and put together a car that afternoon and pulled it into the track. Crew chief Tyler Swank had packed shocks in a suitcase, otherwise their tools were somewhat limited,  but pitting next to brother Ian Madsen I’m sure helped. 

Weather conditions at 7:00pm were 71° and over cast with 50% humidity, winds out of the SE at 10 mph, and a dew point of 52°.  The track widened out nicely.

410 Report
33 cars signed in.  Top 8 Qualifying:  Brian Brown set quick time for the second week in a row with a lap of 15.272 (118 mph), followed by Justin Henderson, Terry McCarl, Danny Lasoski, Kerry Madsen, Tim Kaeding, Brooke Tatnell, and Austin McCarl.

Sassy Haase Makes History!

Night two of the Knoxville Raceway season was a memorable one!  81 sprint cars were checked in.  We dodged the rain all day thankfully.  Justin Henderson put on a great performance in two classes, Wayne Johnson dominated the 360 field, and an 18 year old woman beat the men in the 305 event to make history. Terry McCarl came back from a scary crash last week but got back into the car and fought through some significant back pain to have a good night. 

Weather conditions at 7:00pm were 72° and over cast with 57% humidity, winds out of the SE at 12mph, and a dew point of 54°.  The track was in great shape!

2015 Knoxville Raceway Season Opener

Finally Mother Nature cooperated and the Season Opener for the 2015 Lucas Oil Knoxville Championship Cup Series was this past Saturday night. This was the first event for the FVP National Sprint League at Knoxville and with the ASCS National tour rained out early in the day we had a high number of entries, 98 total sprint cars in the pit area on this night. That was more than any night last season and not since July 28, 2012 have we had 98 or more cars.  Everyone was excited to be racing at Knoxville!

Weather conditions at 7:00pm were 72° and over cast with 57% humidity, winds out of the SE at 12mph, and a dew point of 54°.  The track was heavy and fast, but it widened out nicely for the features.  It was chilly for the fans late but with free kids night the crowd was good.

Porter Wins Osky Hobby Stock Special!

Wednesday night at the Southern Iowa Speedway was a cold one. With temperatures in the low 50’s and steady wind out of the north-west we saw a lot of jackets, blankets, gloves, hats, and hot chocolate.  The low attendance on this night was a shame as the racing on the track was the best we have seen all year.  The Hobby Stocks were racing for $500 to win on this night and four-time Winston Cup Series race winner Ken Schrader was in attendance with this Modified.

2015 Knoxville Raceway 360 Preview

The Knoxville Raceway 360 class should be highly competitive.  Justin Henderson returns in the BDS Motorsports #1 and will try to defend their 2014 owner’s championship while Henderson will compete for 410 driver points only.  The driver’s championship will be a tough one with several strong contenders.

Joe Beaver won his first Lucas Oil Knoxville Championship Cup in 2014 and won three features. Beaver has to be considered the favorite coming into the season but he will have the target on his back this year with several good drivers trying to win the championship.

Jon Agan is sure to be a contender for his first championship. He finished 177 points behind Beaver last year and although he didn’t get a win at Knoxville he had just as many top five finishes (seven) as Beaver did, and he won the Sprint Invaders championship. I look for Agan to be better in 2015 and win some features.

2015 Knoxville Raceway 410 Preview

Thanks to Lucas Oil and MavTV national television, the 2015 Knoxville Championship Cup Series season will have a field of competitors that is stronger than ever.  A check for $20,000 awaits the KCCS champion at the end of the season and there are 17 nights of racing to see who comes out on top.  The season begins this Saturday, April 18 and the KCCS finals are August 29. 

Ian Madsen won his first Lucas Oil Knoxville Championship Cup in 2014 after compiling three feature wins, seven top five’s, and 11 top ten finishes last year.  After a solid second place finish in 2013 the KCP Racing team stepped up in 2014 to win the title. Now the target is on their back but they are not by any means resting on their laurels. The team raced with the World of Outlaws on the west coast in the month of March to get ready for this year after making a change in chassis manufacturers. Ian once again raced this winter in his homeland of Australia and his reflexes should be as sharp as ever.

SAMMY... Not Retired Yet!

Sammy Swindell announced he would retire from sprint car racing on August 25, 2014. Now six months later he is back! The announcement came yesterday via Twitter from Sammy's PR guys at Inside Line Promotions that he will be driving the Cooper Racing #01 in a USCS sanctioned event at Magnolia, MS.

I don’t think this announcement is a huge shock to most fans. I was skeptical that his career would end at the time of his announcement. The rumors of Sammy returning in 2015 were there all winter, and I heard this was a serious possibility at the Chili Bowl. I have a credible source that told me there was a plan forming in early February for Sammy to be racing a car at a lot of Knoxville and NSL races this summer, but that plan has fizzled. 

2015 World of Outlaws Preview

It’s a new year and the scoreboard is set to zero for everyone. They all have hope for a great season to come. Some will win, some will struggle. Can Donny Schatz win a seventh championship? Will Daryn Pittman recapture the title? Can Joey Saldana build on his succes last year and win his first championship? After 6 wins last year will Kerry Madsen and his team take a step up and win more and be a serious contender? Can Paul McMahan and Shane Stewart be players this season? A lot of questions will be answered by the time the World Finals comes in November.

There will be 14 teams attempting to run the full season and it should be a very competitive one. Looking back one year ago we had Steve, Sammy, and Tim Kaeding in the picture. We still may see Steve on a limited schedule this year on the tour and I wouldn’t be shocked if Sammy is back in a sprint car at some point this summer. But the series has picked up Shane Stewart, Jason Johnson, and Craig Dollansky is back to even things out.

Bryan Clauson Has Wings!

Bryan Clauson at 2013 Knoxville Nationals
Studio 92 Photo Credit

Bryan Clauson, the 2-time USAC National Sprint Car champion, 2-time USAC National Midget champion, and 2014 Chili Bowl winner is adding a wing to his sprint car full-time in 2015. The decorated non-wing sprint car driver has tinkered with winged cars the past few seasons, racing a part-time schedule in 2013 and 2014, including an A-Main start in the 2014 FVP Knoxville Nationals in only his second entry at the Nationals. Now Clauson will tackle winged sprints full-time in the Midwest with a focus on the newly formed National Sprint League and at KnoxvilleRaceway in the Lucas Oil Knoxville Championship Cup Series aboard the Cole Wood Racing 17w car.

Clauson started the 2012 Indianapolis 500 and plans to attempt to qualify for 2015 Indy 500 this May. He also has some seat time in NASCAR on his resume. There is no doubt this guy has talent. Clauson was left without a full-time ride this fall when it was announced that Tony Stewart Racing was closing up their USAC operations, presumably to focus more on Schatz, Kinser, and now the All-Star Series

2015 NSL Preview

The National Sprint League is nearly all set for their inaugural 2015 season. With 35 teams signed up to run the 28-30 race schedule across the Midwest and $350,000 in point money up for grabs it is shaping up to be a good start for the NSL.
 
Looking at the NSL “roster” my top ten power rankings are:  1. #2 Danny Lasoski, 2. #21 Brian Brown, 3. #24 Terry McCarl, 4. #18 Ian Madsen, 5. #82 Dusty Zomer, 6. #17B Bill Balog, 7. #77x Wayne Johnson, 8. #13 Mark Dobmeier, 9. #56 Davey Heskin, 10. #55 Brooke Tatnell.

1. Danny Lasoski - I have to pick Lasoski as the favorite. He has experience, a good team behind him, and a lot of the race tracks the series is going to a lot of drivers on the roster haven’t seen before, such as Denison, Britt, Farmington, and Moberly. The benefit of financial support will be there with Big Game #2 car to compete at the front every night. As long as Danny and Guy Forbrook can work together, they not only are the favorite to win the NSL Series, but the Knoxville KCCS, and are a serious contender for the Knoxville Nationals. Predicted NSL win total: 8

Tony Stewart: The Entrepreneur

The All Stars and Renegades split is over. I am happy a guy like Tony Stewart is willing to step up and help the sport of sprint car racing. You cannot deny his passion for dirt track racing, in particular sprint car racing. To invest so much financially and emotionally, after the year he has had to endure is amazing. Especially when you consider the undertaking this will be and the problems that will come with it. Sure the instant reaction is appreciation and thanks for coming in with your cape and rescuing this situation, but in the long run every racing series has its ups and downs. Where will the point fund come from, what political implications will come from owning a track and a series when it comes to scheduling events, rules, all those sorts of things is where you get your hands dirty.

Tony now owns a World of Outlaws team with Donny Schatz, a secondary team with Steve Kinser, he has backed away from USAC team ownership, owns one of the premier dirt tracks of the world in Eldora Speedway, and now the most legendary 410 sprint car series next to the World of Outlaws. He is without a doubt one of the most powerful and influential people in the dirt track racing today.