Sorry for the delay in getting this report to you but coming home after being away for two weeks has a way of keeping you busy. Especially when it took all day Monday to drive home from Indiana, then it was back to work Tuesday morning, an Iron Pigs minor league baseball game Tuesday night, haircut Wednesday night and mid week racing Thursday night. Writing this I now understand way I am so tired. Well you know that old saying “keeping the best until last"? It is true and here comes Kokomo.

Sunday, June 12 - After 4 days in a row of racing, we pulled into our last stop of the journey at 1:30 Sunday afternoon. Of course this came right after eating at my favorite place, Steak & Shake. We found a great spot for the motorhome, pulled out the awning and set up the chairs. It was cool with a breeze or you might say it was perfect. Perfect weather and in my opinion the perfect track, Kokomo Speedway. It was relaxing. I snoozed, read in a book and at one point Steve and Mindy Buckwalter stopped by to get a tour of the motorhome. Life was good and then, this is usually the part of the story when everything goes bad, it got better. At 6:00 we were in our seats waiting for the program to begin.

We found ourselves sitting with the grandparents and cousin of Kyle Larson, an 18 year old midget and winged sprint car ace from California, who came into the last race of the Speedweek as the point leader. They were a lot of fun as we chatted all through the evening. Time trials started at 6:48 and 1/2 hour later it was Darren Hagen who set fast time, with a time of 13.342 around the 1/4 mile slightly baked dirt oval. Following the midget time trials were the sprint heats and they ran three for the 24 sprints in the pits. Next up were four midgets heats for the 27 midgets on hand. The racing was hard and the groove was high. After the heats the fans were really anticipating some great main events. They also ran two other division; street stocks and thunder cars. Each ran two heats and acted as filler. Kokomo’s normal night to run is Sunday so this way the normal competitors still could race on their regular Sunday night. The sprint B main and midget B main followed and all was set for the feature events. It was 9:10.

The midget feature was up first and took the green at 9:45. There were 6 cautions in the race so you could not say it was a great race but you could sure say it was exciting. Even though the track got dusty the cars could run everywhere. High, low and anywhere in between. They actually used the four turn wall as a cushion that they bumped the right rear tire off it prior to shooting down the homestretch. My only problem was USAC only seemed to know the name of Bryan Clauson and no one else. All they kept telling you was where he needed to finish to win the point title and never even mentioned Kyle Larson who actually was in first. Larson lead the entire race until a mysterious caution came out on lap 25. No mention of why but when racing resumed Larson lost the lead and eventually would lose the point championship to none other than Bryan Clauson.

It was Michael Pickens, from New Zealand, who would pick up the win, with Tracy Hines coming home second. Larson dropped back to third with Brad Kuhn fourth and Bryan Clauson fifth.

The sprint feature was next and was stopped twice for flipping sprints. The first saw Anthony Peterman flip and take out third place running Thomas Messerall. Meserall continued on but he was the next red as he jumped the cushion and flipped over in turn two. Again they bounced the right rear tire off of the turn four wall and used every inch of the track to run. Shane Cottle took the win with Chris Windom, Jon Stambrough, Andrew Elson and Tracy Hines rounding out the top five. It was 10:45 and we walked into the pits to wish the Buckwalters’ a safe drive home before heading back to the motorhome.

It was another cool night in Indiana with the temperatures down in the 50’s. No need to run the air conditioning. As we sat there eating a snack we looked back on the past few days here in Indiana. It was a really good time and Kokomo well it is just the best. The only track with a lap counter, pork loin sandwiches that are fantastic and racing that is too good to explain. It is like showing someone a picture of the Grand Canyon. You can see from the picture it is big but unless you really see it you will never know how awesome it really is. I can tell you about the racing at Kokomo but unless you actually come here and experience it you will never know how awesome it is.