Kaeding is Crowned Knoxville Midget Nationals Champion; Madsen is 410 Victor
Sunday, June 4, 2006
By Bob Wilson
Kaeding is Crowned Knoxville Midget Nationals Champion
Knoxville, Iowa - June 4 - Although it was nearly twenty-four hours late, Bud Kaeding of Campbell, California captured the Fifth annual United States Auto Club (USAC) Knoxville Midget Nationals. He was paid $3,350 for his win.
Kaeding's victory came about on a rare Sunday evening show at the Marion County fairgrounds because of a drenching rainstorm 24 hours previously. That forced track and USAC officials to postpone the final events till Sunday.
The near-daylight show saw track conditions deteriorate quickly as the usually wet Knoxville surface did not hold up. However, drivers managed to find various grooves around the big half-mile with the low line being most popular.
The beginning of the 25-lap championship event saw Brad Kuhn drive to the front from his front row starting position. He found a line on the bottom of turns one and two while three and four saw him take to the cushion. Following him was Bryan Clauson who made a race of it by running the bottom all the way around. By lap five Kuhn could count a 10-car length lead on the giant Knoxville half mile.
Into the fray came 16-year-old Brady Bacon of Broken Arrow, Oklahoma. By lap ten he had taken over the runner-up position and was catching Kuhn. One lap later Bacon was within one car length at the start-finish line. Bacon continued to hold Kuhn to the fire until a yellow was displayed on lap fourteen bringing the field to a slowdown.
When the race went green again, Kuhn continued to lead but would hold the point for only one more lap. Coming down the front chute on the fifteenth go around, Bacon made the pass at the flag stand. Kuhn kept close but now he had another problem as Kaeding was on his rear bumper.
Kaeding made the pass of Kuhn on lap eighteen and as one more lap was completed the red flag was thrown as Andy Martin took a tumble at the turn two fence.
Lap twenty was Bacon's last lap to lead as Kaeding made a pass for the lead as they exited out of turn four, Kaeding high and Bacon low. By this time the stream of cars was like a freight train in turn one as rubber had been laid down on the track and that was the line to follow. Most drivers had found the bottom to be fastest line as the high cushion had slowed considerably and was dangerously close to the high Knoxville fences.
With the laps winding down, two yellows slowed the race. On each restart Kaeding and Bacon followed the bottom but in turns three and four they would separate with Kaeding going high and Bacon hugging the bottom. It kept the fight for the lead close but nothing ever developed from it. In the end, Kaeding took the checkered flag and the win while USAC celebrated a return to the Knoxville oval after an absence of 37 years.
Bacon kept second and Kuhn was third. Fourth went to seventh row starter Russ Harper. Don Droud, Jr finished fifth. Rounding out the top ten finishers were Kyle Nicholas (a B Main transfer who started near the tail), Jay Drake, Ryan Pace (started 16th), Brad Mosen and Levi Jones (started 18th).
Madsen is 6th Different Sprint Winner at Knoxville
Knoxville, Iowa - June 4 - Defending Knoxville Raceway track champion Kerry Madsen took the feature event win at Marion County fairgrounds Sunday night. Madsen became the sixth different winner in the 410 division this year.
The 410 sprints had been a companion division with the USAC midgets which were staging their Knoxville Midget Nationals on Saturday night. A sudden rain event postponed the championship as well as the 410 A Feature.
With the feature starting at 7:10 Iowa time, much sunlight and heat of the day still remained for this half-mile oval to endure. Only two key lines remained on the track, the bottom and the cushion near the fences. Calvin Landis utilized his front row starting position to jump to the top at the start of the race. That top groove enabled him to drive to a 20 car-length advantage over Wayne Johnson at the end of five circuits.
By lap seven Landis had come upon lap traffic but the yellow was displayed on the next lap negating the top cars having to sort through the backmarkers. The restart saw Johnson try the bottom but he quickly found out that the top had the faster line. Madsen and Billy Alley settled behind Johnson once he placed his car back upon the cushion. At the fifteen-lap mark one could see that Johnson was making some headway in the Landis lead.
A yellow on lap 16 slowed the field to a single file as Jesse Giannetto lost a right-rear tire to the abrasive track. He was able to restart. Landis led the field back to the green but one lap later his certain victory was thwarted when he too lost a tire coming out of turn four. Landis managed to keep his sprinter steady but would have to rejoin the field at the rear once the tire was changed.
Madsen thus inherited the lead in his Vermeer Motorsports machine and flew around the half-mile oval on the cushion. At the end of twenty laps he could claim a victory of twenty car lengths in his Cool/Wesmar- powered sprinter. Johnson took second, Brian Brown drove a steady race to finish third, Alley was fourth and Skip Jackson claimed fifth. Ricky Logan, Clint Garner (started 16th), Matt Moro (started 15th), Zomer and Bronson Maeschen (started 14th) completed the top ten finishers.
These events were held in conjunction with the annual National Sprint Car Hall of Fame & Museum's induction banquet held Saturday afternoon (June 3) in the Marion County fairground's Dyer-Hudson Hall. This year's class included 13 inductees.
For complete results go to RESULTS at the top of this page.
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