7TH HEAVEN: KODY SWANSON IS USAC SILVER CROWN CHAMP, DORAN-DYSON THE ENTRANT KINGS

By: Richie Murray – USAC Media

Speedway, Indiana (October 24, 2022)………Throughout the first 51 years of the USAC Silver Crown series’ existence, the number 1 had never captured the championship.

But if there’s anybody who was up to the task to alter that half-a-century narrative, it was certainly Kody Swanson.

Swanson’s efforts led him to become just the third driver in USAC history to earn seven national championships within a single division.  A.J. Foyt grabbed seven USAC Championship Car titles between 1960-79. Mel Kenyon performed likewise, scoring seven crowns with the USAC National Midgets between 1964-1985.

Kody has made quick work of his seven USAC Silver Crown championships, which have all been earned in a nine-season span between 2014-2022.

In a unique partnership, Swanson wheeled entries for both Doran Racing and Chris Dyson Racing as completely separate entities throughout his quest to the 2021 series championship. In 2022, the two teams combined forces on paper to earn each team’s first ever entrant title.

The newly christened Doran-Dyson Racing partnership operated from separate shops to house Doran’s pavement car and Dyson’s dirt car for Swanson to drive. The shared team name and number presented an opportunity for all parties to compete under the same umbrella for the same united goal – to win a season championship.

What’s unparallelly interesting about the Doran and Dyson pairing is the two team’s shared backgrounds in road racing. In fact, a photo from the 1980s currently hangs in the Doran team shop and features Al Holbert at speed in IMSA Camel GT competition, driving the famed Lowenbrau Porsche 962 that Kevin Doran was the crew chief of. In the background of that same photo, as fate would have it, was a Dyson Racing machine.

All these years later, the two teamed up for left turns only, and became champions of the oval track variety.

“I’m really fortunate to have the opportunities that I’ve had,” Swanson acknowledged. “I’ve driven for a lot of great race teams and I’m thankful for each one. This year, to have driven for Doran and Dyson in a combination effort, what a special year to do it and have it come down right to the end. We gave it all we had and it’s really special to win the championship any way you can. Winning a USAC title really means a lot and to have it be a seventh is really special.”

While finishes of 7th at Terre Haute, 2nd at Lucas Oil Indianapolis Raceway Park, 8th at Port Royal and 4th at Madison and a third-place position in points may not seem that unsettling to most observers, consider this. The four-race drought was the longest winless stretch Swanson has endured to start a Silver Crown season since 2013, nearly a full decade ago.

Oddly enough, it was a non-points, special event that kickstarted Swanson’s summertime turnaround which put the Kingsburg, Calif. native in the driver’s seat of the championship run following the first non-championship Silver Crown event of its kind since 1996.

Swanson led the 25-lap, 10-car shootout wire-to-wire in June at IRP. It’s a roll he matriculated into Winchester Speedway where he avenged the previous year’s half-car-length defeat with a triumph in which he was 10 seconds ahead of the field at the finish line, putting all but second place finisher Logan Seavey a lap down.

Since 1976, there had been one individual who stood head and shoulders above all others in terms of USAC national feature victories at Ohio’s Toledo Speedway. That was Rollie Beale. In August, Swanson topped the 1973 USAC National Sprint Car champion’s long-standing win record in the race named after the legend he passed. Swanson once again led all 100 laps in succession for his sixth career Toledo victory.

Onto mid-August, it was relatively the same story at Illinois’ World Wide Technology Raceway. Earlier in the day, Swanson became the first to reach 40 career USAC Silver Crown pole positions during a qualifying run which set a new world speed record for a traditional USAC Silver Crown with a time of 30.675 seconds, which translates to 146.699 mph, eclipsing the former speed record for a traditional Silver Crown car set by himself at Iowa Speedway with a 146.212 mph in 2012.

The term “traditional” is used in this matter due to the utilization of a “New Generation” “Super Speedway” car that was used in competition solely during the years of 2006-07. Aaron Pierce turned a qualifying lap of 175.012 mph during the brief era in USAC history at Florida’s Homestead-Miami Speedway in 2006.

At WWTR, Swanson saw the lead slip away early, but made his way back to the front to lead the final 48 laps of the 80-lap affair at the 1.25-mile paved oval located in the shadow of the St. Louis arch.

Now 63 points ahead, the championship seemed well within hand for Swanson as the series moved into a stretch of dirt races. However, that part of the equation suited second place points runner Seavey quite well down the stretch.

Seavey made up ground with a victory in an attrition-filled race at the Du Quoin State Fairgrounds, which saw just seven of the 30 starters still running at the checkered of the 100-lap distance. In doing so, Seavey became the third driver to win both a stock car and champ car race at the Du Quoin Mile along with Jimmy Bryan and A.J. Foyt.

Swanson still maintained full control of the point standings by late September after a somewhat sluggish beginning, but one bit of misfortune can spell near doom and gloom, and that’s what eventually came to be.

“We struggled at the beginning of the year; it was just kind of the way it went,” Swanson recalled. “We didn’t have the dirt race finishes that we wanted, and it was the same with the pavement. We struggled at Madison, but we got hot there in that stretch of summer to resurrect it, but I hate that I made an error at Eldora and almost gave it all away.”

The 4-Crown Nationals at Ohio’s Eldora Speedway in September proved to be exhilarating for Seavey and crushing for Swanson. While Seavey was punishing the field en route to his third consecutive dirt Silver Crown victory of the season, Swanson experienced the complete other end of the spectrum in the first turn on the first lap.

That’s when fifth-starting Swanson and fellow third row starter Carmen Perigo collided, sending Swanson backwards into the outside retaining wall where he was then clipped by the right rear tire of the oncoming Matt Westfall, resulting in a bent axle for Swanson which knocked him out of the race and into a 27th place result, the worst finishing position of his entire USAC Silver Crown career.

The melee accrued disastrous consequences for Swanson as his commanding 57-point lead entering the race dwindled to zero by the end of the night and emerged knotted up alongside Seavey atop the standings with two races remaining.

Seavey and Swanson stayed pretty much in lock step following October’s run at the Illinois State Fairgrounds dirt mile. There, Seavey took third and Swanson fourth, giving Seavey a three-point edge entering the finale right in Swanson’s wheelhouse a week later on the pavement at IRP.

Swanson performed as expected, winning the pole to grab three bonus points which drew him even with Seavey going into the final 100 laps of the year. Swanson took off with the lead while Seavey stayed in the hunt, running a solid third on lap 12 when the proverbial carpet was pulled from beneath him. The culprit for Seavey was a broken oil pump belt, ending his shot at a title run.

Meanwhile, when Swanson crossed the line in front on lap 51, he clinched three more bonus points for leading the most laps which elevated him ahead of Seavey once and for all. With Seavey on the sidelines, Swanson finished 4th once more and ultimately took the title by a 41-point margin. He also became the 14th driver overall, and the first since 2016, to overtake the point leader for the championship in the final race.

Seven driver tallied victories during the 2022 Silver Crown season with Seavey and Swanson both putting one on the board on three occasions. All three for Seavey came on dirt and all three came on pavement for Swanson.

Justin Grant (Ione, Calif.) won the season opener in May at Indiana’s Terre Haute Action Track via a pass of Jerry Coons Jr. with four laps remaining and extended his consecutive start streak with the series to 71, which ranks as the fourth most all-time behind Brian Tyler’s 97, Kody Swanson’s 88 and Dave Darland’s 79.

Bobby Santos (Franklin, Mass.) earned his first USAC Silver Crown score in more than four years after regaining the lead back from Kody Swanson late in the going during a late-May go at IRP.

So-called “dirt guy” C.J. Leary (Greenfield, Ind.) displayed his pavement prowess with a dominant performance in June at Wisconsin’s Madison International Speedway, his first win on pavement since he was behind the wheel of TQ Midgets and karts during the early stages of his racing career.

Shane Cockrum (Benton, Ill.) became the 26th driver to win a AAA/USAC Champ Car race at both Illinois dirt miles in his career. He found redemption in October at the Illinois State Fairgrounds with popular victory after previously winning at Du Quoin in 2014-15.

Tanner Swanson (Kingsburg, Calif.) made it an all-Swanson evening in October’s finale at IRP, passing brother Kody for the lead with 35 laps to go on his way to his first series win in two years while his older sibling celebrated a series championship.

Swanson led or was tied in nearly every single statistical category. His 322 laps led were the most as were his top-tens (10) and pole positions (5). He and Seavey each pegged eight top-fives throughout the run.

Gregg Cory (Shelbyville, Ind.) made his first foray into USAC Silver Crown racing a successful one in 2022 after previously finding success in TQ Midgets and Sprint Cars, bagging a Paragon (Ind.) Speedway track championship in 2006. He made starts in 10 of the 11 main events and finished a best of 10th at IRP in May.

Third place was the best finish by a series Rookie in 2022 with two drivers reaching the mark. Mario Clouser (Auburn, Ill.) snared a third in August at World Wide Technology Raceway while Tyler Roahrig (Plymouth, Ind.) rode the high line to pick up third in the last show of the year at IRP.

Casey Buckman (Chandler, Ariz.) recorded his best career USAC Silver Crown finish at the Du Quoin 100-miler where he also made the biggest move of the season. Buckman, the track and facility manager at Wild Horse Pass Motorsports Park by day, charged from his 23rd starting position to finish 5th.

Six drivers made feature starts in all 11 events during the 2022 campaign: Grant, Leary, Seavey, Swanson, Brian Tyler (Parma, Mich.) and Travis Welpott (Pendleton, Ind.).

Women made a huge impact on the USAC Silver Crown scene with historical performances from two different drivers. Taylor Ferns (Shelby Township, Mich.) became the first woman to finish on the podium of a USAC Silver Crown event at IRP in May, then repeated her feat with another third place result in July at Winchester (Ind.) Speedway.

Kaylee Bryson (Muskogee, Okla.) captivated the audience with a rim-riding effort on seven cylinders at the Illinois State Fairgrounds while becoming the first woman to lead a single lap in the history of the Silver Crown series. In fact, she led 72 out of the 100 laps before finishing in the 5th spot.

The series was saddened to learn of the death of Terre Babb (Decatur, Ill.), who passed away from a heart attack while leading a winged sprint car feature in a non-USAC sanctioned event at Missouri’s Saint Francois County Raceway in July at the age of 55. Babb had competed with the USAC Silver Crown series since 1989, and in May of 2022, made his 31st and final USAC Silver Crown start at Terre Haute, finishing 9th. His career best finish with the series came at the same track in 2010 where he earned a 4th.

By: Richie Murray – USAC Media

Brownsburg, Indiana (October 22, 2022)………The Brothers Swanson corralled all the USAC Silver Crown headlines during Championship Saturday at Lucas Oil Indianapolis Raceway Park.

While Tanner Swanson took the feature victory in the 100-lap battle of the Kingsburg, Calif. siblings, it was Kody Swanson who emerged as the series champion once more for the seventh time in his illustrious career.

Tanner tracked down Kody in lapped traffic with 35 circuits remaining, then led the balance of the distance to earn his seventh career USAC Silver Crown win at IRP, tying himself with, you guessed it, Kody, as the all-time winningest series driver at the track.

Meanwhile, Kody, who trailed Logan Seavey by three points entering the event, collected three points for winning his 41st career pole position to lead off the festivities.  Kody officially moved atop the series point standings when he led the 51st lap, clinching the three-point bonus awarded to the driver leading the most laps in the feature.

Simultaneously, Kody was experiencing an assault upon the unconditional expression of “Brotherly Love.”  Tanner continuously applied pressure to the rear bumper of Kody until executing his move in traffic on lap 66 to make the pass and make himself a happy winner after capturing his first series victory in more than two seasons aboard his Bowman Racing/Bricker’s Pub – T.J. Forged/Beast/Kistler Chevy.

Near midway, Tanner came to the realization that he was pushing too hard.  Once the seed of information was planted from his newfound communication via the spotter, Tanner whoa’d up and recalibrated his approach.

“It’s just a high-speed chess match here,” Tanner related.  “You’ve got two cars that are that good and I didn’t have any radio communication for the first half of it.  I really didn’t know how many laps were left, so I was pushing him a little bit and trying to see where he was at and where I was at.  I thought we were feeling pretty good, then I finally got somebody to come over the radio and say ’40 to go,’ and I was like, ‘Uh oh, we’ve been pushing way too hard!’”  So, I backed off a little bit, then I got lucky with some lapped cars.  Once we got into clean air, we were able to log some good laps.”

“Lucky” is a bit of a misnomer with luck usually playing into the hands of the driver who finds himself in the right place at the right time.  That’s precisely where Tanner was on lap 66 when Kody found himself sandwiched between the tail-end lead lap cars of Nathan Byrd and Brian Tyler in turn four.  Kody was forced to check up while Tanner carried a full head of steam and dove under all three to snare the lead away at the line.

“Being in second while going through lapped traffic is the best place to be,” Tanner acknowledged.  “I was able to make the easy decision while Kody had the hard decision, and I just did whatever he didn’t do.  I got really lucky with those two guys who pinned him in.  If that hadn’t happened, I don’t know how it would’ve played out.”

Three-quarters of a lap later, the caution fell for the first of the race when Kyle Robbins (13th) spun at the exit of turn four.  Jake Day (15th) attempted to avoid by maneuvering to the high side, but clipped Robbins’ left rear wheel with his left front, sending Day on a straight path into the inside wall.  Both drivers were okay, but both saw an early end to their races.

Thereafter, Kody lost second when C.J. Leary dove under in turn one to steal the position away on the lap 74 restart.  Kody further slid back to fourth when series Rookie Tyler Roahrig, debuting a new Legacy Chassis for the Silver Crown debuting team of Legacy Autosport, impressively went to the topside of turns three and four to squeeze around Kody for the spot with nine laps to go, trailing only race winner Tanner Swanson and runner-up C.J. Leary to the line on the 100th lap.

Despite dropping off the podium during the late stages, the story was already written for Kody’s championship ending.  Early in the race, Logan Seavey was running a steady third when the oil pump belt broke, knocking him out of the race on lap 12 and dropping him down to a season-worst 20th place result.

It was a bitter end for Seavey and his Rice Motorsports team who broke a cam in their engine during Friday’s open practice at IRP, then pulled an all-nighter to drop their dirt car engine between the frame rails.  However, the struggle to make it fit didn’t initially go as well as hoped.  The oil pan was retrofitted by Cold Hard Art to help the cause, and by that point, it was already 4am.  Work continued in the shop close to 7am and the trailer and racecar ultimately appeared in IRP’s infield a mere 20 minutes before the first practice session.

Likewise, Kody spent his fair share of shop time as well, practically camping out at Dyson Racing headquarters from the time last Saturday’s Illinois State Fairgrounds race ended until Wednesday night of this past week.  When the final checkered waved, the whole plan had come to fruition with Doran Racing and Chris Dyson Racing earning first ever USAC Silver Crown entrant titles while Kody became a USAC Silver Crown champion for the seventh time.  That is, despite finishing fourth and having to chase his younger brother to the aforementioned checkered flag.

“Tonight, I’m not even the best in my own family,” Kody said with a laugh.  “My brother, Tanner, does an amazing job.  He put it on us tonight.  We just missed (the setup) a little bit, but these championships are hard to come by and I’m thankful to be surrounded by great people who never give up.  We were here until midnight last night trying to get the thing fixed to make it 100 laps, and it did.  We still came home fourth and had a solid finish.  To cap it off with a championship is a little bit of a silver lining.”

C.J. Leary (Greenfield, Ind.) made a sweet move late to grab a second place finish in his Klatt Enterprises/Wilwood Disc Brakes – Lucas Oil – Brown & Miller Racing Solutions/Beast/Ford.  It marked the best career USAC Silver Crown finish by a Leary at IRP.  C.J.’s father, Chuck, finished third in 1999.  C.J. also took home a career-best third in the final series points.

It was a terrific USAC Silver Crown debut for the Legacy Autosport team with driver Tyler Roahrig (Plymouth, Ind.) bringing home a third place finish in his Legacy Autosport/Legacy Brand – Metalloid Corporation/Legacy/Legacy Chevy.  Roahrig, who won the accompanying 500 Sprint Car Tour feature earlier in the night, charged from ninth, then used a high side pass of Kody Swanson with nine laps to go to swipe the third spot.  In two career IRP Silver Crown starts over the past two seasons, Roahrig has now finished second and third.

By: Richie Murray – USAC Media

Madison, Illinois (August 19, 2022)………Entering Friday night, a rare blank had yet to be filled on Kody Swanson’s USAC Silver Crown resume that seemed almost as remarkable for its absence as does his record number of series wins and championships.  Almost.

In three past series starts at World Wide Technology Raceway in Madison, Ill., the Kingsburg, Calif. native had never won at the 1.25-mile paved oval.  Not only that, he’d also never even led a single lap at the joint.

His fourth start, however, found a much more satisfying result for the six-time series titlist and, in the process, he broke a long-standing USAC Silver Crown record at the OutFront 100 in his Doran-Dyson Racing/Glenn Farms – Henry U.S.A. – Duncan Oil/Beast/Lanci Ford.

Swanson’s newest milestone came by virtue of him winning a USAC Silver Crown main event at a 14th different racetrack, surpassing the 13 distinct venues that 2002-03 series champ J.J. Yeley had won at in his USAC Triple Crown career.

The 37th USAC Silver Crown win for Swanson was his third consecutive after going winless throughout the first four races of the 2022 season as he increased his point lead to a season-high 63 markers when trouble befell his two closest title contenders in Logan Seavey and C.J. Leary.

After capturing his 40th career pole position earlier in the afternoon, Swanson led the opening lap under green, and the following seven, which were all under yellow following a turn one tangle between series Rookies Gregg Cory (17th) and Tom Paterson (18th), which sent Cory careening into the outside turn one wall.  Paterson’s car limped away from the scene, putting a premature end to both drivers’ races just two laps in.

On the ensuing lap nine restart, 2013-14 WWT Raceway winner Bobby Santos dove under Swanson to take command of the lead in turn three.  Santos' hold up front was short lived as Justin Grant powered under Santos at the exit of turn two to take the reins all for himself on lap 10.

Davey Hamilton Jr. was the man of the moment shortly thereafter as the seventh-starting driver charged from 10th to first in a span of seven laps, shooting to the bottom by Grant for the lead on lap 18 all while sliding his left side wheels over the rumble strips getting into turn one.

Meanwhile, Swanson went full-Tom Petty, free fallin’ through the field back to the sixth position by lap 12 and remained mired on the outside of the top-five looking in with a quarter of the 100-mile, 80-lap distance complete.

On the 21st lap, second-running C.J. Leary entered turn three and suddenly veered right into the outside wall, an incident triggered by a flat right front tire.  Leary glanced off the SAFER barrier but continued rolling to pit lane where his crew went to work.  After a few ins and outs through pit lane, which forced him to go multiple laps down, Leary soldiered on to the finish line nine laps behind the leader in the 10th position in the final running order.

At that point in time, Swanson needed some redirection as he prepared to restart in the fifth position coming to the lap 25 restart.

“On that restart, I was fifth and might have been a little pouty and maybe I played some things wrong,” Swanson recalled.  “I got in trouble and got a little further back than I wanted, but there were a bunch of drivers doing such a good job by drafting each other better than I was, so I got shuffled back.  It took a good restart to get myself going.”

That certainly got the ball rolling for Swanson as he marched to fourth, to third and then to second with an outside pass of Grant in turn two on lap 29, then tracked down Hamilton, slipping under on the front straightaway, then clearing him with gusto at the entry to turn one on lap 33.

“I got by Justin and Davey, and I knew they were running awful hard, and it looked like they could do it all night, so I figured I was going to need to press hard and try to get the lead as soon as I could,” Swanson explained.  “Luckily, I got a big draft on Davey to make the pass and we had great speed out front.”

For the final 25 laps, Hamilton pushed Swanson to the brink.  After 10th running Travis Welpott came to a rest against the outside wall in turn one on lap 49, Hamilton used the lap 57 restart to motor his way into the lead briefly on the bottom of turn one.  However, Swanson went undaunted and powered back around Hamilton at the exit of turn two to preserve his lead.

Santos, who had stopped during the preceding yellow flag with a tire issue, brought out the next yellow on the 59th lap when he stopped on the pit road exit in turn one, setting up another restart in which Hamilton used to edge into the lead by a full car length underneath Swanson in turn one on lap 61.  Once again, Swanson hammered down to drive back by Hamilton around the outside to retain the lead off the second turn.

As Swanson stretched his lead to two seconds, the yellow flag was displayed for third-running Taylor Ferns who came to a halt on the front straightaway on lap 74, setting up one final chase with three laps to go as the field bunched up for the lap 78 resumption.

“Some of those restarts were awfully tough,” Swanson admitted.  “(Davey) would get such a great draft, and he was really timing it right.”

Hamilton gave it one more timely attempt, and momentarily nosed ahead of Swanson in turns one and two, but couldn’t quite carry enough momentum off the bottom to dispose of Swanson.  Instead, Swanson firmly and calmly drove back around on the high side and meticulously distanced himself from any challengers.

Swanson completed his task with success, 1.158 seconds in front at the finish line ahead of Davey Hamilton Jr., Mario Clouser, Justin Grant and Nathan Byrd.  For Hamilton, Grant and Byrd, the finishes were the best results of their USAC Silver Crown careers.

Earlier in the day, Swanson became the first to reach 40 career USAC Silver Crown pole positions.  As it turned out, his fastest lap was downright historic.  Swanson set a new world speed record for a traditional USAC Silver Crown car during the Fatheadz Eyewear Qualifying session with a time of 30.675 seconds, which translates to 146.699 mph, eclipsing the former speed record for a traditional Silver Crown car set by himself at Iowa Speedway with a 146.212 mph in 2012.

The term “traditional” is used in this matter due to the utilization of a “New Generation” “Super Speedway” car that was used in competition solely during the years of 2006-07.  Aaron Pierce turned a qualifying lap of 175.012 mph during the brief era in USAC history at Florida’s Homestead-Miami Speedway in 2006.

Swanson’s time trial run was monumental in a multitude of manners.  It broke Chris Windom’s nine-year-old series track record at WWT of 31.082 seconds and 144.778 mph, set back in 2013.