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I grew up at Kokomo Speedway. Bill Lipkey promoted the place and they ran a cross between sprints and super mods when I first remember going. I can remember a few seasons when they ran wings in the early 70's. Big heavy plywood wings. Then sprint cars took over for good. I remember watching USAC midgets when about half the cars had roll cages. I had seen weekly cars flip and I remember that being pretty scary. When I was in first grade they had a 2 day ASA sprint show, and I remember 2 things about it. One was it was the first and last time I saw a rear engine sprint car race. The other was my student teacher from school was the trophy girl. Later on in the 70's before the world of outlaws, Bob Deshamps one of the founders of ASA would rent the track for a sprint only show on a Wednesday night. I remember seeing Sammy and Steve for the first time at those shows. I asked Bob Kinser several years ago about Steve flipping out of the park that night, and he told me it was his third or fourth race. All the old people said Steve was just racing because of his Dad's name and would never amount to anything. Guess they missed that one. Later on saw a couple of wingless World of Outlaw races, and the first USAC sprint race ever on a track smaller than a half mile. Once the track went to pure sprint cars, I was lucky as weekly shows were always wingless. I worked for Kent Evans when he had the track.It was quite a thrill the first time circling the track in the water truck, or taking the fast qualifier around the track in the pace truck.Looking back I saw some cool things and some great drivers, and happy to say things are probably even better now.
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