By Mike O’Leary
April 24, 2010 – The defending King of Indiana Sprint Series champion Brady Short is anxious for the first race of this season’s KISS tour, at Gas City I-69 Speedway on May 14. Following a highly successful summer that saw Short top the Bloomington Speedway sprint car division, in addition to the KISS title, Short admits that repeating is one of his goals.
“I said last year that I wanted to get twelve wins and I only got nine, so I was a little upset about that. I made my goal a little higher this year. I’m actually reaching for 15. I think that we can do it. We’ve got a pretty good group of guys around us and we’ve got a really good car. It’s just as matter of having a little luck and being in the right place at the right time.”
Short says that several adjustments that his Indiana Stone Works team made over the winter are paying off. “I’m running a totally different set up than we ever ran last year. So far it’s been a pretty good solid year. We went to Florida and had two track records at two different tracks and ran third, third, and fourth. I’ve already got two wins here in Indiana. So I’m pretty much starting where we left off last year.”
“We were just trying to accomplish where I could get in a little bit more when the track’s a little heavier and rougher,” he says, “get in and rotate and still have the drive off that I’ve always had. I think that we’ve come on some stuff here that is really going to be good at these places around Indiana. I’m pretty excited about running Sprint Week and a lot of these shows. Hopefully, we can come out and win a lot more races this year.”
Opening night at Gas City will be key to the Bedford, IN, racer’s KISS title defense. He calls the quarter mile oval his most challenging track. As it did last year, a strong run will position him for the rest of the series.
“I’ve never been a big fan of Gas City,” Brady allows. “We started running good there when I ran (for Scott Benic) in the second half of ’07. I just can’t get a good handle on that place. It’s probably just me, because I’ve been in two different types of race cars and I never have really done that well. We ran fifth in the KISS race there last year and were pretty excited. If we can go there and learn, the new stuff we have going on will work really good at that place. So I’m actually looking forward to going there because I like challenges.”
How do you win the KISS crown? Following Gas City, Short was tenth at Lawrenceburg, third at Bloomington, then scored last at Kokomo after his car was damaged in a heat race. But he bounced back with his first KISS victory at Tri-State before wrapping up the championship at Paragon with a fifth place run. In many ways, the ability to bounce back from a devastating result one night, and score a victory in the next race illustrates the championship caliber of the Short team.
“What’s cool about the KISS series is that you’re going to different race tracks and it means that you’re not going to be good at just one certain race track. It means that you have to be really good at every type of race track and that’s what’s so fun about the KISS series. You just have to be consistent. You don’t have to win a lot of races, you just have to make sure you’re in there in the top five and avoid wrecks and stuff like that. Make sure you’re there at the end. We actually had a really good KISS deal, we stayed out of trouble and we ran top fives and we won one at Haubstadt,” Brady added. “That’s all the goal is,”
2010 King Of Indiana Sprint Series Schedule
Gas City I-69 Speedway Friday, May 14
Kokomo Speedway Sunday, May 16
Bloomington Speedway Friday, May 21
Lawrenceburg Speedway Saturday, May 22
Tri-State Speedway Saturday, June 5
Paragon Speedway Saturday, June 26
KISS events pay $2,500 to win and $250 to start the feature. The B-Main pays $100 to all starters who do not transfer to the feature. The $3,600 point fund awards the top five point finishers, with $1,000 going to the 2010 King of Indiana Sprints.