By T.J. Buffenbarger
(August 1, 2024) — Kasey Jedrzejek comes from a family with deep roots in supermodified racing in the Ohio region. Just a handful of years ago Jedrzerjek was not even that familiar with the ins and outs of dirt track racing. This week the 19-year-old driver from Lagrange, Ohio is headed to the biggest event in all of sprint car racing to compete in the 360 and 410 Knoxville Nationals over the next 10 days.
Jedrzejek father Tim was a standout supermodified driver throughout his career and there were indications Kasey might follow in his father’s footsteps. Then a foray into dirt racing was triggered from an offer from an old family friend from their supermodified racing days.
“I didn’t really go to dirt races or didn’t know much about them until about four or five years ago,” said Jedrzerjek of his lack of dirt racing knowledge early in life. “A guy that my dad used to race asphalt with, one of his good buddies, Denny Fisher, he put a 305 sprint car together for Attica and Fremont. He wanted to race it the first couple of times, just to say that he raced on dirt, and then he said I can race it after that. That’s how I got into dirt racing. Once I started doing it, I didn’t really want to go back to asphalt racing.”
Jedrzerjek showed speed early in the 305 division winning his first feature in that class in August of 2022 during the Sandusky County Fair special at Fremont Speedway. The following year Jedrzerjek started racing with JRA Motorsports in the 410 sprint car division before parting ways. Jedrzerjek went back to racing 305 sprint cars until a phone call came from longtime sprint car driver and car owner Ed Neumeister.
“I started driving for Ed at the very end of the season last year, right after Knoxville,” said Jedrzerjek. Last year I started with a different 410 team and that didn’t work out. I went back to 305 racing for probably two months and then Ed called my dad one night and asked if we wanted to go race with him and we decided to do it.”
The seat time at the end of last season served as a launching pad for 2024 where Jedrzerjek has four victories with the Great Lakes Super Sprints including the Tim Allison Tribute Race at Limaland Motorsports Park. Those performances have Jedzerjek going to Knoxville with high expectations for the 360 Knoxville Nationals this week along with hopes of being competitive the following week in the 410 Nationals.
“I think we all want to make the 360 A-Main. We feel pretty confident that our 360 program has been really strong this year. We have 410 program rolling decent lately. For that it’s going to be a lot harder to make the A-Main. Of course we’d love to make it, but just being in like the B-Main, C-Main, something like that, just being competitive.”
Those high expectations Jedrzerjek holds for himself and the Neumeister team comes despite never laying eyes on the Marion County Fairgrounds.
“It’s my first trip even seeing the place,” said Jedrzerjek “We were going to try and go earlier in the year, but it just didn’t work out. So, it’s going to be our first time. It was on the schedule from the start of the year. Ed enjoys going to Knoxville for two weeks, hanging out, watching some racing and likes to see his car there. We were pretty much planning on going down there from the start of the year if everything went smoothly.”
While Jedrzerjek has not sought out any advice about getting around Knoxville Raceway, like many of his young counterparts he has done a considerable amount of film study over the past several weeks.
“I just watched races prior years like 360 Nationals,” said Jedrzerjek. “I’ve also studied races from the past couple of weeks to just to see what the track usually does throughout the night.”
Knoxville will not be Jedrzerjek’s first performance at one of the major events in sprint car races. Earlier in July Jedrzerjek made his first Kings Royal start, only competing in the Saturday portion of the event, yet showed some promising results during his first start in one of the crown jewel sprint car events.
“I thought we were very successful for not going down there at all before Saturday,” said Jedrzerjek. “We didn’t qualify the best but the whole field was tight. It’s hard to qualify well with those guys at a place like Eldora. We were able to go ninth to fifth in our heat race and get into the B-Main and finished 16th, but there are a lot of competitive guys in that race.”
Despite being early in his career, Jedzejek is very well grounded in the challenges he faces this coming week in the 360 and 410 Nationals.
“It’s just a lot more competitive. I feel like racing with this group of guys, you got to be going 100% all the time. You can’t make too many mistakes, you’re just going to be losing spots, especially when you go and race the guys like the Outlaws and the High Limit Races and stuff like that.”
Jedrezek’s week will begin at Knoxville in Friday night’s preliminary for the 360 Nationals.
Other Notes
- Thursday night’s preliminary for the 360 Knoxville Nationals includes two former champions in Terry McCarl and Aaron Reutzel, who has been on a tear in the 360 sprint car division at Knoxville Raceway this season racking up five victories so far this season in that division at the Marion County Fairgrounds.Chase Johnson, Cole Macedo, Seth Bergman (ASCS Point Leader), Garet Williamson, Emerson Axsom, Justin Peck, Danny Dietrich, Blake Hahn, and Austin McCarl
- Stehman Motorsports will not be making the trip west to the Knoxville Nationals due to injuries suffered by driver Devon Borden in a non-racing accident. The Stehman team also sat out the World of Outlaws events last weekend at Williams Grove Speedway. No timetable was released for Borden’s return to the driver’s seat.
- The Great Lakes Super Sprints and Great Lakes Traditional Sprints are in action on the I-75 corridor all weekend. Both divisions will appear Friday night at the Tri-City Motor Speedway in Auburn, Michigan along with the Great Lakes Lightning Sprints in an all-open wheel event.Saturday GLSS heads south down I-75 towards Eldora Speedway for Family Fun Night, which always draws a large crowd to see the 360 sprint cars return to the high banks of Eldora.
- In addition to Jedrezek, sometimes competition with GLSS and GLTS Luke Hall will be in competition at the 360 Nationals during the Friday preliminary program. **Note: Hall’s entry was withdrawn from the event**
- Butler Motor Speedway has winged 410 sprint cars again on Saturday. Van Gurley Jr. has closed in on Alex Aldrich for the lead in the Butler point standings despite missing programs. Gurley now is just 17 points behind Aldrich during his second time around tour.