Sweet Springs, Missouri — Kale Drake may not be overly superstitious, but at the least, he is certainly a little bit stitious.

Prior to Sunday night’s USAC NOS Energy Drink Midget National Championship event at Missouri’s Sweet Springs Motorsports Complex, the Collinsville, Oklahoma native was involved in a series of fortunate events with the number two featuring prominently everywhere he turned.

“I was talking to (USAC official Kirk Spridgeon) and Justin (Grant) at the trailer earlier today and I told them that when I stopped at the gas station, it was $22.22. After that, I drew the pill 22, then I put on 22 tear-offs before the A-Main. I might be superstitious but I think it worked out,” Drake said with a laugh.

In the end, that same numeral played an integral role in the backdrop of Drake’s fortunes at Sweet Springs. As a matter of fact, he was leading the USAC Midget race there in 2024 with two laps remaining when he found trouble and bounced to a stop, ending his bid for the win.

On Sunday, Drake was slotted third on the final restart. Picking up from where he left off one year ago, Drake made a charge around the outside to take the lead with – you guessed it – two laps to go. Lest we mention that he led the feature three different times, each in chunks of two laps at a time – laps 1-2, laps 16-17 and laps 29-30.

When all was said it done, Drake collected – wait for it – USAC National Midget career victory number two. But to do it in such dramatic fashion, this will be one he remembers for a lifetime, possibly “two” lifetimes.

“Holy smokes, that was a long race and a technical one and super fun,” Drake exclaimed. “That’s not quite up my alley but we made it work.”

Drake was in a prime spot for the start of the 40-lap main event – on the pole position in his Keith Kunz-Curb-Agajanian Motorsports/Eibach – TRD – Toyota – Mobil 1/LynK/Speedway Toyota. But after leading the opening lap, he found himself suddenly on the chase of his teammate, Jacob Denney.

But on lap 16, Denney tripped over the turn two cushion, opening the door for Drake to race on by while utilizing the bottom of turns three and four to edge his way into the lead. After the lap was completed, 17th running Garrett Benson flipped into the outside wall at the exit of turn four. He was okay, but his night was over.

Now let’s flashback to before the start of the feature. Riley Kreisel was initially slated to start on the pole, but in a wild turn of events, was penalized for being late to staging, delayed while attempting to remedy a tire bleeder issue. The result was a two row penalty, which docked Kreisel back to fifth on the grid. However, as it turned out, it wasn’t much of a deterrent to the determined Kreisel.

Kreisel’s Ron Cox owned ride hadn’t been fired since January’s Chili Bowl Nationals four months earlier. Furthermore, he only found out he was going to compete at Sweet Springs at 11pm the night before. On top of everything else, it was only his third career USAC National Midget start and his first since seven years prior in 2018 at the very same 1/6-mile Sweet Springs dirt oval.

The beneficiary of Kreisel’s position shuffle was Drake who moved from the outside of the front row to the pole, a spot he actually wasn’t all that particularly at ease with.

“I didn’t know how I really felt about taking the pole over,” Drake admitted. “I didn’t really want to start the race off and set the pace, but Jacob got out in front of me and showed me what I needed to do and what not to do, which really showed me where the limit was.”

Back to Kreisel. Just after the restart, he found his groove on the bottom and rolled past Denney for second on the 17th circuit, then picked off Drake moments later on lap 18 for the lead. At the same time, 13th starting Drake Edwards followed Kreisel’s path to slot into second ahead of Drake. However, Edwards performed a half-spin in turn two on lap 24 and lost grip of the second spot to Drake in the meantime. That said, Edwards stuck with it and snuck his way back into second on the bottom past Drake as the pair worked around the lapped car of Thomas Meseraull.

Meanwhile, Kreisel’s lead had expanded to a full second and he looked to be on his way to a surefire first career USAC national victory. But on lap 37, series Rookie Brandon Carr (20th) hooked the turn one cushion and nearly flipped before coming to a rest on all fours. Kreisel’s 1.35 second advantage over the field was erased due to the caution and he now had the field bearing down on him with a three-lap shootout on the horizon.

Sitting third with three to go was Drake who had low line dwellers Kreisel and Edwards, both first time USAC national winning hopefuls, sitting in front of him coming back to green. There was only one place to “send it.”

“I had to remind myself on that restart that I know what I’m doing and I have the best guys behind me, and I just needed to hit my marks,” Drake recalled. “It really came down to that last restart. I really had to send it. If I could hit my marks, I knew I had the best car on the racetrack, so it was just a matter of committing. It took a lot of commitment to run it up there and be fast.”

Staying true to his personal pep talk under the helmet, Drake dug in on the outside and nipped Edwards at the stripe for second with two to go on lap 38. Heading to the white flag, Drake hit the cushion in turn one perfectly, then launched off turn two to dispose of Kreisel and place himself at the top of the leaderboard.

On the last go around, Drake changed course and attacked the bottom of turns three and four to thwart off Kreisel and Edwards and block the lane. Drake crossed the line with a 0.363 second margin of victory, his first in USAC since a BC39 prelim win last September.

Behind him, Justin Grant seemingly came out of nowhere, picking off both Kreisel and Edwards in one fell swoop off turn four to get the second spot by a car length. The runner-up result also moved Grant back to the top of the USAC National Midget standings. Grant’s fourth to second final corner surge proved to be the Inferno Armor Fire Move of the Night.

In Arizonian Drake Edwards’ first ever visit to Sweet Springs, he earned his best career USAC National Midget finish. He very nearly won the thing after starting 13th but wound up a strong third to round out the podium.

Kreisel fell to fourth after leading a race high 21 laps while 2018 and 2024 Sweet Springs USAC Midget feature winner Logan Seavey took fifth.

Andrew Felker doesn’t run USAC National Midgets very often, but when he does, he does some mighty fine work. He advanced 12 positions on his way from 19th to 7th to collect the Rod End Supply Hard Charger award.

Earlier in the evening, Cannon McIntosh recorded his 12th career USAC National Midget fast time during Honest Abe Roofing Qualifying. That moved him to 49th on the all-time list alongside Don Meacham, Larry Rice and Josh Wise.

USAC National Midgets At Sweet Springs Motorsports Complex Results

1. Kale Drake (1), 2. Justin Grant (4), 3. Drake Edwards (13), 4. Riley Kreisel (5), 5. Logan Seavey (3), 6. Gavin Miller (11), 7. Andrew Felker (19), 8. Kyle Jones (15), 9. Cannon McIntosh (6), 10. Jacob Denney (2), 11. Kevin Thomas Jr. (9), 12. Gunnar Setser (12), 13. Daniel Robinson (24), 14. Cale Coons (18), 15. Steven Snyder Jr. (17), 16. Hayden Reinbold (7), 17. Brecken Reese (14), 18. Thomas Meseraull (21), 19. Branigan Roark (22), 20. Mack Leopard (8), 21. Brandon Carr (20), 22. Kameron Key (10), 23. Garrett Benson (16), 24. Chad Winfrey (23)