Being at the right place at the right time is important, too.
“Circumstances can develop that you have no control over, so you need some good fortune to go your way, too,” Swanson said. “For example, last year a guy broke a wheel center right in front of me. If I’d been alongside of him, I would have probably been involved.
“Another time a driver I was racing with had his left-rear tire come off. If that had happened a lap or two later, I might have been right beside him and gotten involved in it. So you have to have some good luck.
“Even the execution of pit stops can affect the outcome,” he noted. “Guys are using air guns in pit stops. If an air gun jams or fails, it can change the execution of the race.”
And then there’s the unknown of push trucks, since sprint cars don’t have starters.
“You try to be the first one ready to get back on the track after several cars pit under a yellow so you can get the first push truck available, but sometimes that doesn’t work out as you’d like,” Swanson said.
Just timing the pit stop right can be difficult.
“As far as pit strategy goes, you have a basic window of when you want to pit, but you have to adapt to when the yellows fall,” he said. “You’ll adjust your strategy for when a yellow comes out. You try to be aware of what your closest competitors are doing. You have to decide if you want to be on the same pit stop cycle as them or not. You don’t really know until you’re 150 laps in where you’ll go with it.”
Last year, Swanson and his Nolen Racing teammate, Shane Hollingsworth, led 499 of the 500 laps, which was an unbelievable accomplishment for one team. Hollingsworth finished fourth.
They also did it with Chevy V-6 engines under the hoods. Team owner Gene Nolen, who died in mid April, dearly loved V-6 engines. He was convinced they’re the best choice for the Little 500 because they get off the turns better than the V-8s.
Swanson gave Nolen his first Little 500 victory in 2018 after years of trying to win it as a car owner and then got him in victory lane there again last year.
“Shane and I ran our races completely separate last year, but when that last caution flew we were both in the same window for needing fuel and as I recall everyone in the top five pitted together,” Swanson related.
“There are things you learn as the race goes along,” he elaborated. “By the time you get to the second pit stop window you’ll have had some attrition. These are some of the kinds of things you have to be aware of. It’s definitely an element beyond what we have in a typical sprint car or midget race.”
Endurance is also important.
“For our type of cars, being on a high-banked, quarter-mile is hard on your muscles,” he said. “I really think how fit you are makes a difference in the middle of the race, and it helps if you’re fresh for the end of the race. You make a special effort leading up to the Little 500 so you will be in as good shape as you can be all year.
“Just the duration of the race makes a big difference,” he continued. “You have to have a different mindset being that the race is that long. Everyone is usually forced to deal with some sort of setback at some point during the race. A tire may go away, or change the handling of your car, or you might have to deal with some other issue. You have to keep your focus all the way to the end, no matter what; you have to endure.
“You have to keep pushing,” Swanson added. “Maybe someone has a big lead, and you can’t keep up with them. You have to realize they may have a setback later that will put you right back in it, so you have to keep focused.
“There’s an opportunity to separate yourself from your competitors if you can keep your mistakes to a minimum, for sure,” he concluded.