Promoters Emmett Hahn and Lanny Edwards had reason to be concerned. The second annual Chili Bowl was on the horizon and the Midwest was in the grip of a fierce winter storm. Just two days before opening night Tulsa was hit with eight inches of snow, and the situation was worse in the hinterlands.
The inaugural event had drawn rave reviews from the participants and fans on hand, but to pay the bills more cars and people were needed going forward. Somehow teams began to arrive with trailers routinely dropping copious amounts of snow and ice on the floor of the Expo Center as they parked.
Scott Hatton won Saturday’s finale, besting Friday night’s winner Danny Frye Jr. to score one of the most important victories in his career. While Frye Jr. was undoubtedly disappointed to come up short, a conversation with Hahn after all the festivities were over proved to be prescient. Looking around as rigs were departing, Frye remarked, “If this thing survives it has the chance to be the biggest midget race in the nation.”
Today, few deny the Lucas Oil Chili Bowl is the kingpin event in contemporary midget racing. In early January every inch of this unique building will be occupied by midget teams. The sheer number of cars is beyond comprehension. On one hand this phenomenon is understandable. If you are a committed racer, you dream about winning the premier event in your discipline.
Here’s the rub. While the Knoxville Nationals, Kings Royal and the World 100 for late models post eye-popping purses, particularly at the top, the take for the Chili Bowl winner is far more modest. Yet the participants come in droves.
Not only do the top teams arrive equipped with purpose-built cars they can race nowhere else, but racers with limited budgets also come with plans of spending a full week in the Oil Capital.
Racing is an inherently irrational enterprise, but the Chili Bowl can appear to take this trait to a new level. So, the question looms why do teams devote so much time, energy and money to this event?
The answer seems to be predicated on the overall objective heading into the week.
There was a time when Pete Willoughby fielded his own midget team, but for years he has been a key member of Keith Kunz Motorsports. Willoughby will be the first to tell you that Kunz is not in this game just because he is an enthusiast, he is also a businessman.
Nonetheless, when asked why there is so much effort devoted to this one event Willoughby’s answer is quick and to the point.
“It is because of the Driller.” Yes, as he elaborates, it would be nice if the purse was larger, but the prime motivation is holding the Golden Driller trophy at the end of the week. Adding emphasis to his point, Willoughby said, “Keith and Rusty (Kunz) taught me when I first got together with them that there are two races a year, Belleville and the Chili Bowl. Everything else is a heat race. When it comes to the Chili Bowl there is no place like it.”
Chad Boat made a smooth transition from driver to team owner and there is no question that he strives for his CB Industries team to be viewed on equal footing with teams like KKM. In 2020, he captured the USAC National Midget Series championship with Chris Windom at the controls, but he also came to the Chili Bowl armed with former winner Christopher Bell.
Like Kunz, Boat is also trying to grow his enterprise, and when asked if he feels that the effort expended for this one event is worth it, he said, “You know I think it is. At the end of the day, it is the race everyone wants to win. No matter how you do outdoors, people always want to know how you did at the Chili Bowl. I think Keith has made a lot of deals on how he has done at the Chili Bowl whether it was with Christopher (Bell), Kyle (Larson) or Rico (Abreu) and other guys who don’t even run for him full time outdoors. What people know is that he won five Chili Bowls in a row.”
The motivation for a racer appears self-evident, but there are unique agendas. In the 2021 finale, Justin Grant made a bonsai move that could easily have cost him second place, but afterward made it clear that losing a spot in the final finishing order was never a concern.
“Nobody really remembers who finished second,” Grant said. “But everybody remembers who won the Chili Bowl. It is definitely one of those events you put all of your effort into and you leave everything out there.”
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