TULSA, Okla. – Barely two months removed from winning the POWRi Lucas Oil National Midget League championship, Jesse Colwell has landed a new opportunity for the Lucas Oil Chili Bowl Nationals.
Colwell, who drove full time for Keith Kunz/Curb-Agajanian Motorsports in 2019 after winning the KKM Giveback Classic, will shift to Steve Reynolds’ Team Ripper Racing squad for the upcoming Chili Bowl.
The outlaw kart standout and Red Bluff, Calif., native will pilot the team’s flagship No. 21ks entry inside the River Spirit Expo Center as he embarks on his second attempt at the Super Bowl of Midget Racing.
Veteran crew chief Flea Ruzic will turn the wrenches on Colwell’s ride as the duo teams up for the first time. Ruzic spoke to Sprint Car & Midget regarding the deal and expressed optimism at welcoming the former Red Bluff Outlaws ace to his and Reynolds’ stable for the biggest midget race of the year.
“It’s actually interesting how this came about,” Reynolds noted. “I originally thought we would probably have Tucker (Klaasmeyer) in a car, because he wasn’t sure of his situation at the time and we’d always gotten along well, so we were looking at that and prepared to put something together for him. And then I got a call from Jesse, not quite two weeks ago, and he said, ‘Hey, I might need a Chili Bowl ride.’
“Steve, his background is in outlaw karts. He had some outlaw karts in the past and went and ran with the Jimmy Elledges and Karsyn Elledges and Nick Hoffmans and Max McLaughlins of that world for a while,” Ruzic added. “And Steve knew Jesse from the outlaw kart days and really liked Jesse. So I told Steve about the situation and Steve came right back and said, ‘Well, if he’s out (at KKM), then we’ve got a car for him.
“It was Dec. 5 that I was in Oklahoma and got a text from Jesse confirming his situation for sure, and Steve told him right away that we had a brand-new car sitting there ready to go for him to drive.”
Ruzic added that Colwell’s work ethic is something that stuck out to him as a major positive, even before he and Reynolds made the decision to hire Colwell for their Chili Bowl effort.
“It was a couple of years ago the first time I met Jesse. Jimmy Elledge was coming through town running a bunch of outlaw kart races, and they stayed at my shop for a couple of days and worked on their karts,” Ruzic recalled. “That was the first time I’d ever laid eyes on the kid and he was just … I have an air conditioned shop and yet Jesse was outside in the sun and the heat laying on the ground, beating on stuff and working on parts and motors and everything else.
“He’s just a get after it kind of kid and I’m pretty excited to have him onboard with us.”
Colwell won the POWRi title this season on the strength of two wins, 15 top-five and 26 top-10 finishes in 29 feature starts, capturing both rookie-of-the-year honors and the season championship in one fell swoop.
To his part, Colwell is looking forward to the chance that’s ahead of him and excited to work with Reynolds and Ruzic for his second attempt at the Chili Bowl.
“It did come together pretty quick,” Colwell said. “I was ready when they said they had a car for me. Steve had joked with me before about coming and running his stuff at Chili Bowl, but when things came together and the chance was there to do it for real it was pretty simple to get it put together.
“Steve and Flea have always had good stuff and they’ve been pretty fast, so I’m confident in what we can do together,” he added. “I’m just excited to go out next month and try something different. I think it should be a pretty good deal.”
Ruzic confirmed that Justin Allgaier will serve as one of Colwell’s teammates during the Chili Bowl in January, with the remainder of the Team Ripper lineup to be announced in due course.
As for the rest of the 2020 season for the squad, Ruzic noted that if the pairing with Colwell works out, then he’d have no problem extending the relationship into the main part of the national midget season.
“If Jesse works out well at the Chili Bowl and he wants to stay, then I’m sure we can run a car with him all year. That’s no problem,” Ruzic said. “I have a couple other deals that I’m working on; there’s another driver that’s interested in running with us next year … and two or three (full-time) cars would be OK, but anything more than that is too big for me to manage. I feel like once you start running more than two or three cars, then you sacrifice a lot of quality unless you have a massive staff, and having a massive staff costs a lot of money.
“But definitely one or two full-season cars is where I can give everything my full attention and do a lot of the stuff myself, so I think that’s pretty ideal if we can work it out,” he continued. “Just have to see how Chili Bowl goes first and then we’ll move forward after that.”
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