TULSA, Okla. — It wouldn’t be a stretch to declare 2023 as the year of Logan Seavey.
The 26-year-old earned two national championships on the USAC trail, became the third driver to win all three USAC features during the 4-Crown Nationals and accomplished a myriad of other feats along the way.
But the flood of success for the California native started in January, when Seavey won the 37th annual Chili Bowl Nationals while driving the No. 39 midget for Kevin Swindell.
“I felt like he came in here last year and felt like his job was on the line,” Swindell said.
The team owner and driver have been paired up since the 2020 running of the Chili Bowl, when Seavey piloted an entry owned by Swindell and his father, Sammy.
While the indoor midget race is typically the only event that the younger Swindell and Seavey meet up for every year — Seavey drove for Abacus Racing in his USAC endeavors this past season — their chemistry doesn’t skip a beat.
“To have a guy like Kevin (Swindell) watching not only your car but your driving and being able to give pointers helps a lot,” Seavey said. “He’s the best ever to do it in this building and to have him in my corner is huge.”
Swindell is a four-time Chili Bowl champion, but the 34-year-old hasn’t competed since 2015 when he sustained back and neck injuries in a crash during the Knoxville Nationals.
From Swindell’s perspective, earning his first Chili Bowl title as a team owner with Seavey will forever be an unforgettable moment. And that’s not even including the part of the story where everything fell into place at the 11th-hour for their 2023 run.
“We thought we’d have this stuff together by the summer and run a race or two outdoors, but we literally didn’t get the thing (car) to run until Sunday and you know, we kind of just barely made everything just in time to function correctly throughout the week,” Swindell recalled.
Last minute or not, it didn’t seem to matter as Seavey proceeded to win his preliminary night on Friday and took a trip to victory lane following the 55-lap A main on Saturday.
“This is the biggest race that I race in — one of the biggest races in the world. It’s one that’s just so hard to win. You never know. You can bring the best car here 20 years in a row and not win,” Seavey said. “You can get in trouble in hot laps and be done for the week, so it’s just tough. There are a million things that can happen and if you don’t put them all together the right way, then someone else will.”
Last year marked Seavey’s fifth appearance in the A main.
Zooming ahead 365 days, a lot has changed for Seavey and Swindell since then. The two seem to be carrying a little more swagger than they had in 2023, and it’s completely valid considering everything that’s taken place.
For one, Seavey’s flashing a lot more confidence, both as the defending Chili Bowl winner and as an accomplished racer on a hot streak.
“It was just a dream year, dream season,” Seavey said. “A couple USAC championships and a lot of big wins was pretty life changing.”
Two, the Swindell-Curb-Bertrand Motorsports crew is a lot calmer after having a year of Chili Bowl experience to rely on rather than starting from scratch with a newly-built car.
When asked how he feels about the prospect of winning a second consecutive Golden Driller with Seavey at the wheel, Swindell didn’t shy away from making his belief in Seavey’s abilities known.
“It’s hard to get confidence in these cars and he’s got as much as you can ever have right now,” Swindell said. “It’s just business as usual.”