BELLEVILLE, Kan. — Open-wheel racing has a long history at Belleville High Banks.
For over 50 years, the track has presented national-level midget, champ car and winged sprint car racers with a big stage on which to compete, crowning its most iconic racers with some of the most prestigious trophies in the sport.
This Thursday–Friday, July 3–4, the American Sprint Car Series will begin carving a legacy for 360 sprint cars at the hallowed, half-mile oval with the inaugural running of The Big One — a bold yet fitting name for an event with the potential to be one of 360 racing’s biggest marquee events.
“Everything in Belleville is bigger,” said track promoter Drew Erkenbrack. “The track is huge, we’re fast… to win here, we’ve always thought it’s a big deal. The winners here — it usually means a lot to guys when they win here. There’s not a lot of races held here in a year. There’s a lot of big names that have won here, and there’s a lot of big names that haven’t won here.”
While the series’ first venture to the high banks came with a regional event in 2006, the national series has made only one appearance at the track. Missouri racer Brian Brown took the checkered flag in the national series debut in May 2015, and since then, ASCS has been absent at the Kansas oval.
When a new promotional group took over management of the facility before the 2021 season, several new goals were established, including bringing national 360 sprint car racing back to the track. For that, the choice of partnership was already clear.
“ASCS has kind of restructured and made their national tour more appealing to more guys and has such a great following,” Erkenbrack said. “We saw that there’s a lot of cars on the tour, and in these deals, the name of the game is to have a good car count, which gets you a good crowd.
“With the World Racing Group, it just feels like it was taken to a whole other level — the competition and quality-of-field.”
For 40 years from 1978–2017, the prestigious Belleville Midget Nationals remained the track’s most prestigious event, in addition to USAC Silver Crown events, three World of Outlaws NOS Energy Drink Sprint Car Series appearances, and several other regional Sprint Car specials. The track’s newest tradition — the Belleville 305 Nationals, started in 2018 — has been another success, which further helped to spark the interest in creating another spotlight sprint car event.
“We were just at that point where we wanted to create another big, two-day event, and it just felt perfect,” Erkenbrack said. “(We thought) if we can have a big USAC event, a big ASCS National 360 event and our big 305 Nationals… since we’re not a weekly track, we have to bring in a touring series or put on a big, special-paying event because it’s just a different animal here at Belleville.”
A $10,000 grand prize is in store for the winner of Friday night’s main event, marking the second of seven five-figure winner’s shares on the 2025 ASCS schedule. It’s a strong cut of cash for a 360 sprint car event, and the track has plans on creating an even larger purse in the future.
“It just seems like there’s room to come in here and become one of the big 360 events of the year, and that’s what we’re trying to do,” Erkenbrack said. “I know we’re 10,000-to-win, and that’s not the biggest paying event on the schedule, but we want to work towards that and make this a big deal and have somebody excited to win The Big One here at the High Banks.”
