KNOXVILLE, Iowa — Contending to win the Knoxville Nationals was getting to be old hat for Brian Brown. And then it wasn’t.
The Grass Valley, Mo., native grew up attending races at Knoxville Raceway. He knows every nook and cranny of the place. His uncle, Danny Lasoski, is the winningest driver in the history of the historic half-mile track, and Brown is slowly creeping up the winner’s list at Knoxville with his 55th career victory coming during Thursday’s preliminary night program.
Still, the biggest prize offered at the Sprint Car Capital of the World — and in all of sprint car racing — has eluded the 42-year-old driver.
Brown made his Nationals debut in 2006 and was famously involved in an altercation with Lasoski, which also involved Lasoski’s dad and Brown’s grandfather George. The on-track skirmish led to Lasoski making the feature and Brown missing out. It also led to a heated and public exchange of words between family members.
Now, 15 years later the family has come full circle. More on that later.
Brown qualified for his first of 10 Nationals features. Along the way, his No. 21 became popular around the country and he earned the nickname “Black Jack.”
In 2012, Brown nearly won the Nationals, but came up short, finishing second to Donny Schatz. It set a trend as runner-up finishes, behind Schatz, followed in 2013 and ’14. He was sixth in 2015 and missed the race in 2016. He was sixth again in 2017 and 25th in 2018. He failed to qualify in 2019.
“For me and my team, it is just a sense of relief,” said Brown after winning on Thursday night. “In ’12, ’13 and ’14 I ran second to Donny (Schatz) and you start thinking that’s the way it’s going to be. I’ll beat him next year. Well, in ’15, ’16, ’17 and ’18, I’ve had some bad luck, a tire vibrating or just me driving like an idiot and I have never been back in the show.
“I am proud of my whole team and proud to be able to relax and breathe these next two days. I feel like with the team we have, we are building confidence and we have a chance to win on Saturday night and I am very excited about that.”
And it’s a race than means more to Brown than any other.
“This event means more to me than any driver in the pit area just because of what it is,” Brown said. “I came here as a kid with Danny. I probably wasn’t two years old. It means a lot to me in my heart. This is my favorite week of the year as a fan, and at six o’clock I get to go drive, too. For those who have never been here, it is the Daytona 500, the Superbowl or the Indy 500.
“It is everything to us because I have come here for a long time,” Brown continued. “The woman (Katie Spriggs) who sang the national anthem, I remember her singing it when I was a kid, the flag man. I know these people, they are my family, to come here and run well means a lot to me and to win this race would be an absolute dream come true.”
If that dream does come true on Saturday night, it may come as the result of a family reunion that would have been a huge surprise a few years ago.
But as the month of June wound down, Brown and the Brian Brown Racing No. 21 were struggling on the track. He called Lasoski.
“I called him up and said I needed help. He showed up without batting an eye,” Brown explained. “He’s just a small piece — Ty Wolfgang, Nate Steinhaus, my dad Robert, my grandpa George. I think that’s special. My grandpa George is 84 years old. I see a new fire inside of him.
“He used to come to my shop a couple days a week,” Brown said proudly. “He’s there six days a week now. He’s working. I think it means a lot — everybody remembers what happened between me and Danny in 2006 here — I think it means a lot to him to see us back together. That’s how it started.”
Brown said the driver-crew chief with Lasoski is a work in progress.
“It’s been great so far,” he said Thursday night. “We are just living day to day and race to race and looking forward to challenging for a Knoxville Nationals with Danny and my team on Saturday.”