MILAN, Mich. The International Hot Rod Assn has officially added another fantastic facility to its portfolio with the purchase of Milan Dragway.

The quarter-mile Michigan track, located 40 miles west of Detroit and 25 miles south of Ann Arbor, opened in 1964. Milan Dragway has hosted IHRA national events like the Motor City Nationals and Northern Nationals as well as IHRA Pro-Am events.

Kurt Johnsons TVC, the industry leader in track preparation, is currently working at the facility making major improvements to the track surface and pit areas. It means changes to the 2025 schedule that will be updated on the tracks social media pages.

While there is short-term inconvenience, the goal is to make Milan Dragway one of the premier drag strips in the world. Johnny Quick, the famed grudge racer from Street Outlaws and a 28-year veteran of racing at Milan Dragway, has been named the track manager.

(IHRA owner) Darryl Cuttell is making major investments in the track, Quick said. His goal is to make it one of the premier race tracks in the world. Thats why Kurt Johnson and TVC are out there making sure the track surface is the best it can be.

These improvements are made with the racers and fans are in mind. Beyond the track surface and pits, plans are for grandstands, restrooms, concessions and other areas to be updated for a world-class facility.

With its long history, the list of previous winners read like a whos who of drag racing. Big Daddy Don Garlits won three straight IHRA Northern Nationals Top Fuel races from 1977-79. Other Top Fuel winners include Connie Kalitta and six-time IHRA World Champion Clay Millican.

The list of other winners in other classes is just as impressive with The King of Speed Kenny Bernstein, Raymond Beadle and Ed Ace McCulloch in Funny Car, Warren The Professor Johnson, Bob Glidden and Rickie Smith in Pro Stock.

More recently, the track has hosted many great No Prep and Heads-Up events. Milan Dragway is home to one of the largest heads-up classes in the country. But, it is also a multi-purpose facility frequently hosting swap meets, car shows and rock concerts. Both Car and Driver and Automobile magazine have used Milan Dragway to conduct car tests.

Quick has called Milan Dragway his home track for over 20 years. He sees an incredibly bright future for the historic drag strip.

Even if I wasnt the track manager, I would be excited about the improvements taking place, Quick said. You want your home track to be the best, and I think that Milan Dragway is going to be one of the best tracks around. With Darryl and Kurt, we will have one of the best surfaces in the country to race at.

Stay in touch with the latest happenings and schedule updates for Milan Dragway with the tracks social media pages. Keep checking out IHRA.com and the IHRAs social media pages for more exciting news coming soon.

TOLEDO, Ohio The USAC Silver Crown trail is a diverse one with an array of dirt and pavement tracks each taking turns hosting the behemoths of the USAC arsenal the champ cars.

Just last Sunday, Terre Hautes dirt half-mile was the battlefield. Saturday night the stage is paved with asphalt as the series takes on Ohios Toledo Speedway for the 12th running of the Hemelgarn Racing/Super Fitness Rollie Beale Classic Fueled by Marcos Pizza.

The annual event remembers Toledos racing hero, 1973 USAC National Sprint Car champion Rollie Beale, who also later became a highly respected USAC official who served as the chief steward for both the Silver Crown and National Sprint Car series for many years.

WHOLL STOP THE REIGN?

Kody Swanson has raced to eight overall USAC Silver Crown victories at Toledo in 2011-15-18-19-21-22-23-24, including six consecutive. The eight victories are one shy of the record for most by any driver at a single track in USAC Silver Crown history, one that he himself owns with nine scores at Lucas Oil Indianapolis Raceway Park.

Swansons current run of six consecutive Silver Crown wins at Toledo does have him at the top of another record for consecutive victories at one track. He set the record during the 2024 running of the event in which he led all 100 laps after starting on the pole.

As the owner of eight poles and eight victories in Silver Crown competition at Toledo, Swanson is the winningest USAC driver in the history of the track. Hes also the only driver to have started all 11 previous USAC Silver Crown events contested at Toledo dating back to 2010 and has now led 778 of the 1,200 laps run in Silver Crown competition at Toledo for a percentage of 64.8%.

The eight-time USAC Silver Crown champion, however, is buried deep in the points entering Toledo following a 16^th-place result in last Sundays opener at Terre Haute.

THE 100 CLUB

Twenty drivers have reached the 100 start mark with the USAC Silver Crown series. Justin Grant is poised to become the next this Saturday.

Grant currently stands at 99 starts dating back to his 2012 series debut. Other drivers in the 100 career start club include: Russ Gamester (218), Brian Tyler (212), Dave Darland (201), Jerry Coons Jr. (190), Tracy Hines (172), Jack Hewitt (163), Kody Swanson (154), Eric Gordon (153), Johnny Parsons (151), Tony Elliott (147), George Snider (129), Gary Hieber (125), Chuck Gurney (115), Bud Kaeding (113), Jimmy Sills (113), Dave Steele (111), John Heydenreich (110), Aaron Pierce (106), A.J. Fike (105) and Larry Rice (100).

Grant has finished each of his last three Toledo starts inside the top five with a third in 2022, fourth in 2023 and another fourth in 2024.

NEW SPEEDWAGON

This past Sunday, Rice Motorsports-Abacus Racing captured the season opening victory of the USAC Silver Crown campaign on the dirt of the Terre Haute Action Track with Logan Seavey as the winning driver.

However, for the first time since 2019, the No. 22 will have a different driver in the seat. Mario Clouser has been selected as the wheelman of the car for Toledo. In the teams four previous starts with Seavey, he collected a 10th, fourth, fifth and seventh.

Meanwhile, Clouser has progressively finished better in each of his three Toledo Silver Crown starts with a ninth in 2022, a seventh in 2023 and a sixth in 2024.

MAKING HISTORY

At age 15, teenage sensation Colton Bettis will become the youngest driver to compete in a USAC Silver Crown event this Saturday at Toledo. The Lutz, Fla., native will drive a second Sam Pierce Racing car at Toledo as a teammate to Kaylee Bryson.

Bettis has been on quite a roll as of late, winning the 2024 Auburndale Pro Late Model Championship and the 2024 BG Southern Sprint Car Series Championship. Thus far in 2025, hes won five of the first seven winged pavement sprint car races in Florida in which he competed.

Second in the 2025 National Pavement Sprint Car rankings, Bettis is also the current BG Southern Sprint Car Shootout Series points leader.

BUSY BYRD

Perhaps no other driver will have a more diversified upcoming week of racing than Nathan Byrd.

On Thursday, Byrd will compete with the 500 Sprint Car Tour at Indianas Anderson Speedway. On Friday, hes off to North Carolinas Rockingham Speedway to race with the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series.

To cap off his weekend on Saturday, hell wheel the Meyer Auto Research no. 40 Silver Crown car at Toledo.

The first of Byrds two Silver Crown starts at Toledo was his best, finishing sixth in 2021. His most recent appearance at the track netted a 16th in 2023.

LEARYS NEW CAR

To kick off the week, C.J. Leary took his first ride in the Team AZ-Petty-Rossi Silver Crown car, which he took to a fifth-place finish at Terre Hautes dirt oval.

This weekend, the team will make a debut of another kind as they unveil the first ever DRC pavement Silver Crown chassis.

In a series dominated by Beast chassis in the win column over the pavement for the past three decades, it will be interesting to see how the new DRC design performs in its first race day.

Leary also has a bit of a score to settle at Toledo after a magnificent 2023 run which saw him lead a race-high 77 laps before finishing second to Kody Swanson.

Learys most recent USAC Silver Crown win actually came on the pavement of Wisconsins Madison Intl Speedway in 2022.

FIRST THINGS FIRST

When it comes to USAC Silver Crown season openers on pavement, no driver has won more often than Bobby Santos. Santos has captured the pavement opener on six occasions in his career in 2012-13-17-18-22-23.

Back in 2017, Santos raced around Kody Swanson just before the midway point to score one in the win column for himself and the DJ Racing team at Toledo Speedway.

Hes also the only driver to win at Toledo in a USAC Sprint, Midget and Silver Crown car in his career in addition to collecting a King of the Wing Sprint Car victory there in 2017.

In six of his nine career Silver Crown starts at Toledo, Santos has placed on the podium, and hes also taken the runner-up position four times in 2018-19-21-22.

FORT PAYNE, Ala. Rising dirt late model standout Sam Seawright and his brother J.T. are expanding their footprint in the motorsports industry with the acquisition of Category 5 Race Cars.

The well-known chassis brand, previously operated by Stormy Scott and Jason Durham, will enter a new era rebranded as Mach X Chassis.

With their father, Ron, offering support, Sam and J.T. Seawright plan to continue chassis production at Bruce Nunnallys Brucebuilt Performance facility in Knoxville, Tennessee. Additionally, the team intends to establish a house-car program based out of Seawright Motorsports headquarters in Fort Payne, Ala.

This has always been a goal of mine, J.T. Seawright said. With Sam focused on traveling and racing, Ill be managing the day-to-day operations at our Alabama shop in Eastaboga. Right now, our primary focus is developing the house car that Sam will drive. Once we get it dialed in, we plan to begin taking customer orders and building chassis for other teams.

While the purchase may seem unexpected, it had long been under consideration by the Seawrights. The idea began to take shape shortly after Stormy Scott announced his decision to scale back his late model efforts and return to his roots in modified racing.

This new venture wouldnt be possible without the support of our dad and [sponsor] Troy Baird [of Troy Baird Truck & Trailer Sales], J.T. Seawright said. Sam and I presented the idea to them, and they were fully on board from the start. Stormy and Jason built a strong client base, and were excited to carry on their commitment to supporting customers.

Although the business is undergoing a rebrand to Mach X Chassis, J.T. Seawright emphasized that existing Category 5 Race Cars customers will continue to have access to parts and support through the newly established operation.

Anyone that currently has a Category 5 can still receive support from us, he said. Taking care of the existing customers that Stormy and Jason built relationships with is a top priority.

Sam Seawright is preparing to hit the ground running this weekend, unveiling his brand-new Mach X Chassis in the Schaeffers Spring Nationals mini-series event at I-75 Raceway.

DAYTONA BEACH, Fla.  The late Bob Uecker as announcer Harry Doyle in Major League once said of Clevelands perpetually scuffling baseball club after winning one game, they had a chance to extend their winning streak to two.

Sure, twos the technical definition of a winning streak, but three in a row really feels like getting on a heater.

Through the opening three rounds of the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship season, its worth noting the latest three-peat and seeing how this run of form compares to other entries that have done it the last five years.

Three-in-a-row race-winning runs arent overly common and when they do happen, they almost always deliver an end-of-year championship.

Will Porsche Penske Motorsport be the latest to follow this trend? Can AO Racing join the list, albeit in two different GT classes, if they win a third straight race at WeatherTech Raceway Laguna Seca?

2025

Porsche Penske Motorsport has done something no other team in Grand Touring Prototype has since the class launched in 2023: win three races straight. And theyve done so at a canter.

Once the No. 7 Porsche 963 of Felipe Nasr and Nick Tandy, joined by Laurens Vanthoor at the Rolex 24 At Daytona and Mobil 1 Twelve Hours of Sebring, has ascended to the lead past the three-time polesitting No. 24 BMW M Hybrid V8 of Dries Vanthoor, its stayed there.

The No. 7 car led 307 of 781 laps at Daytona, 166 of 353 at Sebring and 55 of 75 in Long Beach for a total of 528 laps led of a possible 1209 thus far through three races some 43.67 percent.

I mean its incredible. I havent had a season in my career that I started with three wins straight like this, so its really unique to put it all together, Nasr reflected at Long Beach.

The No. 7 Porsche leads the sister No. 6 Porsche of Mathieu Jaminet and Matt Campbell by 123 points, while the third-placed No. 24 BMW M Hybrid V8 sits some 265 points in arrears. Nasr is a three-time IMSA champion (2018 Prototype, 2021 DPi, 2024 GTP) while Tandy, surprisingly, remains in search of his first.

2023

The last prototype team in any WeatherTech Championship class to win three straight races did so in the previous Le Mans Prototype 3 class. Riley produced a four-race win streak in 2023 with a combination of Felipe Fraga, Gar Robinson and Josh Burdon across the IMSA Michelin Endurance Cup rounds of the Mobil 1 Twelve Hours of Sebring and Sahlens Six Hours of The Glen and the sprint races at Canadian Tire Motorsport Park and Road America. Robinson took the title solo as Fraga and Burdon alternated alongside depending on schedules.

2021

In the final year of another class, GT Le Mans, Corvette Racings pair of then-C8.R GTE-specification cars both enjoyed separate three-race win streaks. Eventual class champions Jordan Taylor and Antonio Garcia won their three straight at Watkins Glen in both the six-hour race and the WeatherTech 240 sprint race, as well as at Lime Rock Park.

Teammates Nick Tandy and Tommy Milner then added three later victories with a California sweep of WeatherTech Raceway Laguna Seca and the streets of Long Beach before their third straight at VIRginia International Raceway in a classic GTLM battle vs. the WeatherTech Racing Porsche.

Riley produced its first LMP3 three-peat this year to become the first LMP3 class champions. Robinson and Fraga enjoyed wins at Mid-Ohio and the two Watkins Glen races, with Scott Andrews joining the full-season pair at the six-hour Watkins Glen race.

2020

The unusual 2020 season, which saw a flurry of races in an adjusted schedule in a truncated period due to the COVID-19 pandemic, also saw the greatest number of three-race win streaks by any team in the last five years. Three different teams pulled off three-peats.

Team Penske is the last WeatherTech Championship top-class prototype team to win three straight races, with the former Acura ARX-05 in Daytona Prototype international. The No. 7 of Ricky Taylor and Helio Castroneves three-race run at Road America, the six-hour TireRack.com Grand Prix at Road Atlanta (moved from Watkins Glen) and Mid-Ohio vaulted the team out of a significant point deficit into eventual championship contention, before winning it all.

Corvette Racings GTLM team in its first year with the C8.R fired on all cylinders. Its No. 3 car won the WeatherTech 240 At Daytona, the first race back after the pandemic break, with the No. 4 car capturing the Cadillac Grand Prix of Sebring and the No. 3 car back on top at Road America and VIR.

The Garcia/Taylor pair won the GTLM title, ensuring both Taylor brothers won titles in two different classes in the same season.

Porsche North America, in its final year running a factory GTLM program in coordination with CORE autosport, won the final three races at Motul Petit Le Mans (No. 911 Porsche 911 RSR), WeatherTech Raceway (No. 912) and Mobil 1 Twelve Hours of Sebring (No. 911).

OTHER STREAKS

Longer win streaks appeared more common before the turn of the decade. In 2019, PR1/Mathiasen Motorsports won six straight LMP2 races while Porsche GT Team won five straight in GTLM split between its two cars. Ford Chip Ganassi Racing won four straight GTLM races in 2018 with its two Ford GTs. And in 2017, the first year of the DPi formula, Wayne Taylor Racing opened the year with five straight victories while in the final year of the Prototype Challenge class, Performance Tech Motorsports won the first seven of eight races, before finally losing its first and only race of the year at Motul Petit Le Mans.

But like those winners from 2020 through 2024, the championship-winning story rang true for the above group here. Of the above five teams, four won driver championships, while Ford CGR lost the drivers title but the blue oval still captured the 2018 GTLM manufacturers crown.

INDIANAPOLIS Fleddermann von Rieste, an independent Indiana-based watch brand, has expanded its roster of brand ambassadors with the addition of Indy NXT driver Jack William Miller.

The 21-year-old Miller is the only Indy NXT driver born in the Hoosier State. He is from the Indianapolis suburb of Carmel and is currently in the midst of his junior year at Indiana University Indianapolis where he majors in biology.

Miller joins NASCAR Cup Series driver and fellow Hoosier Chase Briscoe as Fleddermann von Rieste ambassadors with each representing the brands growing line of high-quality timepieces. The partnership with Miller further amplifies Fleddermann von Riestes commitment to motorsports, aligning with drivers who exemplify passion, precision and performance.

As part of this collaboration, Miller will work with Fleddermann von Rieste to promote its luxury watches, raising awareness to a broader audience within his home state and the motorsports community.

Adding Jack William Miller to our ambassador lineup is a significant moment for Fleddermann von Rieste, said Dr. Adam Fleddermann, CEO, Fleddermann von Rieste. Jacks dedication to his craft, his Indiana roots and his commitment to excellence on and off the track align perfectly with our brands values. Having both Jack and Chase Briscoe as part of the Fleddermann family is an incredible asset as each can emphasize the importance of precision engineering, craftsmanship and legacy in both racing and watchmaking.

Miller has been racing since he was 3. It began in go-karts where he racked up numerous wins and championships. He later augmented that experience by racing snowmobiles, quads and motocross.

By age 13, Miller transitioned to open-wheel racecars, specifically, the Formula 4 United States Championship. From 2017 through 2018, he competed in this first rung on the Road to Indy ladder before moving to USF2000 in 2019-2020.

Next up was up USF Pro 2000 in 2021-2023. In 2024, Miller was a rookie all over again, joining Indy NXT, the stepping-stone division to the elite NTT IndyCar Series. Now in his second Indy NXT season, Miller competes for Abel Motorsports and drives the No. 40 Patterson Dental Dallara.

Racing has always been about time, and to be a racer representing and wearing Fleddermann von Rieste watches is a great honor. Im a proud Hoosier and so is the Fleddermann family. Were all able to wear that pride with the watches they make, Miller said. Every glance at your wrist provides a sense of achievement. Its a reminder of how far youve come, but also where you want to be.