TULSA, Okla. — Cannon McIntosh, better known as “Mr. Monday Night” when it comes to the Chili Bowl Nationals, is planning to forget about his preliminary performance this year.
Of course, his Keith Kunz Motorsports crew will still reference the notebook they compiled on the No. 71p midget and McIntosh also has a few lessons he learned behind the wheel of his new ride.
But overall, the 21-year-old is ready to throw away his sixth-place result during Monday’s Cummins Qualifying Night at the SageNet Center and wipe his slate clean.
Despite sixth-to-first runs in both his heat race and qualifier, the Toyota development driver slipped from first to sixth during the 30-lap A main on Monday.
KKM teammate Tanner Carrick won the main event.
When considering McIntosh’s streak of winning three Monday night preliminary features in the last four years, it was a bit of a blow to hand over his master status to Carrick.
“I think you just forget about Monday,” McIntosh said upon reflection. “Just focus on what Saturday brings and attack it with the best of our ability.”
The Oklahoma native has flexed his muscles at the prestigious indoor midget race more than once. He owns a collection of top-five finishes in Saturday’s A main, including two thirds and a fourth.
Last year, McIntosh took it a step further and led laps on the quarter-mile track for the first time in his Chili Bowl career. He ultimately finished third.
“It was super cool to be able to contend for the win there last year, winning our prelim night and then being right there in the mix of the entire race,” McIntosh said. “Being able to command a race like this at least for 10 laps or 15 laps — whatever it was — it was cool.”
Thanks to the battle that raged between McIntosh and eventual race winner Logan Seavey last January, the 21-year-old believes he has a better handle on the pace of the race and what to do while leading.
“You try not to focus on the defensive side of it. It’s just more trying to be consistent and not pushing too hard to force yourself into mistakes,” McIntosh explained. “You don’t really want to get into defense mode, because it just takes away from any type of performance to try and extend your gap.”
He recognizes his path to the podium will be more challenging this year, considering he’ll be fighting his way into the $20,000-to-win feature by way of one of two B mains.
“We’re a little bit behind where we were last year, but if we just get ourselves locked in and work through traffic, I think we’ll be fine,” McIntosh said, flashing his confidence with a smile. “Hopefully we will have the experience needed if we can get back to the lead this year on Saturday.”
The Bixby, Okla., native is also back in the Keith Kunz Motorsports camp for the first time since 2021. Last season, McIntosh split his time between the Dave Mac Dalby Motorsports No. 08 and one of Chad Boat’s CBI Industries midgets.
“Keith (Kunz) had reached out to me actually like right before I had started running for Chad (Boat),” McIntosh said, referring to his late-season midget ride with CBI last year. “He said he and Pete (Willoughby) had talked and they wanted me to run at Chili Bowl. I told them I would obviously let them know and I knew they have really good cars here, if not the best every year.”
The development driver discussed the opportunity with Toyota and Gearwrench, his primary sponsor, and moved forward with the KKM deal.
“We’re back here with them and obviously they have a lot of cars, so they have a lot of notes to gain still,” McIntosh said. “Saturday’s gonna come quick and we just gotta be ready when the time comes for the B main.”
At the end of the day, McIntosh is still living by the words he spoke during his podium interview last season at the Chili Bowl: “One day, we’ll be on top of the podium.”
One year later, his motive hasn’t changed.
“Obviously it’s a goal of mine to have my name on the banner one day when I walk into this building, so yeah, I’m going to keep pushing every bit I can to make that happen,” McIntosh said.