TULARE, Calif. — Making one’s World of Outlaws NOS Energy Drink Sprint Car Series debut is a major step for any sprint car driver and it’s one Kaleb Montgomery made March 11 at Thunderbowl Raceway.
During a night that included a mix of ups and downs and ultimately resulted in him making the 24-car main event, Montgomery came away both satisfied and slightly in shock after competing with the country’s best aboard his own No. 3 sprint car.
“It was crazy,” Montgomery said following the feature. “It was definitely an eye opener.”
Montgomery’s night got off to a flying start by going fifth quick in hot laps, his name higher on the charts than the likes of Rico Abreu, Carson Macedo and Sheldon Haudenschild. While posting a quick lap during hot laps doesn’t help with positioning for the night, it provided a confidence boost.
“At the end of the day, hot laps doesn’t mean anything, but that definitely lit the fire underneath me,” Montgomery said. “It made me feel like I could at least come here and make the show.”
In qualifying the evening’s trajectory dipped as Montgomery slotted 24th of 32 entries. Contributing to the qualifying woes was needing to exercise a level of caution on a track that is infamous for tearing up cars.
“What I think set me apart from hot laps to qualifying was I didn’t have anyone in front of me to gauge my speed,” Montgomery explained. “I had (Jacob) Allen in front of me in hot laps and it made it easier to be like ‘OK, I have to step it up here or I don’t have to drive as hard.’
“I also had it lingering in the back of my head that this is my only car,” Montgomery added. “So I thought, ‘Tulare qualifying, not really my best friend, don’t have the best track record,’ and I didn’t want to junk it. I definitely lifted a little bit too much on entry to the corners.”
Heat race action delivered another boost on this roller coaster of an evening as Montgomery shot from sixth to fourth on the opening circuit and held on to transfer to the feature.
“I knew on that start was where I had to make it count,” Montgomery recalled. “On the entry to (turn) one I just opened it up as big as I could and drove it in there pretty deep. I had it in my head that I was going to cut across the track. When I cut across, luckily Allen biked it up and I’m pretty sure (Austin) McCarl biked it up, and I just shot the gap and went right in between them and that sent me into fourth.”
The heat race result lined Montgomery up mid-pack for the feature. When the race began, the 21-year-old noted the intensity level of an Outlaw feature and after gaining some valuable experience, Montgomery pulled off to preserve his equipment after 18 laps.
“My thing at the start of the feature is, ‘I’ll take it easy.’ It was 35 laps, more than we normally do and I was just going to feel it out, go 50 percent and try to get it all single file. With the Outlaws? No. Those guys, at the drop of the green flag, green means go, and it’s 100 percent. One of the biggest takeaways is once that green flag drops it’s go time. You’ve got to go.
“About halfway through it I was like, ‘OK, I’m done. I’m going to save my tires. Let’s take what I learned tonight and move on.’”
Throughout the remainder the season, Montgomery will primarily be committed to 360 sprint car racing with the F&F Racing team as they chase the Sprint Car Challenge Tour and Placerville Speedway titles. However, after getting a little taste of competing with the Outlaws, Montgomery is eager for more this coming weekend and more 410 racing in general when opportunities arise.
“I will more than likely be at Merced,” Montgomery said. “If Placerville rains out, I might make an appearance at Ocean (Speedway), but as of right now my priority lies with the (No.) x1.
“There are a few things in the works that I might be running NARC shows for the double-duty nights (with SCCT),” Montgomery added. “Or, if it doesn’t conflict with SCCT, Placerville, Chico or anytime the x1 wants to run, I might try to bring out my 410.”