INDIANAPOLIS — There are times when things fall perfectly into place. As Weston Gorham surveyed his situation all was right with the world. Preparing his midget for the night ahead, he could catch a glimpse of the famous pagoda at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway. It nearly caused him to do a double take.
Though it was difficult to believe it was true. Gorham was getting a chance to race on the grounds of the nation’s most famous speedway.
The Gorham family is no stranger to racing. Weston figures the clan’s involvement is 65 to 70 years deep. Yet, in this case happenstance just seemed to be the order of the day. A branch of Weston’s family settled around El Paso and into New Mexico.
As Gorham says, “There is a lot of racing in that area,” and it turns out his extended family was in the middle of it. However, for Weston’s father, real life got in the way and appeared to put racing permanently on the back burner. Kelly Gorham is an engineer by trade and by the time he relocated to north Texas any chance to jump in the speed game seemed lost forever.
“My dad always wanted to race,” Weston said. “But he never had the chance or means to do it.”
How quickly things changed. Kelly’s father, Bill Gorham, died from cancer at the age of 65. It was a premature death by our standards, but solace came from knowing he had lived a full and active life. Not long after delivering the eulogy he was presented with a unique opportunity.
Picking up the tale Weston Gorham said, “My dad’s uncle Donald approached him and said why don’t you come out and race a stock car at Southern New Mexico Speedway?”
The timing was perfect. Kelly Gorham’s father’s death reminded him that little is gained living a sedentary life. Set to take on a 30-car field, Kelly Weston entered the track on the second turn unaware he was heading for the green flag. The field took off without him. Scrambling to get acclimated and settling his nerves he recovered sufficiently and put forth a respectable effort.
He lined up third in the semi-feature. As he hit the grid, he realized one of his cousins was on the pole. Reckoning she had plenty of experience he simply tried to mock her every move. It worked.
Kelly Gorham raced from the rear of the feature to finish near the top 10.
According to Weston Gorham, “the next thing you know he has an open trailer and a stock car. He was hooked.”
As Kelly Gorham worked his way up the racing food chain at places like Fort Worth’s Cowtown Speedway, his wide-eyed son was enthralled by the action. What happened next was inevitable. Weston Gorham was racing a kart by age 7 and by his own admission, “had pretty good success.”
Moving forward the karts got faster, and he proved to be equal to the task.”
That led him to micros and to major events such as the Tulsa Shootout. In 2016, he strapped into a 305 sprint car for the first time and began racing at places like Kennedale Speedway Park and the famed Devil’s Bowl Speedway.
Showing plenty of promise, Gorham nailed down two wins early in his sprint car career. With this experience under his belt, he jumped at a chance to race a midget and then competed in non-winged 360 sprints with the ASCS Elite series.
As much fun as racing was, he knew it was not going to pay the bills. With the big picture in mind Gorham ventured from his Colleyville, Texas, home to Oklahoma State University. He earned a degree in mechanical and aerospace engineering and completed an internship with Cummins, which led to a job at the company’s Columbus, Ind., plant.
His girlfriend, Leesha Gilliland, was working on a master’s degree in aerospace engineering, and he would be a long way from home. “I was on the fence,” he admitted. “But Indiana is the mecca for sprint car and open-wheel racing, so that contributed to the decision to come up here.”
There was a lot to juggle when he arrived in the Hoosier state. During business hours he is a component engineer, and his current project is an innovative 6.7-liter gasoline powered engine. This season he has found time to compete more than the previous two years combined.
Before leaving Texas, he acquired a 410 engine that had been used by Shane Golobic with Matt Wood Racing. He came fully expecting to take on the Indiana bullring scene in traditional sprint cars and midgets.
The Midget Trail
In the smaller cars he found a home with owner Mike Dickerson and together they traveled to the Chili Bowl Nationals and raced with USAC and the Xtreme Outlaw Midget Series.
“It is one of the most comfortable midgets I have ever raced,” he said. “We were pretty good at the Chili Bowl, but the results don’t show that. We ran into bad luck, and you must have luck there. Then recently with USAC I was wide open and giving it all we got, and I looked down and we were 19th quick. It’s tough.”
Gorham knew all along he would take his lumps, but that doesn’t lead him to shy away from a challenge. He’s already excited about next season.
“Next year we have a lot of racing on the docket,” he said. “I want to do a lot of USAC racing like some Indiana Sprint Weeks shows and the Smackdown at Kokomo. I won a heat race my first time there and led a bunch of laps in the feature, so that was a good experience. Everyone loves Kokomo and I’m no different.”
With his background one gets the sense Gorham will quickly become a force on the local scene and with USAC. While there may not be a direct relationship between his day job and avocation, having a mind that understands how systems work can only help him in the shop and at the track.
“It’s fun to be in the engine development world at Cummins and then to be able to come to a racing environment,” he said. “Because my dad was also an engineer when I first got around race cars my mind quickly began to think about how I could make race cars faster and better.”
Right now, his mind wasn’t on a 6.7-liter engine or what the next year would bring. The goal on this night is to crack the starting field at the BC39.