69th running of the Turkey Night Grand Prix

Tonight's 69th Turkey Night Grand Prix from the state of the art Toyota Speedway at Irwindale will feature four United States Auto Club championships being crowned in over 200 laps of racing competition. Nik Romano of Pleasanton, Calif. will seal the deal on his 2009 USAC California Pavement Ford Focus championship. He will be joined by Kingsburg's Tanner Swanson putting the wraps on a brilliant USAC Western Sprint Car season that includes an impressive run of all finishes in the top-two throughout the season.

But the Turkey Night Grand Prix is all about the Midgets with the 98 lap classic determining champions for the USAC National (Brad Kuhn) and USAC Western (Garrett Hansen) series. How many people in attendance will really be focused on the points standings in the Midget series? With 45 entries for the contest, how many of these entries would skip this race if it was a non-point event? The answer is likely zero.

From this authors point of view, the title of USAC National champion is a valuable crown. But as less and less teams campaign the full USAC National trail, the importance of the championship has diminished. Much like Dirt Late Model racing, Midgets have many huge events to follow throughout the year. Chili Bowl, Night before the 500, Midget Week, Belleville, Fireman's Nationals, Four Crown, Gold Crown, Phoenix, Turkey Night, Twas the Midgets Before Christmas, and several other races populate the Midget calendar.

There are many teams that could follow this schedule and campaign perhaps a weekly 410 Sprint Car program on the side to make a good living. With the national Midget points series eliminated, there could potentially be more of these races added throughout the country and more outlaw teams following this schedule. When you have a national series with only eight or nine full-time teams, but these events getting anywhere from 30-60 racers, its clear that the USAC points trail is not bringing in the car count numbers that the sanctioning fee demands.

The added benefit of a national Midget series is a standardization of rules of procedures. The DLM scene has used the leadership of the WoO and Lucas Oil tours to shape the rules structure for their many special events. It is clear, especially with the shift to "outlaw" schedules for major teams like Tony Stewart Racing and Kasey Kahne Motorsports, that Midget racing will continue to have less emphasis on points racing and more emphasis on its major events.

Tonight's Turkey Night Grand Prix should be a fantastic show no matter whether you are there to see a USAC champion or a Turkey Night champion crowned.