Swanson Rebounds from Accident on Initial Start
To Finish Seventh in Little 500 Saturday at Anderson
In Doran Binks Racing’s Mission Foods No. 77

ANDERSON, Ind., May 25 — Doran Binks Racing’s Mission Foods No. 77 and its driver, Kody Swanson, ended up lodged in the side of Kyle O’Gara’s car and up in the air, while Shane Hollingsworth’s car crumbled up the tail of the No. 77. Then the cars of Brian Vaughn and Tim Creech piled in behind Hollingsworth in a multi-car accordion crash on the frontstretch near Turn 1 during the initial start of Saturday night’s Unified Group Services Little 500 Presented by UAW at Anderson Speedway. Those five cars came to a halt low on the track, while two others driven by Bryan Gossel and Billy Wease crashed into the frontstretch’s outside wall. An eighth car driven by Landon Butler stopped further into Turn 1. Donnie Adams was also out in the chaos, which drew a red immediately after the initial green.

Luckily no one was hurt, but the Mission Foods No. 77 pavement sprint car, which is also sponsored by Glenn Farms and Wilke Orthodontics, was dislodged and then removed by a wrecker and taken to the Doran Binks Racing pit area a few yards away. Although the tail of the car that holds the fuel cell was crumpled, the team persevered, and Swanson not only restarted the 500-lap race on the quarter-mile paved track, he rebounded to finish seventh in the field of 33 assembled for the largest asphalt sprint car race in the world. 

In the five-car club sandwich in which Swanson was a layer, Hollingsworth restarted but dropped out on lap 28 due to the damage his car sustained. O’Gara and Swanson were both running at the finish. Creech did 413 laps and finished 14th, while Vaughn was done for the night.

Different fireworks occurred at the end of the night. The car of the initial winner, Dakoda Armstrong, failed post-race technical inspection and was disqualified. Jake Trainor was declared the winner of the 77th edition of the Little 500, and O’Gara ended up second. Davey Hamilton Jr. was third in the revised rundown followed by Bobby Santos III, Jackson Macenko, and Jake McElfresh.

And Swanson, a native of Kingsburg, Calif., who now calls Brownsburg, Ind., home, and his Lebanon, Ohio-based team ended up in exactly the same position they started — seventh — after dropping back to 25th for the first of numerous restarts.

Throughout the race Swanson focused on clawing his way back up the scoreboard with the No. 77, which is powered by a Binks-prepared Chevy V8 engine.

By lap 40 he was 16th, and he was 15th by lap 47. He moved into 14th on lap 79, 13th by lap 80, 12th on lap 98, 11th on lap 115, and he was back in the top 10 on lap 120. He remained in tenth or 11th until he had to pit under green on lap 161, which dropped him back to 19th and he had to start his climb all over again, five laps down.

Yet another yellow waved on lap 172, and several competitors make their first of two mandatory pit stops under that very lengthy delay. When the green finally flew again on lap 212 Swanson was 12th, still five laps down, but the top 10 was once again in sight. Getting there was the goal. Two other drivers — Creech and Chris Neuenschwander — were on his same lap at that point.

Swanson remained in 12th place until he got 11th on lap 296 when the polesitter and the driver who was leading at the time, Tyler Roahrig, dropped out with mechanical difficulties. One lap later Swanson was in the top 10 again when he passed Creech, although he was still five laps down.

He got ninth on lap 326 when Logan Seavey pitted, and eighth on lap 334 when Macenko did the same. He took over seventh when Ryan Newman had an issue on lap 350. That put him on the same lap as McElfresh and Macenko. Macenko passed him on lap 377 to push him back to eighth, and he dropped to ninth on lap 386 when he made his second pit stop under yellow. The new tires allowed him to set his fastest lap of the race with about 100 laps to go. At that point he was on the same lap as the driver who was eighth, Seavey, while C.J. Leary was tenth, an additional lap back.

Swanson remained in ninth until Seavey pitted on lap 438, giving him eighth back. He took the checkered in eighth place, five laps down, but rose to seventh with Armstrong’s disqualification.

Swanson took it in stride.

“It was a challenging race; that start was something you wouldn’t expect, but we just got collected,” he said. “Considering everything, I feel like we did OK. Our car actually was really fine, even though it caved the fuel cell in. I don’t know if that pushed the fuel up over the overflow or not, but we had to pit under green because we were running low on fuel. From that point on we just tried to get as good a finish as we could. Our car was good, and so is our team. We didn’t have many options left, but I’m grateful we were able to restart, and that Kyle was OK.”

A large crowd was on hand to view the race, while DirtVision provided a live stream for subscribers and pay-per-view patrons.

The Little 500 is part of the 500 Sprint Car Tour, but it’s a non-points-paying special event. Swanson is the series’ defending champion.

About Mission Foods:
The Gruma Corporation began in 1949 and is today the leading tortilla manufacturer worldwide. Mission Foods is a proud subsidiary of Gruma, and as the #1 tortilla company in the United States, manufactures a wide variety of authentic Mexican products. Five years ago it opened a state-of-the-art plant in Dallas, Texas, with the capacity to produce 30 million tortillas daily. Today Mission Foods is a global company, with special emphasis not only on the United States but also Mexico, Central America, Europe, China, Malaysia, and Australia. Its products include flour and corn tortillas; tostadas; low-carb, whole wheat, organic and gluten-free items; wraps; flatbreads such as naan, pita and roti; tortilla chips and organic chips; chicharrones; salsa, and dips. For more information see missionfoods.com.

For more information on Doran Racing, see DoranRacing.com.
The team also has a Facebook page.