PENDLETON — For Travis Welpott, the most important race in May will happen on Saturday, not Sunday.
The Pendleton resident and long-time industrial technology teacher at Pendleton Heights Middle School, is one of the entrants in this weekend’s Little 500 at Anderson Speedway, annually one of the biggest sprint car races in the country.
Welpott has been racing sprints, midgets and champ cars for more than 20 years. Each year the big one for him is right in his own home county.
“In most regards it’s the biggest race of the year (for sprint cars),” Welpott said. “It’s the largest paying and longest running sprint car race. They come in from all over.”
This year’s event is the 74th running of the Lucas Oil Little 500 presented by UAW at Anderson Speedway, located at 1311 Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd., in Anderson.
Cars will run 500 laps on the ¼ mile track.
Total purse for the race is $136,700 with the winner taking home $25,000.
Practice was set to start Wednesday, May 25, qualifications for the pole were to start at 1:30 p.m. today, Thursday, May 26. The field will be filled after Friday’s 1:30 p.m. qualifying session. The race is set to start at 8 p.m., Saturday. Pre-race activities begin at 7 p.m.
Just like the Indy 500, the race will feature 33 drivers taking the green flag in 11 rows of three.
Welpott will be attempting to qualify for the his 10th Little 500. He is 35th on the race’s all-time list of laps completed with 3,913.
You could say that racing has been in Welpott’s blood from the day he was born. He celebrated his 51st birthday earlier this week. His parents were at the 1971 Little 500 the day before he was born.
It makes the Little 500 a little extra special to the Madison County driver.
“It takes so much luck and so many things go right (to win), plus you have to be fast,” Welpott said. “It’s a combination of all of it. Being in my backyard and almost being born at it, I always wanted to race (in the Little 500).
“Everything’s amplified for this race with so much going into it. It’s huge. It’s the priority on everything. Our (racing) year is based around it. We make sure that stuff comes first (for this race) as far as getting equipment. The dollars go there first and then we work from there. To make sure we have a good one. To win it would be the ultimate and the goal, still.”
Welpott has done well, and has had his best races most recently.
Twice in his previous nine Little 500s he has finished in the top 10.
He placed 10th in last year’s race and ninth in 2019 (there was not a race in 2020, due to the pandemic).
Welpott isn’t the only local connection to his racing team.
Mike Smith, Bob Hennis and Smith Family Farms and Smith Family Meat Market (out of Pendleton) are big supporters and sponsors for the No. 18 Ernie Gorman Racing florescent orange and white sprint car. Tray House, of Chesterfield, who has raced in the event, too, is his chief mechanic.
The support system also includes his family and those he works for and with in the South Madison school district.
“I have a lot of good people and support system with my family, my father Warren Welpott got me started (in racing) ,and at school all the way up to the superintendent to the principal and other teachers,” Welpott said. “I have a great support system there and at home.”
This year’s race will also feature a pair of long time NASCAR stars. Kenny Schrader and Ryan Newman, a former teammate of Welpott’s at Gorman Racing, are entrants in this year’s event. Schrader is a Little 500 veteran. It is Newman’s first time at the ¼-mile track.
Welpott said he doesn’t strive to beat just the big name NASCAR guys.
“I don’t want to beat just one person, I want to beat them all,” he said. “At the end of the day, that’s the goal.”