At his family’s home on Christmas morning of 2023, Kody Swanson’s upcoming season and the entirety of his racing future hung in the balance.
MRIs, CT scans and multiple surgeries on his broken left foot came and went in the months to come, with Swanson having plates and screws installed shortly thereafter. The most positive prognosis had Swanson possibly returning to the cockpit by June at the earliest.
While still utilizing crutches, Swanson maintained a rigorous rehabilitation and physical therapy program. By March 4, just a little over two months since the accident, he took his first unaided steps without crutches. Therapy continued into the Spring, and ultimately, the walking boot finally came off just in time for the start of the USAC Silver Crown season on April 20 at Ohio’s Toledo Speedway, plenty of time ahead of schedule. But the question remained – was he ready?
How did Swanson respond? Similar to Pancho Carter’s heroic comeback to kick off the 1978 season, Swanson showed no signs of wear, tear or rust. Despite a slight limp in his gait, Swanson showed all the signs of the same ol’ Kody as he led the day off by taking the top time in practice, then laid down the fastest lap in qualifying and concluded the afternoon with a masterpiece driving performance in which he led all 100 laps in succession for his eighth career Silver Crown victory at Toledo, and sixth straight.
“I don’t know if I should’ve even raced this year,” Swanson remarked. “I shattered my foot pretty well over the winter and I can’t believe that God put so many special people in my life to give me a chance to walk like I can, to race again and to even make it back in time for the first race in the spring.”
As an encore, two weeks later at the Rich Vogler Classic on the high banks of Indiana’s Winchester Speedway, Swanson once again established the fastest time in practice before capturing the pole and going on to lead all 100 laps en route to his third consecutive Winchester USAC Silver Crown victory, the first driver to win three USAC features in a row at Winchester since Ryan Newman in 1999.
Swanson’s winning ways continued into the fourth round of the season in May as he once again led all 100 laps from the pole to earn a $26,000 payday and his fifth career Hoosier Hundred, his first on the pavement of Lucas Oil Indianapolis Raceway Park after scoring his first four on the dirt of the now shuttered Indiana State Fairgrounds in 2014-15-16-18.
In early August, Swanson had yet another surgery to remove two screws from his foot. In his first race back, during the series debut at Pennsylvania’s Jennerstown Speedway, Swanson was perfect once again, leading all 100 laps in succession from the pole.
Gripping a mere six-point edge in the standings over Justin Grant heading into October’s season finale at IRP, all Swanson needed was a top-three run to secure the title. However, yet again, he went above and beyond. Despite winning the pole position for an all-time single season series record seventh time, “domination” wasn’t exactly part of the equation. After leading early, Swanson fell back to third, then regrouped and worked his way back to the front to lead the final 38 laps on a record-setting night in which he became the track’s all-time winningest Silver Crown driver with his ninth win. To boot, his nine wins there are more than any other driver in series history at any single track.
Swanson’s eighth USAC Silver Crown title (2014-15-17-18-19-21-22-24) set a new record in terms of total championships earned by any one driver in a USAC national series. He had previously been tied with A.J. Foyt’s seven Indy Car crowns under the USAC banner as well as Mel Kenyon’s seven USAC National Midget championships.
The 2024 campaign also represented the fourth time in which Kody won both the season finale and the USAC Silver Crown title on the same day. He’s now accomplished this feat in 2014-2015-2021-2024. Nobody else has done it more than twice.
In the process, Swanson drove the Doran Binks Racing team’s No. 77 to the entrant championship. Utilizing a Maxim/Hampshire Chevy combo on dirt and a Beast/Lanci Ford package on pavement, their Mission Foods – Wilke Orthodontics – Glenn Farms entry earned five wins in totality on the season en route to a 21-point spread between him and runner-up Grant in the final championship tally. For Kevin Doran, it’s his second USAC Silver Crown entrant title while, for Dan Binks, it’s his first.
“I’ve got an Army behind me, and I’m so fortunate for each and every one of them,” Swanson praised. “My wife, Jordan, she does so much for me personally as a wife, as a teammate and as a spotter.”
The 14 USAC Silver Crown events held in 2024 were the most since the 2006 season, and the second most all-time behind only the 1999 schedule which contested 15 races. For Swanson, it was a grueling task to master, but seemingly no matter how short or long the season is, Swanson is always there at the end with this being his 11th consecutive top-two finish in the series standings.
“This was a 14-race Silver Crown schedule and this was the first time we’ve completed that many races in my career,” Swanson noted. “It was a grueling year, and there were a lot of really strong contenders. I think of C.J. (Leary) having four podiums in a row at the beginning before trouble befell him, and Logan (Seavey) and Justin (Grant) doing the same. Each of those guys had great runs and were a part of the title fight. We had some unfortunate things on our end too, but it seemed like we were never out of it. I’m so thankful that certain things fell our way, and on other ones, we were able to overcome and just keep digging. With three races to go, running heads up and being in a really close title fight, coming out second on the two dirt miles was great except for Justin sweeping them both.”
Outside of Swanson, the 2024 season will be remembered for the emergence of five first-time USAC Silver Crown winners, the most in a single year with the series since 2010. Unquestionably, one of the most major of all milestones occurred in mid-May at the Belleville High Banks in Kansas when Kaylee Bryson became the first woman to win a USAC nationally sanctioned event in the 69-year history of the organization.
In just his second career USAC Silver Crown start, Daison Pursley scored, perhaps, the most exhilarating victory of the year. Pursley erased a two-plus second deficit over the final few laps in June at Port Royal (Pa.) Speedway, then took over the lead with a highwire high side pass of Justin Grant off the fourth and final turn on the 50th and final lap.
Dakoda Armstrong’s journey to a first career USAC national victory included its share of twists, turns and excursions that took him down a variety of paths throughout the past two decades of his career behind the wheel. During the final 12 laps of June’s round at Wisconsin’s Madison International Speedway, he went from being on the verge of his first career top-five finish with the series to leading his first ever laps to becoming the 2024 season’s third first-time USAC Silver Crown race winner after racelong leader C.J. Leary fell out due to a flat left rear tire on lap 89.
After five career runner-up finishes in USAC Silver Crown competition, Kevin Thomas Jr. had no desire for any more “second” thoughts during USAC’s inaugural run at Hutchinson, Kansas’ Salt City Speedway in July. In a late-race battle for the lead, he and C.J. Leary touched wheels, resulting in Leary toppling over while Thomas continued onward to victory to become the third-straight first-time Silver Crown winner on the season.
To finish first, you must first survive. Mitchel Moles did just that during September’s 4-Crown Nationals at Ohio’s Eldora Speedway where he was practically the last one standing during the 50-lap race, overcoming a near devastating accident with a lapped car and flat tire after flat tire for his competition down the stretch. In what was the 100th USAC Silver Crown race ever held on a 1/2-mile dirt track, Moles became the fifth and final first-time series winner of the season.
Less than two months after becoming a first-time Silver Crown winner, Dakoda Armstrong made himself a two-time series winner on the biggest and fastest track on the circuit, the 1.25-mile paved oval of World Wide Technology Raceway in Madison, Ill. While running second to Kody Swanson with two laps remaining, Swanson’s engine suddenly expired. Given the reins to the lead, Armstrong felt he might’ve been running out of fuel but managed to fend off the field on a late restart to make it to the finish line first once more.
When it came to dirt mile season in August, Justin Grant had the field covered. At both Springfield and Du Quoin, Grant was picture perfect by setting the fastest pace in practice, scoring the pole position, then going on to lead every lap in both features to become the first driver to sweep to victories on both Illinois miles in a single season since Chris Windom in 2018.
In a year in which he had won 15 times across USAC’s National Sprint Car and Midget divisions to that point, Logan Seavey had to wait patiently until he could taste victory once again with the USAC Silver Crown series in October’s Sumar Classic at Indiana’s Terre Haute Action Track.
Furthermore, Kody Swanson’s qualifying run of 30.239 seconds at WWT Raceway set a new speed record average of 148.814 mph, the fastest lap ever turned by a traditional USAC Silver Crown car in the 54-year history of the series. On the run, Swanson bested the former mark of 146.699 mph, set by none other than himself in 2022 at the same track.
Kody Swanson led all drivers with 466 laps led and seven fast qualifying times. Swanson and Justin Grant notched 10 top-five finishes apiece, best in the series. Logan Seavey, meanwhile, finished inside the top-10 in all 14 events. Five drivers started all 14 events: Justin Grant, C.J. Leary, Nathan Moore, Logan Seavey and Kody Swanson.
C.J. Leary advanced more positions in a single race than any other driver throughout the season. His 22nd to 3rd run at IRP in May came in an unfamiliar car borrowed from fellow competitor Bryan Gossel. In fact, Leary advanced 18 or more positions in three different races throughout the Silver Crown season, just the second driver to do so in series history after Brian Tyler in 2004. Leary also traveled from 20th to 2nd at Belleville and 24th to 6th at Terre Haute.
With a pair of top-five finishes on dirt (3rd at Salt City) and pavement (4th at Madison), 6’8” tall Trey Osborne finished sixth in series points to earn Rookie of the Year honors with the series.
Meanwhile, Gregg Cory earned the Engler Machine Fast Pass title for the 2024 USAC Silver Crown season. The first car running a lap down received a fast pass and their lap back at each race on the schedule. Cory earned five fast passes in all, which earned him a $5,000 reward – $2,500 to him as a driver and $2,500 for his Williams-Cory Racing team.
Kyle Steffens, a longtime veteran of the modified ranks, posted a career-best fifth in Silver Crown points after scoring five top-10 results, including a best of 7th at both Salt City and Du Quoin.
After 42 seasons of competition, the Bateman Racing team bid farewell following the 2024 season. Originally driven by Randy Bateman, the team continued on after his death from Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS) in 2017, led by his wife, Patty, and several friends. In 2024, the team was stellar with driver Jerry Coons Jr. at the controls, recording four top-10 finishes in all four of the team’s starts.
USAC PR
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