Coming home: Chase Briscoe's races Late Models at Brownstown Speedway

BROWNSTOWN — There is no question Chase Briscoe is one of the top young-gun drivers on the NASCAR Cup Series. His skill and results at every level along the way to the top tells us that, and this year's Cup win at Phoenix cements it as fact.

The 27-year old Mitchell man is more than just great behind a wheel, however. He's also one of the wiser, more thoughtful and respectful drivers one will encounter.

That wisdom with words was at work Wednesday night at Brownstown Speedway when Briscoe ventured to Brownstown Speedway for the Castrol FloRacing Night in America Late Model event, a $22,000-to-win feature that drew many of the country's top pilots in that division to the quarter-mile dirt oval.

While he was certainly a star attraction for fans, Briscoe was intelligent enough not to carry himself like a superstar, or offer any brash declarations. In fact, he came into the very first Late Model event of his career with all of the expectations of a grade-schooler entering his first spelling bee and hoping not to misspell C-A-T.

"I just hope I don't get out there and look like a fool," Briscoe said with big laugh and grin.

Still, he wasn't kidding. Briscoe wasn't about to pretend he was going to go out his first time and be better than these Late Model warriors.

Briscoe learning Late Models

Briscoe may have chuckled with his statement about his first time driving a Late Model, but he wasn't joking. For him to say he was going to even make the feature and finish in the upper-echelon would be akin to Jonathan Davenport — who held off Bobby Pierce, Mike Marlar, Brandon Overton and another NASCAR Cup Series star, Kyle Larson to win Wednesday's main event — saying he was going to climb into a Sprint car and beat Briscoe.

Briscoe cut his teeth in open-wheel and became a Sprint car star before shifting to NASCAR. He won a Sprint feature last week in Alabama. Experience and comfortability is a great equalizer.

"I'm actually really serious about not wanting to look stupid out there," Briscoe said. "This is one of the most nerve-wracking things I've done in a long time. It's totally out of my element and something I've never done before, so I really just don't want to mess up too badly while I'm learning.

"I don't expect to come out here and beat guys who do this for a living. These guys are great Late Model drivers and most of them have raced here at Brownstown a lot."

Briscoe endures early end

Briscoe was behind the wheel of a high-caliber hot rod owned by Kent Robinson of Bloomington, and he clearly had a learning curve to catch up with in the Late Model.

"There is no similarity at all between racing the Cup car on dirt and these things," said Briscoe, who was strong in the Food City Dirt Race at Bristol a couple of weeks ago. "They're a completely different feel."

Yet, he certainly wasn't embarrassing himself out there on the southern Indiana clay. His qualifying time was a shade over 14 seconds, slower than the big boys, but competitive. Then came time for his first actual Late Model race, the eight-lap fourth heat that also included Davenport and Larson.

Alas, it didn't last long for Briscoe. He started in back and had a solid start. He appeared to be biding his time, content to get the coveted seat time in traffic, and he made it through a lap before Dylan Thompson in the No.99 car was either turned sideways or spun in Turn 2. It came directly in the path of Briscoe, who tried to avoid contact, but had nowhere to go and punched the side of the 99 with his front end.

It resulted in major damage to the right front suspension of the 14 car. Robinson's crew sprang into action like all the king's horses and men trying to put Humpty together again. It was an impressive and valiant effort to get it repaired in time for the second Late Model B-main, but it couldn't be done.

"I don't know who it was and I don't really know what happened, but I didn't have anywhere to go," Briscoe said. "I came off 1 and was heading into 2 and all of a sudden he was just there sitting sideways.

"I hate it. I just wanted to get some laps and I couldn't even do that. It was rough. I messed up our qualifying run and had to start the heat in the back, and the guy spun right in front of me. I need a lot more laps, and hopefully I can get them in a few weeks."

Briscoe begins barnstorming ways

The show at Brownstown was part of a summer sort-of barnstorming tour for Briscoe and his new major NASCAR Cup sponsor, Mahindra Tractors. He doesn't anticipate becoming like his Cup team co-owner, Tony Stewart, who would've raced seven days a week in his younger days.

But it is a nice diversion for Briscoe that he and Mahindra are combining on a combined Sprint/Midget/Late Model mini-circuit that is designed to be mutually beneficial for both parties.

His next scheduled event in his Chase'n Dirt Tour, which obviously come between Cup Series races, is a two-day Late Model event in Charlotte on May 11-12.

"I'm definitely excited about this deal and I think it will help me as a driver on Sundays," Briscoe declared. "It will help me become a more diversified race car driver and help me deal with a lot of things. It's a matter of learning to slow things down. There are so many things going on with these cars, and you really have to develop reaction time and be able to adjust on the go out there.

"I look at guys like Larson who have been able to do it well in these cars and I know he'll say it's made him a better Cup driver. So we'll keep doing it as much as we can in order to improve and get better on Sundays."

Briscoe said Mahindra is happy to use it to spread their brand in areas that are more rural and cater to their farming equipment.

"It's meant to help both of us, really," he said. "Like I said, I'm doing it to improve overall, and to get out and have some fun. Mahindra wants to get their name out there to places like this that are more blue-collar like they are.

"I really appreciate Mahindra doing this. When they heard what we were thinking of doing they were on board immediately. And I can't thank Kent Robinson enough for letting me drive his car. I hate what happened to it."

The kid is a humble star

Briscoe's rapid rise in the NASCAR ranks has made him a racing star, and of course being so close to his boyhood home Wednesday night, he had hundreds of well-wishers and fans visit him at his pit. He humbly met with each one, taking pictures and signing autographs, even approached a patient press guy and asked if it was okay to talk for a few minutes (it's a miracle!).

His mom and pop (Kevin and Jamie) raised him right, and one certainly gets the impression that Briscoe will never forget his roots even as his career arcs toward its zenith.

"This is a lot of fun for me, honestly," he said. "It's been great to get out here, 45 minutes from home, and get to see so many people that I don't get to see much of anymore because I'm so busy with my schedule now.

"It's humbling to come out here and see so many people wearing "14" shirts and coming up to me to wish me well and want to shake my hand and get a picture. I'm doing this thing (the Chase'N Dirt Tour) because I truly feel it makes me better on Sunday. It if it wasn't going to do that I probably wouldn't do it.

"But the side benefit is that it's a lot of fun and I'm also out here for that. I get to come out during the week once in awhile, meet with the fans, and get to race when there's no real pressure on me.

"I'm thankful anytime I get to do that and have fun because there's more than enough pressure every single Sunday."

What's next

Briscoe's Indiana visit was brief. He flew in early Tuesday, tested just a bit at Brownstown later that day, raced Wednesday, and flew back out for North Carolina at 6 a.m. Thursday. He will rejoin his Mahindra Tractors/Stewart-Haas Racing team Friday in Dover, and compete in the Dover 400 Sunday in Delaware.

The other remaining confirmed dates on his Chase'N Dirt Tour are Millbridge Speedway, N.C., May 23&24 (Midget); Tri-City Speedway, Granite City, Il., June 1-3 (Late Model/Midget); Plymouth Speedway, In., July 1 (Sprint), TBA, July 2 (Sprint) and Indianapolis Motor Speedway, July 27-28 (Midget).

The next event for Brownstown Speedway is Saturday night with ILMS Pro Late Models, Super Stocks, Pure Stocks, Crown Vics and Hornets.

Contact Times-Mail Sports Writer Jeff Bartlett at jeffb@tmnews.com, or on Twitter @jeffbtmnews.

This article originally appeared on The Times-Mail: Coming home: Chase Briscoe races Late Models at Brownstown Speedway