Terre Haute, Indiana (May 24, 2021)………The Beatles may have told us that happiness is a warm gun.  However, the ultimate happiness very well may be the image of a driver holding the traditional rifle in victory lane after a hard earned win at the Tony Hulman Classic.

We know that’s how it’ll end on Wednesday night, May 26, following the conclusion of the 51^st running of the Hulman Classic for the USAC AMSOIL Sprint Car National Championship, but who will be the driver with both hands on the coveted rifle?

That’s the question that remains to be answered when the series arrives at the famed half-mile dirt oval for the 165^th points race held since the USAC Sprint Cars’ 1957 debut at the Wabash Valley Fairgrounds track.

The Hulman Classic is the longest annually-held USAC National Sprint Car event, being contested every year since the 1971 season with George Snider winning the inaugural edition.  Over the past half-century, only two drivers have won the event three times: Levi Jones (2005-08-09) and Cary Faas (1992-94-98).  Two drivers have a chance to join the exclusive club this Wednesday.

Chris Windom’s first win of the USAC season in 2020 came during the Tony Hulman Classic.  To date, through 11 races in 2021, Windom finds himself in a similar place, sans a victory.  However, the Hulman Classic could very well be the site of his breakthrough.  After all, Windom has notched six top-fives in a row in the event: 2nd in 2015, 5th in 2016, 2nd in 2017, 4th in 2018, 2nd in 2019 and 1^st in 2020.

Windom (Canton, Ill.) won twice with the USAC AMSOIL National Sprint Cars in 2020 at Terre Haute, the first of which captured his second career Hulman Classic triumph.  He leads all expected entrants with six career series wins at the track.  The 2017 USAC National Sprint Car champ has also tasted victory with the USAC Silver Crown division at Terre Haute in the 2017 Sumar Classic.  At the Hulman, though, his prowess dates back more than a decade with a 5th place run in 2009.  In 2011, he became the youngest ever Hulman Classic winner at the age of 20, a record that still stands to this day.

It's difficult to win the Hulman Classic in consecutive years with only three drivers going back-to-back during the first 50 years: Steve Butler (1987-88), Levi Jones (2008-09) and Robert Ballou (2015-16).  Ballou also comes in as the series’ most recent winner, on May 8 at Eldora.  Ballou, the 2015 USAC National Sprint Car titlist, has won both of his Terre Haute USAC Sprint Car races during the Hulman.

In 2019, Chase Stockon (Fort Branch, Ind.), broke through to capture his first win in the Tony Hulman Classic.  The win gave the veteran driver, who grew up in nearby Sullivan, Ind., the rare trifecta at Terre Haute by winning the “big three” USAC AMSOIL National Sprint Car races held there in his career: the Jim Hurtubise Classic in 2012, the Don Smith Classic in 2016 and the Hulman Classic in 2019, an exemplary feat that only he and Chris Windom (Canton, Ill.) have accomplished in their careers.

Stockon has been consistently consistent, so to speak, at the Hulman Classic in recent years with a 5th in 2014, then stringing together a current run of top-five finishes in each of his past four starts in the event: a 3rd in 2017, a 5th in 2018, a win in 2019 and a 3^rd in 2020.

Kevin Thomas Jr. (Cullman, Ala.) won the 2017 running of the Tony Hulman Classic and has had his share of front running efforts over the past decade in the event with runner-up results in both 2014 and 2018.  He also won once more at Terre Haute back in 2013 during Indiana Sprint Week in a tenacious last lap battle with Dave Darland.  In the 2020 event, Thomas earned a 7^th place result.

Current point leader Brady Bacon (Broken Arrow, Okla.) recorded the fastest time ever by a USAC Sprint Car driver at Terre Haute during the 2014 Hulman Classic, a 19.225 second lap around the half-mile.  He also set the quickest time at the 2016 and 2020 Hulman Classics.  As fate would have it, every time Bacon sets quick time at the Hulman Classic, he goes on to win the USAC AMSOIL National Sprint Car championship that same season.  The three-time series champ and two-time Terre Haute USAC Sprint winner (2014 & 2018), however, is seeking his first Hulman Classic triumph after four career top-four runs: 2nd (2013), 3rd (2014) and 4th (2016-2017).

Like Bacon, Justin Grant (Ione, Calif.) has won at Terre Haute, but a win in the Hulman Classic still eludes him.  Grant won the Jim Hurtubise Classic (2019) and Don Smith Classic (2020) USAC Sprint Car features at Terre Haute in recent seasons and he’s also a past Silver Crown winner at Terre Haute, capturing the headlines in a 2018 Sumar Classic victory there.  He earned his best career Hulman Classic finish with a 2^nd in 2020.  He was also 5^th in 2019.

C.J. Leary (Greenfield, Ind.) is seeking his first Hulman Classic score as well.  He was the fastest qualifier at the Hulman Classic in 2019 but has yet to record a top-five feature finish in his Hulman Classic career.  The 2019 USAC AMSOIL National Sprint Car champion knows how to get around the place as evidenced by his 2016 Silver Crown win at the Terre Haute Action Track as well as his 4^th place finish last July during the Don Smith Classic.

Jake Swanson (Anaheim, Calif.) had a fine run in his initial Hulman Classic start in 2020, winning his heat race and finishing 4^th in the 30-lap feature, which was his best career series result at the time, since eclipsed by a 2^nd at Pennsylvania’s Big Diamond Speedway in June of 2021.  Tanner Thorson (Minden, Nev.), the winner at Big Diamond, likewise, made his Hulman Classic debut in 2020, picking up 6^th in the A-Main.  Max Adams (Loomis, Calif.) was a top-ten runner in his first Hulman Classic experience in 2020 as well, taking home 8^th.

One-time USAC National Sprint Car winner Matt Westfall (Pleasant Hill, Ohio) took 11^th in the 2020 Hulman Classic while last year’s USAC National Most Improved Driver, Brandon Mattox (Terre Haute, Ind.) was just one spot behind Westfall in 12^th.  Mattox made his very first career USAC National Sprint Car feature start at the 2010 Tony Hulman Classic.

Kyle Cummins (Princeton, Ind.), a winner on the USAC AMSOIL National Sprint Car trail this season at Haubstadt, Indiana’s Tri-State Speedway, also recently won with the Midwest Sprint Car Series at Terre Haute during the first weekend of May.  He finished a best of 9^th at the Tony Hulman Classic in 2017.

Logan Seavey (Sutter, Calif.) enters Wednesday's Hulman Classic on a hot streak, winning at the local level in Indiana with the Baldwin Brothers Sprint Car, first on Saturday at Lincoln Park Speedway in Putnamville, and again on Sunday at Kokomo Speedway.  Baldwin won the Hulman Classic as an owner in 2011 with driver Chris Windom.  For Seavey, Wednesday will mark his first career Hulman Classic appearance.

The 2020 USAC National Sprint Car Rookie of the Year, Jadon Rogers (Worthington, Ind.), aims to make his first Hulman Classic start on Wednesday.  Rogers took 3^rd with MSCS at Terre Haute in May of this year.

One piece of the USAC National Sprint Car Rookie class for 2021 is Paul Nienhiser (Chapin, Ill.), who is also making his first Hulman Classic appearance.  He currently stands 9^th in the series standings, two spots behind fellow Rookie Tanner Thorson in 7^th.  Nienhiser, the 2019 MOWA winged sprint car champ, recently captured his first career sprint car win without a wing earlier this month at Jacksonville Speedway in Illinois.

This group, and many more, will duke it out for the prize and prestige of winning the 51^st Tony Hulman Classic at Indiana’s Terre Haute Action Track on Wednesday, May 26, which will also have the Scott’s Custom Colors DIRTcar Modifieds at the event.

Pits open at 2pm EDT, grandstands at 3pm, hot laps at 6:30pm with racing to follow.  Adult general admission tickets are $25. Infield admission is $15. Pit passes are $30.

Advance tickets for both the Tony Hulman Classic and the following night’s Sumar Classic USAC Silver Crown race at Terre Haute on Thursday, May 27, are on sale now at www.tracpass.com.  Tickets will also be available at the gate on each race day.

USAC AMSOIL SPRINT CAR NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIP POINTS: 1-Brady Bacon-763, 2-Justin Grant-734, 3-Kevin Thomas Jr.-697, 4-Robert Ballou-659, 5-Chris Windom-635, 6-C.J. Leary-628, 7-Tanner Thorson-602, 8-Jake Swanson-591, 9-Paul Nienhiser-449, 10-Chase Stockon-440.