Kevin Kovac's Take Five
Take Five: Schlenk patches pre-race wound
In a new feature appearing regularly on DirtonDirt, senior writer Kevin Kovac will offer readers five things worth mentioning from around the Dirt Late Model landscape (index to previous Take Fives):
No. 1: Hot off his first DIRTcar Summer Nationals victory in 16 years on Wednesday at I-96 Speedway in Lake Odessa, Mich., Rusty Schlenk unloaded for Thursday’s Hell Tour stop at Butler (Mich.) Motor Speedway riding a high. But the 39-year-old driver from Jackson, Mich., saw his fortunes change abruptly before Butler’s action even began. While Schlenk was dismounting a tire from his teenage son Carter’s car that was damaged in a wreck at I-96, a 1-inch-long shard of aluminum sticking out from the wheel jammed into his lower right leg and broke off. “It was stuck pretty deep so I had Carter Schlenk grab it and pull it out for me,” Schlenk wrote in a Facebook post. “Well, once he pooped the cork it turned into a blood waterfall! I couldn’t get it to stop bleeding.” Shane Schlenk made a tourniquet out of his belt until a medical worker arrived at Schlenk’s trailer, but they also couldn’t stanch the blood flow so he was directed to visit the emergency room of the nearby hospital. He soon realized that he wouldn’t be able to see a doctor before Butler’s racing started, so he left with Mallory Midtgard, who had driven him to the ER, because they “decided that we’ve watched enough medical shows to handle it ourselves.” After a visit to the nearby Walgreen for supplies, he pulled the compression bandage off the wound in the parking and it started gushing blood again, so he and Midtgard cleaned it the best they could with peroxide and Schlenk — using his racer’s mentality here — super-glued a piece of gauze into the hole to stop the bleeding. “Flex-Seal had nothing on our patch job … we wrapped it up and headed back to the track,” Schlenk wrote, noting that the puncture wound was “still trying to leak a little bit” but “with continued appreciation of super-glue I’ve got the leak under control.”
No. 2: Schlenk, who turns 40 on July 20, made it back to the track in time for time trials. His night, however, didn’t go well as he was sixth fastest in his 10-car qualifying group, made no headway in his heat and then spent the B-main testing some setup changes expecting to have a provisional for the feature … but he didn’t, so he was a DNQ. Missing the headliner caused him to plummet in the Summer Nationals’ Week 5 points standings — going from the lead to fourth — and has prompted him to bypass Friday’s series event at Crystal (Mich.) Motor Speedway to prepare for Saturday’s Birthday Race at Oakshade Raceway in Wauseon, Ohio.
No. 3: Three races remain on the 2026 Summer Nationals schedule — Crystal, Oakshade and Wayne County Speedway in Orrville, Ohio, but Tanner English of Benton, Ky., has effectively clinched the overall points championship with Jason Feger of Bloomington, Ill., the only driver with a mathematical shot at catching him, skipping the final four shows. It’s a satisfying accomplishment for English, who becomes the first driver from Kentucky to win the Hell Tour title over its 40-year existence. He’s already the winningest Kentucky driver in Summer Nationals history with his 10 victories after capturing Thursday’s feature at Butler. Who’s the second-winningest racer from the Bluegrass State? English’s father and crew chief Terry English, who has five career Summer Nationals triumphs with his most recent coming on June 17, 2008, at Highland (Ill.) Speedway — where Tanner just won on July 4.
No. 4: Another interesting Summer Nationals note: Tanner English is the third non-Illinois driver in the last four years to win the overall Summer Nationals points crown, joining Ashton Winger of Hampton, Ga. (2023) and Tyler Erb of New Waverly, Texas (’24). (Jason Feger won the title last year.) The previous 18 years — from 2005-22 — saw only Illinois residents emerge as Hell Tour champions with the trophies over that span split between Oakwood’s Bobby Pierce (five), Moweaqua’s Shannon Babb (four), Chatham’s Brian Shirley (four), Carpentersville’s Dennis Erb Jr. (three), New Berlin’s Brandon Sheppard (one) and Feger (one).
No. 5: Teenager Jackson Hise of Ocala, Fla., has been active in Super Late Model racing since his debut season in 2024, but the 18-year-old announced today that “after considerable thought and careful reflection” he’s decided to step away from racing to “pursue new opportunities beyond the racetrack.” The18-year-old appeared to be on an upward trajectory — he was the Hunt the Front Super Dirt Series Rookie of the Year in 2024, ran much of the DIRTcar Summer Nationals schedule in ’25 and currently sits ninth in this year’s Hunt the Front points standings — but wants to focus on his education as he plans to attend the University of Floria in the fall to study engineering and work “toward achieving new personal and professional goals.” In a statement revealing the news, Hise thanked veteran wrenches Jason Fitzgerald and Ronnie Blair “for their unwavering guidance, support and belief” in him throughout his journey and asserted that he’s been “incredibly grateful for every opportunity I’ve been given, the memories I’ve made and the people I’ve had the privilege of meeting throughout my racing career.” He added that “racing will always be a part of who I am and I have no doubt I’ll be back behind the wheel somewhere down the road” but he’s now “excited to begin this next chapter and pursue the goals I’ve set for myself.”
