Teenage Drivers - Going Places

"That's probably the thing I'm most proud of Kyle about, that he does pay attention and understands there is more to it than just driving."

The Grissoms have the luxury of living in Concord, North Carolina, just minutes from many Nextel Cup shops and in an area where the short-track competition is intense. It's the area that produced Dale Earnhardt, Bobby Labonte, Dale Jarrett, Brian Vickers, and others.

While the Grissoms are content for Kyle to stay in Legends in the near future, Steve is eyeing the next move for his young driver. He mentions North Carolina tracks in Hickory, Concord, Durham, and in South Boston, Virginia, as possible venues they'll visit. "Obviously, when it's time for Kyle to start running cars," says Steve, "we'll move around and run different tracks and not just settle on one or two racetracks. There's plenty of competition in this area where he can get a good handle on a competitive series.

"We don't have an age [to move up] per se," continues Grissom. "That will be more in line with when we feel he's ready to make the next step. It will be that way more than saying, 'OK, he's 17 now and needs to be driving this. Or at 16 he needs to be driving that.' It's more going at his own pace for that."

The key to progressing involves a rather simple concept. Putting the concept into practice is the challenge. "What ends up allowing us to get sponsorship [for a young driver] is success in whatever activity they do," says Smith, the Roush Racing president. "It's important to be able to show you're competitive with whatever group you're racing with."

Marianne Austin missed a special night in the life of her 17-year-old daughter, who as a senior in high school was a member of her homecoming court in Eudora, Kansas, last October. On that night, Marianne was several hundred miles away in Concord, North Carolina, where her 14-year-old son Chase was competing in a Late Model race at The Dirt Track at Lowe's Motor Speedway.

"We have three children and we walk a precarious line in making sure each one has equal attention and equal funding," says Marianne.

Chase and his dad Steve spent several weeks in Gaffney, South Carolina, last year prior to the race at Concord. In July, Chase attended Mike Duvall's driving school in Cowpens, South Carolina, where he caught the eye of the school's owner. Duvall encouraged the family to spend some time in the Southeast in an attempt to further Chase's career.

During the summer months before the temporary move to South Carolina, Chase competed in the Topless Outlaw Racing Association (TORA), a dirt Late Model touring series in the Midwest. Being part of a touring series was a necessity for the young driver. Kansas, like many states, has strict rules governing the age of racers. "Most of the tracks in Kansas won't let you on the track unless you're 16," says Marianne.

Chase was fortunate, however, because his talent behind the wheel caught the eye of Larry McDaniels, a successful racer in the Midwest who owns a go-kart and mini-sprint track where Chase competed when he was first getting started in the sport. McDaniels encouraged the Austins to put Chase in a dirt Late Model and opened doors for the youngster by speaking to Lonnie Smith, the TORA promoter.

"[Without the help of McDaniels] Chase wouldn't be racing Late Models," says Marianne. "In our area in particular, the track owners wouldn't have let us run. We probably wouldn't have been able to run very many places locally without Larry saying, 'The kid is not going to do anything stupid on the track. He's going to hold his line. He's not going to cause any problems.'"