Mosen impresses on US speedway circuit

Brad Mosen proved a crowd favourite in Iowa and set the fastest lap time of the night.

Brad Mosen has made a good start to the US speedway season with a top 10 finish in Iowa.
New Zealand speedway driver Brad Mosen completed his first major race meeting at the USAC Midget Nationals at Knoxville Raceway in Iowa, United States, last weekend.

A top 10 finish in the main event proved an auspicious start to the 18-year-old's inaugural US speedway racing season.

Mosen had been scheduled to race at Kokomo, Indiana on May 25, four days after arriving in the US, but the race meeting was cancelled.

The Keith Kunz Motorsport team, who Mosen is contracted to, entered four drivers including the young Aucklander in the nationals at the famous half-mile track.

The Knoxville Nationals event is not an easy place to start a US racing career. Twice as big as Mosen's home track, Western Springs Speedway in Auckland, he spent the practice session getting to grips with the extra speed and his new car.

"It's really fast to start with but you get used to it and it goes from scary-fast to fun-fast pretty quick," said Mosen.

"The car is roomier in the driver's seat area than my car in New Zealand and the engine is a bigger capacity, so the car has more power."

Mosen proved a crowd favourite after dominating the hot lap session to set the fastest lap time of the night.

Although Mosen failed to qualify through the heat races, he finished second in the main repechage to secure a start on the 11th row of the grid for the feature race.

A crash on lap two brought the red light on, and on the restart Mosen went high on the track, hit the wall and flipped, bringing his preliminary race to a premature end.

Another satisfying hot laps session saw Mosen with the fourth quickest lap time overall on Saturday.

Mosen started the second heat race in grid five and drove well to finish second to Californian Johnny Rodriguez, qualifying directly into the A Feature.

Rain postponed the final races until the Sunday night.

Mosen's finish in the heat racing the night before had put him 12th on the start grid on a surprisingly dry track.

"The track was really dry and slick early in the night and I was a bit worried about getting the car hooked up," said Mosen.

"But the team set the car up and once I got started and figured out a good line on the slick track, I adjusted the shocks and we were going forward."

Mosen eventually finished the 25-lap championship feature event in 9th place two spots behind team-mate Jay Drake.

His drive quickly endeared him to team principal Keith Kunz who was impressed by Mosen's first time on US dirt.

"This is just the beginning for Brad and Keith Kunz Motorsport, he has a real future here with our team," said Kunz.

"This weekend he has shown what he can do. The boy has fantastic potential."