My name is Casey Baker and I am a 19 year old nursing student at Rockhurst University and drive the #9 305 Sprint Car. I have been around racing all of my life. My Grandfather Ted Hall was Greg Weld’s mechanic in the early 60’s winning the 1963 Knoxville Nationals and again in 1965 as car owner and mechanic with Jay Woodside. He then went to Indy with Greg and stayed on as a chief mechanic for Greg, then Steve Krisiloff, Tom Sneva, Wally Dahlenbach and Art Pollard to name a few. After returning to the Kansas City area he has had midgets and sprint cars with Ron Kuhn and Mitchell Moore as drivers before putting my younger brother Cody in a micro sprint when he was 9 years old. Although I loved speed and running my go kart and dirt bike I spend most of my time competing in Rodeos with my horses. With Cody racing I started bugging grandpa and mom that I wanted to race but nobody really paid any attention. Two years ago, they finally gave in and I got my first car, a 600cc micro giving it the #9 for my favorite driver Kasey Kahne. Since Cody was running two classes in micros and a 305 sprint car by that time, grandpa didn’t have much time for my car. I had motor problems most of the year only winning a couple heat races in the restrictor class but proving to my family that I had the desire to seriously compete. When it was decided to sell Cody’s micro and go sprint car racing full time, I got to move up to sprints too.
It has been a very exciting year. My first race was at Wheatland, MO at a big race and it felt like being thrown out of the boat and told to sink or swim. It was so much more fun then I could have imagined and I truly fell in love with sprint cars. Not only did I finish the race in 10th, Cody flipped so in the record book, I beat him. My second race was at CMS in my first non-wing race. I hooked a rut and hit the wall coming out of 4 in my heat but made it back for the feature and again had a respectable finish. Since then I have run Friday’s at LA Speedway in LaMonte where I finished 10th in the point standings, non wing at I-70 where I flipped 8 times going out off the 4th turn into the woods when I was hit by another car while leading the heat, at Lebanon and will run at Valley Speedway in Grain Valley. I don’t know how far I will get to go but I am sure enjoying the ride.
I owe a big thanks to my Mom for believing in me, grandpa for his money and hard work, Grandma for video taping my races and always having food at the track, Ron for being my mechanic when Cody’s racing schedule and mine conflict, Mike, Dave, Lloyd and Bill for helping at the track. I have the greatest support group ever. Sponsors are needed however to help keep us racing.
