Pottsville, Pennsylvania (June 19, 2025)………For many, a fourth place result would never even remotely be considered a disappointing performance. But then again, as the 2025 season has proven time and time again, most drivers aren’t Kyle Cummins.
One night after a rare finish off the podium, the Princeton, Indiana racer came back with a vengeance during Thursday night’s second round of USAC Eastern Storm Presented by Levan Machine & Truck Equipment at Pottsville, Pennsylvania’s Big Diamond Speedway.
“Last night (at Bridgeport), we were pretty disappointed with fourth,” Cummins admitted. “We had a pretty good car all night long and just missed it. These tracks have some grip to them, and I just missed it for the feature there and came home fourth. We weren’t happy with that. We wanted to get a win.”
Cummins wired the entire 30-lap distance in his Petty Performance Racing/Avanti Windows & Doors – Premier Recycling/Mach-1/Stanton Chevy to score his sixth USAC AMSOIL Sprint Car National Championship victory of the season, which propelled him to the top of the Eastern Storm standings and extended his lead in the season long series points.
In the process of racking up his 15th consecutive top-10 finish to start the season, and his 22nd straight dating back to the end of 2024, Cummins captured his second career Eastern Storm feature win, and his first since the 2023 series finale at Kutztown, Pennsylvania’s Action Track USA.
Overall, it’s Cummins 26th career USAC National Sprint Car win, which surpasses the total of USAC Hall of Famers Steve Butler, Jay Drake and Parnelli Jones. Cummins has now moved into 23rd place on the all-time list alongside Tony Elliott, Logan Seavey and Dave Steele.
It’s somewhat startling to think that Cummins considered himself to be off-stride after not winning in any of his four most recent USAC National Sprint Car starts. After all, in those four particular starts, he finished a “distant” 8th, 3rd, 2nd and 4th. But this team is on a mission, and they don’t intend to be satisfied with anything less than a visit to victory lane.
“We haven’t won in a while, it seems like,” Cummins relayed. “It feels good to get back and win another one. It just proves that we’re a force to reckon with everywhere we go. We found some stuff throughout the last couple of weeks and we were kind of not great. We got back to our stride here.”
In an all Mach-1 Chassis front row for the feature, Kyle Cummins started on the pole alongside outside front row starter Kevin Thomas Jr. Cummins slid up in front of Thomas in turn one and broke out to the early advantage while fourth starting Mitchel Moles split between Thomas and Jake Swanson at the exit of turn two to slot into second.
Throughout much of the duration of the 30-lap distance, Moles was able to steadily inch closer to Cummins and managed to get right to the back bumper of Cummins by the eighth lap. Even through lapped traffic on lap 11, Moles could only close up so much before Cummins found an escape route that not only helped maintain his grasp of the lead but also tightened his grip as he moved around first-time USAC starter Olivia Thayer, which allowed himself to gap Moles as he darted off into the distance at the 3/8-mile dirt oval.
A yellow flag for a turn four spin by 16th running Abby Hohlbein on the 15th lap shook things up for a moment at the midway point, completely wiping out Cummins’ 1.113 second lead prior to the caution.
That said, Cummins, who had finished 11th and 7th in his only two previous appearances at Big Diamond in 2023 and 2024, respectively, had an ace up his sleeve with the help of sage-like wisdom from his chassis builder, who also happens to own several sprint car wins of his own at Big Diamond over the years, most notably with the United Racing Club (URC).
“Mark Smith is here and he runs here a bunch,” Cummins noted. “He said, at all costs, come off the bottom of turn four. No matter what happens, if I ran the top or whatever, I made sure I came off the bottom coming off turn four. It felt like I was super slow getting into three, and I thought somebody was going to come around me, but I felt like I was getting a pretty good drive down the back stretch.”
While Cummins found no ill effects from the bunch up of the field, the man who most took advantage of the opportunity was Daison Pursley, who picked his way along the bottom to fifth on lap 15, to fourth on lap 16 and to third on lap 17.
All the while, Cummins was enjoying a comfort cruise up front as his lead extended to more than two seconds over the field in the waning laps. When all was said and done, Cummins had put a lock on his latest feature victory by a 1.580 second margin over Mitchel Moles, Daison Pursley and Briggs Danner with Jake Swanson rounding out the top-five.
Mitchel Moles finished second at Big Diamond in 2024. He was second at Bridgeport 24 hours earlier. Then, he was second again on Thursday at Big Diamond. While Moles doesn't like finishing as the runner-up all that much, he’s pretty pleased that he’s now just three points out of the Eastern Storm lead after winning the title one year ago.
Without Daison Pursley’s miraculous save in hot laps – which at one point saw him bike up on his right front tire, then go all four wheels off the ground before landing back on all fours – he wouldn’t have been able to make his successful run in the feature. For his save, Pursley was bestowed with the Inferno Armor Fire Move of the Night. To close the evening, he earned Rod End Supply Hard Charger honors for his plus-five surge from eighth to third in the feature.
Justin Grant rewrote the record book in Honest Abe Roofing Qualifying by setting a new one-lap USAC National Sprint Car track record with a lap of 14.527 seconds. That broke the record of 14.785 set by Daison Pursley in 2023. Grant’s 37th career fast qualifying time in USAC National Sprint Car competition also elevated him past Bryan Clauson on the list and into a tie for eighth place all-time alongside Larry Dickson.
USAC AMSOIL SPRINT CAR NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIP RACE RESULTS: June 19, 2025 – Big Diamond Speedway – Pottsville, Pennsylvania – 3/8-Mile Dirt Track – USAC Eastern Storm Presented by Levan Machine & Truck Equipment
HONEST ABE ROOFING QUALIFYING: 1. Justin Grant, 4, TOPP-14.527 (New Track Record); 2. Briggs Danner, 39, Hogue-14.578; 3. Mitchel Moles, 19AZ, Reinbold/Underwood-14.626; 4. Jake Swanson, 5T, Daming Swanson-14.648; 5. Kevin Thomas Jr., 3R, Rock Steady-14.681; 6. Kyle Cummins, 3p, Petty-14.685; 7. Hayden Reinbold, 19, Reinbold/Underwood-14.782; 8. Kale Drake, 2B, 2B Racing-14.797; 9. Robert Ballou, 12, Ballou-14.822; 10. Steven Drevicki, 19s, DeGre-14.839; 11. Logan Seavey, 57, Abacus-14.844; 12. Daison Pursley, 86, CBI-14.867; 13. C.J. Leary, 21AZ, Team AZ/Curb-Agajanian-14.869; 14. Gunnar Setser, 5G, KO-15.105; 15. Joey Amantea, 88J, JPA-15.194; 16. Kayla Roell, 4K, Roell-15.297; 17. J.T. Ferry, 18, Ferry-15.313; 18. Abby Hohlbein, 2A, 2B Racing-15.333; 19. Braydon Cromwell, 4x, Boyd-15.424; 20. Billy Ney, 83s, Ney-15.820; 21. Olivia Thayer, 39T, Thayer-NT.
CAR IQ FIRST HEAT: (8 laps, all transfer to the feature) 1. C.J. Leary, 2. Kayla Roell, 3. Jake Swanson, 4. Hayden Reinbold, 5. Steven Drevicki, 6. Justin Grant, 7. Braydon Cromwell. 2:04.029
K1 RACEGEAR SECOND HEAT: (8 laps, all transfer to the feature) 1. Kale Drake, 2. Briggs Danner, 3. Gunnar Setser, 4. J.T. Ferry, 5. Logan Seavey, 6. Kevin Thomas Jr., 7. Billy Ney. 2:09.449
USAC GEAR THIRD HEAT: (8 laps, all transfer to the feature) 1. Daison Pursley, 2. Kyle Cummins, 3. Mitchel Moles, 4. Robert Ballou, 5. Joey Amantea, 6. Abby Hohlbein, 7. Olivia Thayer. 2:06.993
FEATURE: (30 laps, starting positions in parentheses) 1. Kyle Cummins (1), 2. Mitchel Moles (4), 3. Daison Pursley (8), 4. Briggs Danner (5), 5. Jake Swanson (3), 6. Kevin Thomas Jr. (2), 7. Justin Grant (6), 8. Robert Ballou (11), 9. Kale Drake (7), 10. Logan Seavey (13), 11. Hayden Reinbold (10), 12. Gunnar Setser (14), 13. C.J. Leary (9), 14. Steven Drevicki (12), 15. J.T. Ferry (17), 16. Joey Amantea (15), 17. Kayla Roell (16), 18. Abby Hohlbein (18), 19. Olivia Thayer (21), 20. Braydon Cromwell (19), 21. Billy Ney (20). NT
FEATURE LAP LEADERS: Laps 1-30 Kyle Cummins.
**Olivia Thayer flipped during the third heat.
USAC AMSOIL SPRINT CAR NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIP POINTS: 1-Kyle Cummins-1168, 2-Justin Grant-1072, 3-Mitchel Moles-951, 4-Logan Seavey-901, 5-Briggs Danner-882, 6-Robert Ballou-873, 7-Jake Swanson-848, 8-Kale Drake-825, 9-C.J. Leary-817, 10-Kevin Thomas Jr.-790.
USAC EASTERN STORM PRESENTED BY LEVAN MACHINE & TRUCK EQUIPMENT POINTS: 1-Kyle Cummins-152, 2-Briggs Danner-150, 3-Mitchel Moles-149, 4-Justin Grant-139, 5-Daison Pursley-137, 6-Jake Swanson-114, 7-Robert Ballou-112, 8-Logan Seavey-111, 9-Kale Drake-102, 10-C.J. Leary-98.
USAC PARALLAX GROUP NATIONAL PASSING MASTER POINTS: 1-Kale Drake-132, 2-C.J. Leary-58, 3-Kyle Cummins-55, 4-Gunnar Setser-55, 5-Briggs Danner-50, 6-Robert Ballou-50, 7-Chase Stockon-50, 8-Justin Grant-47, 9-Jacob Denney-35, 10-Kevin Thomas Jr.-34.
USAC EASTERN STORM PARALLAX GROUP PASSING MASTER POINTS: 1-Briggs Danner-12, 2-Daison Pursley-12, 3-Robert Ballou-9, 4-Kyle Cummins-8, 5-Mitchel Moles-5, 6-Jake Swanson-5, 7-Logan Seavey-5, 8-C.J. Leary-5, 9-Gunnar Setser-5, 10-Kale Drake-4.
NEXT USAC AMSOIL SPRINT CAR NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIP RACE: June 20, 2025 – Williams Grove Speedway – Mechanicsburg, Pennsylvania – 1/2-Mile Dirt Track – USAC Eastern Storm Presented by Levan Machine & Truck Equipment
CONTINGENCY AWARD WINNERS:
Dirt Draft Hot Laps Fastest Driver: Kevin Thomas Jr. (14.490)
Honest Abe Roofing Fast Qualifier: Justin Grant (14.527)
Car IQ First Heat Winner: C.J. Leary
K1 RaceGear Second Heat Winner: Kale Drake
USAC Gear Third Heat Winner: Daison Pursley
Rod End Supply Hard Charger: Daison Pursley (8th to 3rd)
Inferno Armor Fire Move of the Night: Daison Pursley
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