SILVER TO GOLD! MOLES ROLLS TO FIRST USAC SPRINT WIN OF 2026 AT TRI-STATE

Mitchel Moles traded in his silver for gold during Saturday night’s 13th running of the
Spring Showdown at Haubstadt, Indiana’s Tri-State Speedway. (David Nearpass Photo)

By: Richie Murray – USAC Media

Haubstadt, Indiana (May 2, 2026)………”We won at Haubstadt!”

Mitchel Moles finally traded in his silver for gold during Saturday night’s 13th running of the Spring Showdown at Haubstadt, Indiana’s Tri-State Speedway.

After several close calls in recent years – and in recent weeks – in USAC AMSOIL Sprint Car National Championship competition, the Raisin City, California native hustled past Jadon Rogers with eight laps remaining to corral his first victory of the series season.

Moles’ latest triumph came after finishing as the runner-up in three of his past four USAC National Sprint Car feature starts this season, finally parking his Reinbold-Underwood Motorsports/AME – Mesilla Valley Transportation/Spike/Stanton Chevy in victory lane.

A frequent frontrunner at the 1/4-mile dirt oval, Moles had finished on the podium in each of his past two Spring Showdown starts in 2024 and 2025, and was second in the USAC Indiana Sprint Week round at the track in 2024. This time, he was on the top step after finally putting his personal checkmark next to a Tri-State Triumph.

“Man, I feel like I’ve been so close,” Moles exhaled. “It was around this time last year that Justin (Grant) and I were going at it, but I gave it up with a couple laps to go. But tonight, Jadon and I got to firing some slide jobs over there and neither of us wanted to give it up. We both haven’t won a ton of USAC races. He gave it his all and I was giving it my all, and I think that’s what makes it great for the fans.”

Ironically, Moles’ feature victory came on the same night one of his finest streaks came to a close. Moles had been the fastest qualifier for four consecutive USAC National Sprint Car events at Tri-State dating back to 2024. On this night, he was beaten to the punch by Kyle Cummins to the tune of a mere .017 seconds.

Turns out, it was just fine for Moles as he notched his sixth career USAC National Sprint Car victory, tied for 78th on the all-time list alongside Emerson Axsom, Chad Boespflug, Kevin Briscoe, Shane Cottle, Jac Haudenschild, Jason McCord, Jan Opperman, Tom Sneva, George Snider and Dick Tobias.

Starting fifth on the grid for the 30-lap feature, Moles quickly rose to the second position on the first lap of the feature, instigating a nearly race long pursuit of frontrunner Rogers.

Rogers, still on the med from a broken left fibula suffered about six weeks ago, looked exemplary at the same place he picked up his one and only USAC National Sprint Car win to date back in 2022. Rogers sliced through the thick of the traffic as he kept Moles at bay for the time being. But Moles never strayed too far behind from there on out.

In a spectacular sequence on the 18th lap, Rogers and Moles threw hands and exchanged the lead four times in a single trip around The Class Track. Moles was able to dive under Rogers for the position in both turns one and three. However, at the exit of turns two and four, Rogers managed to fend off Moles’ attack and drive back underneath to resecure the lead by a .038 second margin at the stripe, about the diameter of a front wheel.

The caution fell on lap 18 when Robert Ballou (7th) and Aric Gentry (21st) stopped sideways in turns one and two. On the ensuing restart, Moles had his hands full with Kevin Thomas Jr. for the next three laps, but Moles was able to shake loose and gain some ground on Rogers once again.

Ninth running Eli Wilhelmus’s dramatically slowing car necessitated a yellow flag on lap 23, bringing Moles right to within a whisper of Rogers’ rear bumper. On the first lap of the resumption, Moles’ toured the middle of turns three and four, and glided up in front of Rogers at the exit of turn four to gain the lead for the first time.

“I think we just rolled it in a little more,” Moles explained regarding the evolution of the track surface throughout the course of the feature. “It took a little longer for that one to get picked up, and we rolled it in even more. So, I think that hurt (Jadon’s) run. I’ve been beaten like that before here, so I knew what (Kevin Thomas Jr.) was doing and I knew if I could kind of mimic that. I don’t know where their racecar was at, but when you’re good at Haubstadt, everybody’s stuff seems to go.”

All that said, Rogers kept his foot in it, and by the time the two reached turn four on lap 24, Rogers returned the favor and slid across the nose of Moles to retake the spot. Yet, a split second after Rogers found himself at the front once again, the caution was displayed for a two-car tangle between Eli Wilhelmus and Cale Coons, who were involved in a tussle for 15th place at the time. As a result, Rogers was moved back behind Moles for the next restart.

On the lap 24 restart, Moles distanced himself from the pack. Meanwhile, a battle was raging for third between Thomas and Kyle Cummins. But it was then and there that a catastrophe nearly came to fruition. As Cummins went topside around Thomas off turn two and down the back straightaway, Thomas’ right front tire and Cummins’ left rear tire brushed each other, sending Cummins’ car careening full speed sideways through the infield before he somehow managed to straighten himself out and rejoin the field, albeit after losing two positions to drop to fifth.

Up front, Moles had a firm grip on the number one spot and took it straight to the checkered flag to win by a 1.564 second margin over Rogers in second with Thomas taking third. Moles’ teammate, Hayden Reinbold, also demonstrated his best series finish of the year with a fourth. Cummins wound up rounding out the top-five.

For the first 22 laps of tonight’s feature, Rogers was firmly established at the top of the leaderboard. In the end, he came home as the runner-up finisher to earn the K & N Filters Clean Air Award for the most laps led.

Donny Brackett raced with a damaged Jacobs Ladder during the feature, but it wasn’t enough to slow him a bit in his ex-Kyle Cummins ride. Starting 16th, Brackett raced his way up to a seventh place result, the best finish of his USAC National Sprint Car career in what was his 17th series start. He was honored as the Rod End Supply Hard Charger.

Cummins was the night’s LearnLab Fast Qualifier. His lap of 13.416 seconds represented his 20th career USAC National Sprint Car fast qualifying time, a number which moved him to 25th place all-time alongside fellow series champions Jerry Coons Jr., Tony Elliott and Roger McCluskey.

USAC AMSOIL SPRINT CAR NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIP RACE RESULTS: May 2, 2026 – Tri-State Speedway – Haubstadt, Indiana – 13th Spring Showdown – 1/4-Mile Dirt Track

LEARNLAB QUALIFYING: 1. Kyle Cummins, 3p, Petty-13.418; 2. Mitchel Moles, 19AZ, Reinbold/Underwood-13.435; 3. Hayden Reinbold, 19, Reinbold/Underwood-13.450; 4. Justin Grant, 4, TOPP-13.705; 5. Eli Wilhelmus, 55, Wilhelmus-13.722; 6. Jadon Rogers, 14, Rogers-13.761; 7. Logan Seavey, 57, Abacus-13.867; 8. Kevin Thomas Jr., 3R, Rock Steady-13.901; 9. Briggs Danner, 39, Hogue-13.986; 10. C.J. Leary, 53, Fox-13.996; 11. Logan Calderwood, 6, Calderwood-14.017; 12. Trey Osborne, 6T, Osborne-14.028; 13. Chet Williams, 38, Williams-14.082; 14. Robert Ballou, 12, Ballou-14.093; 15. Harley Burns, 16, Britt Aero-14.186; 16. Donny Brackett, 4B, Brackett-14.197; 17. Carson Short, 21m, Edwards-14.229; 18. Jake Swanson, 5T, Daming Swanson-14.254; 19. Chase Stockon, 92, Sertich-14.271; 20. Kendall Ruble, 17, Ruble-14.314; 21. Aric Gentry, 10, Gentry-14.402; 22. Sam Scott, 7s, Scott-14.602; 23. Adyn Schmidt, 12s, Schmidt-14.734; 24. Cale Coons, 63, Dooling/Curb-Agajanian-14.828; 25. James Boyd, 16B, Boyd-14.838; 26. Brady Short, 61m, Edwards-14.850; 27. Austin Cory, 49, Cory-14.880; 28. Kobe Simpson, 21K, Simpson-14.942; 29. Reed Whitney, 87, Whitney-14.971; 30. Troy Carey, 45N, Carey-15.252; 31. Collin Ambrose, 36, Ambrose-15.430; 32. Dakota Earls, 15E, Earls-15.487; 33. Austin Hawkins, 5A, Hawkins-15.507.

K1 RACEGEAR FIRST HEAT: (10 laps, top-5 transfer to the feature, starting positions in parentheses) 1. Kyle Cummins (6), 2. Carson Short (2), 3. Chet Williams (3), 4. Aric Gentry (1), 5. Briggs Danner (4), 6. Eli Wilhelmus (5), 7. James Boyd (7), 8. Reed Whitney (8), 9. Austin Hawkins (9). NT

TJ FORGED SECOND HEAT: (10 laps, top-5 transfer to the feature, starting positions in parentheses) 1. Mitchel Moles (6), 2. Robert Ballou (3), 3. C.J. Leary (4), 4. Jadon Rogers (5), 5. Jake Swanson (2), 6. Sam Scott (1), 7. Troy Carey (8), 8. Brady Short (7). 2:15.918

K & N FILTERS THIRD HEAT: (10 laps, top-5 transfer to the feature, starting positions in parentheses) 1. Hayden Reinbold (6), 2. Chase Stockon (2), 3. Harley Burns (3), 4. Logan Seavey (5), 5. Adyn Schmidt (1), 6. Logan Calderwood (4), 7. Austin Cory (7), 8. Collin Ambrose (8). 2:19.333

INDY POWERSPORTS FOURTH HEAT: (10 laps, top-5 transfer to the feature, starting positions in parentheses) 1. Kevin Thomas Jr. (5), 2. Kendall Ruble (2), 3. Cale Coons (1), 4. Justin Grant (6), 5. Trey Osborne (4), 6. Donny Brackett (3), 7. Kobe Simpson (7), 8. Dakota Earls (8). 2:25.328

FIVE STAR BODIES SEMI: (12 laps, top-4 transfer to the feature, starting positions in parentheses) 1. Eli Wilhelmus (1), 2. Donny Brackett (3), 3. Logan Calderwood (2), 4. Sam Scott (4), 5. Troy Carey (8), 6. Brady Short (9), 7. James Boyd (5), 8. Kobe Simpson (7), 9. Collin Ambrose (11), 10. Austin Hawkins (13), 11. Reed Whitney (10), 12. Dakota Earls (12), 13. Austin Cory (6). NT

FEATURE: (30 laps, starting positions in parentheses) 1. Mitchel Moles (5), 2. Jadon Rogers (2), 3. Kevin Thomas Jr. (7), 4. Hayden Reinbold (4), 5. Kyle Cummins (6), 6. Justin Grant (3), 7. Donny Brackett (16), 8. C.J. Leary (10), 9. Logan Seavey (1), 10. Chet Williams (13), 11. Robert Ballou (14), 12. Briggs Danner (9), 13. Harley Burns (15), 14. Chase Stockon (19), 15. Cale Coons (24), 16. Kendall Ruble (20), 17. Adyn Schmidt (23), 18. Jake Swanson (18), 19. Aric Gentry (21), 20. Logan Calderwood (11), 21. Eli Wilhelmus (8), 22. Trey Osborne (12), 23. Sam Scott (22), 24. Carson Short (17). NT

FEATURE LAP LEADERS: Laps 1-22 Jadon Rogers, Laps 23-30 Mitchel Moles.

USAC AMSOIL SPRINT CAR NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIP POINTS: 1-Kyle Cummins-760, 2-Mitchel Moles-723, 3-Justin Grant-701, 4-Jake Swanson-674, 5-Logan Seavey-660, 6-Kevin Thomas Jr.-638, 7-Chase Stockon-630, 8-Briggs Danner-605, 9-C.J. Leary-567, 10-Robert Ballou-547.

USAC PARALLAX GROUP NATIONAL PASSING MASTER POINTS: 1-Cale Coons-38, 2-Logan Calderwood-36, 3-Robert Ballou-30, 4-Justin Grant-29, 5-Briggs Danner-28, 6-Kevin Thomas Jr.-28, 7-Chase Stockon-23, 8-Chelby Hinton-22, 9-Jadon Rogers-21, 10-Hayden Reinbold-20.

NEXT USAC AMSOIL SPRINT CAR NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIP RACES: May 15-16, 2026 – Eldora Speedway – Rossburg, Ohio – #LetsRaceTwo Presented by LGMG – 1/2-Mile Dirt Track                                                                                  

CONTINGENCY AWARD WINNERS:

Dirt Draft Hot Laps Fastest Driver: Mitchel Moles (13.669)

LearnLab Fast Qualifier: Kyle Cummins (13.418)

K1 RaceGear First Heat Winner: Kyle Cummins

TJ Forged Second Heat Winner: Mitchel Moles

K & N Filters Third Heat Winner: Hayden Reinbold

Indy Powersports Fourth Heat Winner: Kevin Thomas Jr.

Five Star Bodies Semi Winner: Eli Wilhelmus

K & N Filters Clean Air Award: Jadon Rogers (22 laps led)

Rod End Supply Hard Charger: Donny Brackett (16th to 7th)