UNPRECEDENTED – The Journey To Greatness Lies In Every Step

“Many of life’s failures are people who did not realize how close they were to success when they gave up.”

Thomas Edison

As a sports media journalist, you always go to every show hoping to see something special. Personally, I truthfully love every race I cover. But especially after I get the time to take a closer look. At the track, it’s impossible as an individual to see everything that happens in real time. But if you’re lucky enough to be able to look over all the information you can find about anything and everything you may have missed, you learn to have an even deeper and greater respect for the sport. Sometimes though, it really does come down to a series of events that just stand out above everything else. History being made in real time. But honestly, in all my years as a race fan and a credentialed journalist, I’ve never seen anything quite like this, and most likely never will again.

One of the things we do well at Short Track Report is identify great young racing talent competing at the local short tracks in our region, that fortunately for us happens to be in the heart of NASCAR country. We don’t take it for granted. The road to big league stock car racing goes through here and we understand the worth of getting to see the young future stars of the sport showcase their talent. And so we don’t just listen to the hype. I get down in the corners and look. Truly look. The hard truth is that with hundreds, check that, thousands of young kid’s families pouring their hard earned cash into the sport, true success is not a guarantee that comes with the check. And pure raw talent doesn’t have a price that can be gathered. Racecraft can be learned, and with hard work, a good amount of success can come your way. But wins and championships come much easier when you have a true driver behind the wheel. Only then does it all come together. And let’s face it, some drivers, for whatever reason, can make that race car an extension of themselves. That’s special. That my friends is at the heart of why we do what we do. Watching a driver go into the “mode” and rise above everything against them, overcoming the odds of both machine and human competition, luck, both good and bad…and then still find the ability to do things with a car that shouldn’t even be possible. As a fan, that’s what brings us to the sport. So when you see something that’s literally history in the making, you have to take the time to recognize.

I’ve been impressed with a lot of young drivers that have and are currently moving through the short track ranks here in the last few years as the new stock car racing era has taken hold. Layne Riggs, Brenden Queen, Connor Zilisch…names that literally are the future of the sport. They start their journey younger than any generation of driver before them, and if you know what you’re looking for, it’s in those developmental years that you see the truth. Kaden Honeycutt started his racing journey at the age of nine, and it was clear then he could find his way to victory lane. By 15 he was making his first ARCA starts and in 2021 he competed full time on the CARS Tour, scoring 2 wins and falling just short of the Late Model Stock title. In 2024, he was competing part time for Niece Motorsports in the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series where in 14 starts he managed 10 top 10 finishes with 2 of those top 5s. In that same year he earned his first CARS Tour championship in the Pro division and scored his first ever Snowball Derby win. All very impressive and an indication of not only what he’s capable of, but also of an individual that also thrives to be better even now in the throes of success. But none of that has been as easy as it sounds.

Now full time on the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series at the age of 21 as driver of the #11 TRICON Garage team, Kaden Honeycutt’s future wasn’t always so certain. When he caught our attention driving for Justin Johnson’s CARS Tour team as a rookie in 2021, it was clear he was a special talent. But racing on that level takes a ton of money, and in Honeycutt’s case, that meant some big time sponsors. They were hard to come by. Kaden however wasn’t gonna just go away. So he spent the next few years driving anything he could get seat time in. We not only learned of his dedication, but we learned he could get the best out of whatever he drove, and helped elevate every team he drove for. The mark of a great driver. Still…pulling in sponsors is a truly difficult chore. But there is one truth about the sport that worked to Honeycutt’s advantage. Wins matter. Wins draw the big sponsors. And at the highest levels, teams know that to compete for championships, it’s going to take both money and talent. And for drivers, we’ve seen how hard it is to make it to the next level in this sport. It can be a tremendously humbling industry. We watched Kaden Honeycutt in the midst of learning that as a personal experience. But, Kaden Honeycutt is also a racer. He lives to race and he used every opportunity to show what he could do. Still, the frustration was evident.

Cut to the modern day however and coming into the zMAX CARS Tour event at Ace Speedway, the tour’s 6th event of the season, Kaden Honeycutt was coming off of his first win in the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series, inevitable by the way, on the heels of taking his first national ARCA Menards Series win, both at Watkins Glen International on the same day. Long story short here is that he flies back to North Carolina the next day and sweeps both CARS Tour races. UNPRECEDENTED. No one will ever do it again. 4 races, 4 wins for 4 different teams in 2 days. 4 elite series in 4 different race cars against some seriously stout competition. Yeah, hard work does pay off. Of course it helps to have a tremendous work ethic along with some serious raw ability. That’s Kaden Honeycutt. It’s going to be very interesting to see what he is able to accomplish in his racing career. At 21 years of age, his prime is still ahead of him. Yeah, this newer generation of driver is not what you’ve been told. Not just a bunch of rich kids racing off of daddy’s money. Again, sure, that’ll get you there, but you better learn how to win along the way. That is if you don’t want to be caught out in the dust bin of history. It’s getting serious out here and that’s just the way we like it. See You At The Track!