Kusheba Aims at Peak Stock Car Challenge
Paul Kusheba, IV of Monroe, CT is one of 18 candidates for the second annual Peak® Stock Car Dream Challenge 2, held June 9-11 in Charlotte, NC. The competition has a grand prize of racing a NASCAR K&N Series car with PEAK sponsorship. The modules at Charlotte Motor Speedway included the quarter mile track, iRacing, the dirt track, pit stops, and the 1.5 mile quad oval.
The 18-year-old SK Modified rookie at Waterford Speedbowl qualified for the event through a series of races on iRacing.com. Kusheba won the 2014 PEAK Stock Car Dreams National Series championship with 21 wins in 28 starts. He and Tyler Hudson were added as finalists.
“It can really potentially bring your name out there a lot,” Kusheba said. “You could be a standout and definitely not win the competition. So being in the final 18 in this competition is already a huge step in potentially a much bigger future for my racing career already, which is really a true blessing.”
Kusheba emphasized the dirt track module as an example of the challenges he will face. He explored testing a Late Model to have some experience in full-bodied cars.
“There’s probably people looking forward to that and they might be taken out day one and it might hurt them, so it’s kind of hard to tell what to look at going into it. It’s hard to prepare.”
Kusheba’s best finish was sixth on May 10. Kusheba entered the challenge fourteenth in points with three top 10s in his last five starts. Since the challenge, Kusheba has been more consistent with five top 10s in his last six races including four in a row. He is now twelfth in the standings.
“We’ve put so much into the SK Modified as a team. … Even if we do win the competition I do think it’s just that one race and we’re still going to be running the SK Mod weekly, still going to be working on it, still doing everything that we can to be competitive every week with that because that’s really our main priority with that right now. But definitely if we do win it, it might have to get sidetracked to an extent. We are going for Rookie of the Year as well, but this is definitely a bigger opportunity.”
Kusheba would like to be in North Carolina to pursue racing professionally. But he also realizes the difficulties in looking for sponsors and to get opportunities with teams.
“That’s really what it takes is going down there and taking a year’s worth of time and all your effort and trying to meet with people and meet with teams and getting your name out there as much as you possibly can,” Kusheba said. “…I really want racing to be a part of my life for as long as can be. It’s been a part of my life since I was five years old thanks to my dad getting me into it and that’s just really all I’ve always wanted to do.”
Kusheba’s career began in Go Karts at age five. That foundation has helped him throughout his career. Kusheba raced Legends Cars from 2009 to 2013, winning the Waterford track championship in 2012.
“Go Karts really taught me how to drive very smooth and to drive something smooth and translate it over to something larger like a Late Model or a K&N car really, really helps and it shows very well,” Kusheba said. “If you can drive a Late Model smooth, you’ll have really consistent times. Being smooth in a Go Kart was really helpful to me in a Legend Car because the Legends Cars are so, so snappy and twitchy and out of control, and then going back from a Legend Car to an SK, it helped out even more because the SK’s so smooth … I would definitely agree that the Go Karts were a really good place to start and it’s probably the number one place to start.”
Inaugural winner Patrick Staropoli of Plantation, FL has seven career NASCAR K&N Pro Series starts in the Peak #99 for Bill McAnally. He finished fifth in his West debut at Spokane in August and won his first race at Irwindale in March.
The program will air August 2 on Velocity at 9PM ET.
Sources: Nicholas Teto/YankeeRacer.com