Gavin Miller Mans the Red Clay for USAC Midgets Victory
Photo by Rich Forman
BLOOMINGTON, Ind.—For Gavin Miller, the red clay of Bloomington Speedway has been a home away from home.
Back in 2023, the Allentown, Pennsylvania native captured his first career USAC NOS Energy Drink Midget National Championship.
On Friday night, it was more of the same as Miller capitalized on the misfortune of early race front runners Jacob Denney and Justin Grant, then led the final 15 circuits of the 30-lap feature to score his third career series win, two of which have come on the southern Indiana 1/4-mile.
“I think it just fits my driving style,” Miller acknowledged. “Sometimes you’ve got to hit it nice and straight. I felt like the top was pretty good down here. I just started sliding myself because I found the moisture on entry there.”
Miller has turned up the wick of late, finishing inside the top-two in four of his last seven series starts through July and August, including two victories. Miller also scored a win in July on the opening night of the Midwest Midget Championship at Fairbury, Nebraska’s Jefferson County Speedway.
After waiting 56 races between his first and second career USAC National Midget triumph, Miller only had to wait one more race to get win number three in his Keith Kunz-Curb-Agajanian Motorsports/SoundGear – Toyota – Mobil 1/LynK/Speedway Toyota.
Now, Miller is a two-time winner with the series in 2025 and is among the hottest contenders right now on the tour.
“I struggled last year and just had to regroup and rethink who I am as a driver,” Miller explained. “I’m working great with (crew chief) Beau (Binder) now. Working at the shop has definitely taught me what I like in my racecar a little bit better. Communication with my crew chief has been the biggest thing.”
Miller actually had to bounce back at the start of Friday night’s feature, the first USAC National Midget event held at Bloomington outside of Indiana Midget Week since Tony Stewart’s victory in August 1994, 31 years ago.
After starting from the pole position, teammate and outside front row starter Denney pounced to the lead after he and Miller sliced and diced one another on each end of the racetrack for the first pair of laps. By lap three, Miller had fallen to third as Grant zipped past on the inside of turn two to overtake the second position.
By the midway point, Denney had stretched his lead out to a full two seconds as he matriculated through lapped traffic with relative ease while Grant and Miller couldn’t seem to break free from the gridlock nearly a straightaway behind in the second and third spot.
However, on lap 16, Denney’s right rear tire was noticeably low, and on the 17th lap, it finally gave way in turn three to bring out the caution, relegating Denney to the Indy Metal Finishing Work Area. After restarting at the tail, he worked his way back up to a 12th place result.
Grant inherited the lead for the restart but soon found his own bit of right rear tire misfortune as well. As soon as the green flag was waved for the lap 17 restart, Grant was swallowed up by Miller instantaneously as Grant’s tire rapidly deflated, dropping him to third behind Brecken Reese within a lap.
Moments later, Steven Snyder Jr. (9th) got crossed up in turns three and four and nearly came to a halt. Just behind him, 15th running Thomas Meseraull was unable to avoid Snyder, and the ensuing contact sent Meseraull flipping upside down. During the red flag, Grant headed back to the work area before returning with fresh rubber, managing only to get back to 16th by the race’s end.
From there, Miller said ‘sayonara’ to the competition as the only shakeups at the upper tier of the field occurred behind him. With six laps remaining, Reese got tied up atop the turn two cushion, allowing both Kevin Thomas Jr. and Cannon McIntosh to sweep on by into second and third, respectively.
When all was said and done, Miller was 2.373 seconds ahead as he crossed under Keith Dewig’s checkered flag with Kevin Thomas Jr. taking second, Cannon McIntosh third, Brecken Reese fourth and Jakeb Boxell rounding out the top-five with his best career USAC National Midget result.
Winning isn’t easy, and even though the night didn’t exactly unfold the way he envisioned it, Miller is grateful to add another one in the win column.
“The track was great; it was racy,” Miller praised. “I didn’t really want to win it that way, especially with them cutting tires there, and I honestly thought I did the same thing on the restart. I kept spinning my tires just praying that my tire wasn’t cut. But I just had to be smart on the restarts, hit my line right and make sure I wasn’t making mistakes getting into the corners. I just had to hit my line on the bottom and slide myself the best that I could.”
In 12 USAC National Midget starts this season, Brecken Reese had grabbed just a single top-10 finish, which also happened to be his only result better than 14th! But Friday night was different as the USAC Rookie from Canyon, Texas earned his best career series finish of fourth in his first ever visit to Bloomington Speedway.
To start the night, a throttle linkage issue relegated Gunnar Setser to just one qualifying lap. Starting 17th in the feature, Setser worked his way up to a seventh place finish in the feature, which earned him the Sober Joe’s Coffee Recovery of Night award.
When Hayden Reinbold pulled off in his heat race, his night was trending downward. After going to a backup car for the feature, the Arizonan advanced +12 from his 23rd starting spot to finish 11th, good enough for Rod End Supply Hard Charger honors.
In Honest Abe Roofing Qualifying, Kevin Thomas Jr. blazed to his first quick time of the USAC National Midget season, marking 4 Kings Racing’s first ever USAC fast qualifier award as the team went one-two with Jakeb Boxell also going second quickest. For KTJ, it was his 10th career USAC National Midget fast qualifying time tonight, which tied George Amick, Pancho Carter and Allen Crowe for 65th place on the all-time list.
In a statistical oddity, every race conducted during the program was won by a car sporting the number 97. Zach Wigal scored the first heat race win in Pat O’Dell’s No. 97x. The second race victory was captured by Kale Drake in the Keith Kunz/Curb-Agajanian Motorsports No. 97K. Gavin Miller, aboard his Keith Kunz/Curb-Agajanian Motorsports No. 97, finished off the preliminaries with a win in heat race three, then completed the night as the feature victor.
USAC NOS ENERGY DRINK MIDGET NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIP RACE RESULTS: August 29, 2025 – Bloomington Speedway – Bloomington, Indiana – 1/4-Mile Dirt Oval
HONEST ABE ROOFING QUALIFYING: 1. Kevin Thomas Jr., 14, 4 Kings-11.852; 2. Jakeb Boxell, 14JB, 4 Kings-11.854; 3. Brecken Reese, 20Q, Reese-11.909; 4. Justin Grant, 87, CBI-11.937; 5. Jacob Denney, 67, Kunz/Curb-Agajanian-12.046; 6. Gavin Miller, 97, Kunz/Curb-Agajanian-12.061; 7. Cannon McIntosh, 71K, Kunz/Curb-Agajanian-12.099; 8. Drake Edwards, 83, CBI-12.100; 9. Steven Snyder Jr., 4, RMS-12.105; 10. Colton Robinson, 67K, Kunz/Curb-Agajanian-12.111; 11. Cale Coons, 63, Dooling/Curb-Agajanian-12.121; 12. Hayden Reinbold, 19AZ, Reinbold-Underwood-12.121; 13. Zach Wigal, 97x, O'Dell-12.205; 14. Kale Drake, 97K, Kunz/Curb-Agajanian-12.255; 15. Thomas Meseraull, 7s, Engler-12.287; 16. Braxton Cummings, 71B, Cummings-12.308; 17. Ethan Mitchell, 19m, Bundy Built-12.311; 18. Stephen Schnapf, 11s, Martin-12.320; 19. Gunnar Setser, 43, Arnold-12.443; 20. Mack Leopard, 86, CBI-12.485; 21. Jeff Schindler, 8x, Schindler-NT; 22. Justin Dickerson, 21D, Dickerson-12.861; 23. Alex Shipman, 17, Cummings-12.915; 24. Chris Hartman, 35s, Hodge-12.950; 25. Mark Chisholm, 56x, Chisholm-NT (time of 12.508 disallowed after missing the scales).
CAR IQ FIRST HEAT: (10 laps, all transfer to the feature) 1. Zach Wigal, 2. Colton Robinson, 3. Justin Grant, 4. Cannon McIntosh, 5. Kevin Thomas Jr., 6. Gunnar Setser, 7. Braxton Cummings, 8. Mark Chisholm, 9. Justin Dickerson. NT
K1 RACEGEAR SECOND HEAT: (10 laps, all transfer to the feature) 1. Kale Drake, 2. Jacob Denney, 3. Ethan Mitchell, 4. Cale Coons, 5. Drake Edwards, 6. Jakeb Boxell, 7. Mack Leopard, 8. Alex Shipman. 2:06.221
USAC GEAR THIRD HEAT: (10 laps, all transfer to the feature) 1. Gavin Miller, 2. Steven Snyder Jr., 3. Brecken Reese, 4. Thomas Meseraull, 5. Jeff Schindler, 6. Chris Hartman, 7. Hayden Reinbold, 8. Stephen Schnapf. NT
FEATURE: (30 laps, starting positions in parentheses) 1. Gavin Miller (1), 2. Kevin Thomas Jr. (6), 3. Cannon McIntosh (9), 4. Brecken Reese (4), 5. Jakeb Boxell (5), 6. Steven Snyder Jr. (11), 7. Gunnar Setser (17), 8. Kale Drake (8), 9. Zach Wigal (7), 10. Colton Robinson (12), 11. Hayden Reinbold (23), 12. Jacob Denney (2), 13. Drake Edwards (10), 14. Ethan Mitchell (16), 15. Mack Leopard (18), 16. Justin Grant (3), 17. Cale Coons (13), 18. Justin Dickerson (20), 19. Chris Hartman (21), 20. Thomas Meseraull (14), 21. Mark Chisholm (22), 22. Braxton Cummings (15), 23. Jordan Kinser (#17) (24), 24. Jeff Schindler (19). NT
FEATURE LAP LEADERS: Laps 1-15 Jacob Denney, Lap 16 Justin Grant, Laps 17-30 Gavin Miller.
**Thomas Meseraull flipped on lap 18 of the feature.
USAC NOS ENERGY DRINK MIDGET NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIP POINTS: 1-Cannon McIntosh-979, 2-Justin Grant-947, 3-Jacob Denney-917, 4-Kale Drake-882, 5-Kevin Thomas Jr.-879, 6-Gavin Miller-868, 7-Drake Edwards-805, 8-Steven Snyder Jr.-798, 9-Logan Seavey-783, 10-Gunnar Setser-699.
USAC PARALLAX GROUP NATIONAL PASSING MASTER POINTS: 1-Kale Drake-207, 2-Briggs Danner-129, 3-Gunnar Setser-112, 4-Kevin Thomas Jr.-111, 5-Logan Seavey-105, 6-Justin Grant-97, 7-C.J. Leary-95, 8-Kyle Cummins-94, 9-Chase Stockon-82, 10-Hayden Reinbold-81.
NEXT USAC NOS ENERGY DRINK MIDGET NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIP RACE: August 31, 2025 – Angell Park Speedway – Sun Prairie, Wisconsin – 1/3-Mile Dirt Oval – 40th Firemen’s Nationals
CONTINGENCY AWARD WINNERS:
Dirt Draft Hot Laps Fastest Driver: Jacob Denney (11.930)
Honest Abe Roofing Fast Qualifier: Kevin Thomas Jr. (11.852)
Car IQ First Heat Winner: Zach Wigal
K1 RaceGear Second Heat Winner: Kale Drake
USAC Gear Third Heat Winner: Gavin Miller
Rod End Supply Hard Charger: Hayden Reinbold (23rd to 11th)
Inferno Armor Fire Move of the Night: Brecken Reese
Sober Joe’s Coffee Recovery of the Night: Gunnar Setser
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