CONCORD, NC (April 30, 2026) – Pete Willoughby is known among most people as the right-hand man to Keith Kunz in forming the most successful dirt Midget program of the modern era.
Before that, he was once an Indiana racer trying to make it into the big leagues of dirt Late Models.
Born and raised in Columbus, IN, Willoughby spent his childhood visiting tracks to watch his dad compete in the division. After graduating high school in 1976, he purchased his first Late Model and began competing around his “Hoosier State” home.
“My dad ran dirt Late Models when I was growing up as a kid,” Willoughby said. “As soon as I got out of high school, I got myself one and started racing local-type races like Brownstown, Putnamville, Lincoln Park, Haubstadt, Mount Vernon, because most of it was all close by.”
During the majority of Willoughby’s time racing in the division, he competed in the peak era of wedge-designed Late Models. While they were easier to drive compared to today’s Super Late Models, the costs of maintaining them became unreasonably high, resulting in dwindling car counts across the area.
“The body rules were all over the map, but not so much tires, though,” Willoughby said. “(Bob Memmer) was the one that really stepped in with the standardized rules that everyone agreed to and gave it a try. A typical night at Brownstown was about 40 Late Models. It was dying away, and it went down to about 20, maybe 30 cars if you were lucky. Most of the locals jumped on board with it pretty quick.
“The traveling guys like the Moyers and Jeff Purvis didn’t jump on it quite so quick. They kind of went to pick their own places where they could still get away with what they wanted. But it wasn’t too long before everyone started settling down. The first UMP-sanctioned race was at Brownstown in 1984, and I won that night, so that was my claim to fame.”
Willoughby owns a prominent dirt Late Model victory on his resumé: the 1982 Herald & Review 100 at Macon Speedway. Before the DIRTcar Summer Nationals formed the race into an annual crown jewel event, Willoughby’s victory in the second running at the 1/5-mile Illinois bullring rewarded him with a $2,000 payday and two watermelons.
“We were able to sneak over to Macon to run the Herald because it was always on Thursday,” Willoughby said. “We ran pretty good that year, but that was just one of our nights. We had Quick Time, started on the Pole, and I remember Russ Petro was dominating the season. I remember going down one straightaway, looking across to the other side, and seeing Russ running in second. It was a lot of fun, I remember we won $2,000 and two watermelons. We were over in farm country, and Russ got about $1,000 and three cantaloupes.”
When funds and equipment started to run thin for Willoughby, he decided to hang up his helmet in 1984 and end his involvement in Late Model racing completely.
“In ‘84, it was time to go buy a couple of motors and spend some money,” Willoughby said. “I ran a few races, and I thought my family sacrificed enough for me. I wasn’t going to get anywhere, and I didn’t know there was a way to get anywhere. So, I decided to quit cold turkey and build a new house for my family. I didn’t go to Brownstown, I never went and watched any Late Models.”
To fill the void, he began constructing go-karts to keep a form of racing activity near his Indiana stable. When ESPN’s Thursday Night Thunder rose to popularity by highlighting drivers in the lower ranks of motorsports, dirt Midgets became Willoughby’s new passion.
“A few years later, we ended up with a foster son, and I was looking for a way to control him,” Willoughby said. “So, I went and bought a couple go-karts. He was pretty good at that, but before long, I had a company that built go-karts. I met a kid that I wanted to help get him along because at the time, Thursday Night Thunder was a big deal. I bought a couple of Midgets for him, and it wasn’t long until he got hurt. While he was recuperating, I got bored and hired Jason Leffler.”
While Leffler drove in select USAC races during 1996, Willoughby searched for more day-to-day help on the cars while he focused on his primary job at his parents’ trucking business. The man who stepped up to the plate was a Springfield, IL native named Keith Kunz.
“I told John Godfrey from Stealth (Chassis) that I needed help,” Willoughby said. “I just need to go do my job and let somebody else take care of the cars and know what they’re doing. John pointed me to Keith, who was living in California at the time. So, I hired Keith, and he moved over (to Columbus) at the end of ‘96. From 1997 to 2000, he and I raced together under my name.”
“LEFturn” won three consecutive USAC National Midget championships from 1997 to 1999 before stepping into NASCAR at the turn of the new millennium. Before the 2000 season, the family trucking company folded, forcing Willoughby to turn ownership over to Kunz, creating Keith Kunz Motorsports (KKM).
“In 2000, my parents’ trucking company went bankrupt, so I was out of a job,” Willoughby said. “Keith said, ‘What are we going to do?’ I said, ‘Well, we got a couple Midgets and a Sprint Car. We’re fast. Let’s just go race till we can’t race anymore.’
“Jay Drake was driving for us at the time, and the first weekend, we won $17,000 at Terre Haute. It just kept going on and on, and at the end of the season, somebody asked us if we could take care of his daughter’s car. Well, when the trucking company closed, I transferred everything over to Keith’s name because I was going to get dragged into it. So that’s when Keith Kunz Motorsports was born.”
With Kunz at the helm, Willoughby remained as CEO and used his position to recruit potential drivers to join the team. Amongst the countless names that have made stints with KKM are the late Bryan Clauson, NASCAR Cup Series stars Kyle Larson and Christopher Bell, and Winged Sprint Car standouts Michael (Buddy) Kofoid, Spencer Bayston, Rico Abreu, and Tanner Thorson.
In the decade, Jade Avedisian won the 2023 Xtreme Outlaw Midgets presented by Toyota title before moving into the ARCA ranks, and 2025 National Midget champions Jacob Denney (Xtreme, POWRi) and Cannon McIntosh (USAC) have transferred into USAC non-wing competition for 2026. While KKM helps springboard their drivers up the ladder, they focus less on teaching and more on elevating what drivers already possess.
“Keith and I are believers in that we can’t teach a guy how to be a race car driver,” Willoughby said. “Like Jacob (Denney), we haven’t taught him anything. He just needed to go to a place where he had Keith Kunz’s knowledge, then he could start to show what he actually could do.
“I think we’ve had over 200 drivers over the years, and we can tell them what not to do. We can say, ‘Hey, here’s what you did right and what was wrong, what you should and shouldn’t have done.’ But as far as teaching them, they’ve either developed it by the time they get to us or they haven’t. We get credit for developing them, but teaching them is something I don’t think we can do.”
Willoughby’s secret to finding talent for KKM is simple: how do they steer the car, and what do they do when the car loses front-end traction?
“If they’ve got speed, it definitely speeds up that process,” Willoughby said. “But at that point, you start watching their hands. It’s hard to see it, so you watch the left front wheel to see what it’s doing. If it’s not a lot of movement, you know they’ve got some good hands. Then, I want to see them run over the berm. At the Chili Bowl, if they miss it on the bottom, where are the wheels when the thing comes back down? Are they behind the car? Are they ahead of the car?
“Christopher (Bell) was always out ahead of the car. He knew when it came down and where he needed the wheels to be pointed before they touched the ground. That’s when I knew he was gonna be pretty special. It’s a little similar to Jacob (Denney). I wasn’t the one that found Jacob, but I knew he was fast.”
Though Willoughby has left his Late Model past in the rear-view mirror, he cherishes the time spent behind the wheel and the experiences that shaped his handling of KKM, including helping drivers with special talents.
“We used to race around Charlestown (Indiana) a good bit,” Willoughby said. “Mark Martin had just gotten out of NASCAR and was trying to work his way back up to there. The promoter called me and said, ‘Hey, would you consider letting Mark in your car one night? We’ll start him from the tail one lap down and let him race.
“We did that, and Mark ended up winning the Feature from basically a lap behind, and that was pretty cool. Mark would call occasionally about wanting to go to other places, and I couldn’t always go. But, I think that woke me up to thinking, ‘Pete, you’re not good enough to be a driver.’ But, I enjoyed what we were able to do for him and what we accomplished.”
Willoughby will continue serving his keystone role with KKM as the Xtreme Outlaw Midgets return in 2026 for the Ironman 55 at I-55 Federated Auto Parts Raceway Park on Aug. 7-8. The 40th anniversary of the DIRTcar Summer Nationals will begin at Brownstown Bullring on Tuesday, June 9.
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Pete Willoughby: From Dirt Late Models to Keith Kunz’s Inseparable Partner
CONCORD, NC (April 30, 2026) – Pete Willoughby is known among most people as the right-hand man to Keith Kunz in forming the most successful dirt Midget program of the modern era.
Before that, he was once an Indiana racer trying to make it into the big leagues of dirt Late Models.
Born and raised in Columbus, IN, Willoughby spent his childhood visiting tracks to watch his dad compete in the division. After graduating high school in 1976, he purchased his first Late Model and began competing around his “Hoosier State” home.
“My dad ran dirt Late Models when I was growing up as a kid,” Willoughby said. “As soon as I got out of high school, I got myself one and started racing local-type races like Brownstown, Putnamville, Lincoln Park, Haubstadt, Mount Vernon, because most of it was all close by.”
During the majority of Willoughby’s time racing in the division, he competed in the peak era of wedge-designed Late Models. While they were easier to drive compared to today’s Super Late Models, the costs of maintaining them became unreasonably high, resulting in dwindling car counts across the area.
“The body rules were all over the map, but not so much tires, though,” Willoughby said. “(Bob Memmer) was the one that really stepped in with the standardized rules that everyone agreed to and gave it a try. A typical night at Brownstown was about 40 Late Models. It was dying away, and it went down to about 20, maybe 30 cars if you were lucky. Most of the locals jumped on board with it pretty quick.
“The traveling guys like the Moyers and Jeff Purvis didn’t jump on it quite so quick. They kind of went to pick their own places where they could still get away with what they wanted. But it wasn’t too long before everyone started settling down. The first UMP-sanctioned race was at Brownstown in 1984, and I won that night, so that was my claim to fame.”
Willoughby owns a prominent dirt Late Model victory on his resumé: the 1982 Herald & Review 100 at Macon Speedway. Before the DIRTcar Summer Nationals formed the race into an annual crown jewel event, Willoughby’s victory in the second running at the 1/5-mile Illinois bullring rewarded him with a $2,000 payday and two watermelons.
“We were able to sneak over to Macon to run the Herald because it was always on Thursday,” Willoughby said. “We ran pretty good that year, but that was just one of our nights. We had Quick Time, started on the Pole, and I remember Russ Petro was dominating the season. I remember going down one straightaway, looking across to the other side, and seeing Russ running in second. It was a lot of fun, I remember we won $2,000 and two watermelons. We were over in farm country, and Russ got about $1,000 and three cantaloupes.”
When funds and equipment started to run thin for Willoughby, he decided to hang up his helmet in 1984 and end his involvement in Late Model racing completely.
“In ‘84, it was time to go buy a couple of motors and spend some money,” Willoughby said. “I ran a few races, and I thought my family sacrificed enough for me. I wasn’t going to get anywhere, and I didn’t know there was a way to get anywhere. So, I decided to quit cold turkey and build a new house for my family. I didn’t go to Brownstown, I never went and watched any Late Models.”
To fill the void, he began constructing go-karts to keep a form of racing activity near his Indiana stable. When ESPN’s Thursday Night Thunder rose to popularity by highlighting drivers in the lower ranks of motorsports, dirt Midgets became Willoughby’s new passion.
“A few years later, we ended up with a foster son, and I was looking for a way to control him,” Willoughby said. “So, I went and bought a couple go-karts. He was pretty good at that, but before long, I had a company that built go-karts. I met a kid that I wanted to help get him along because at the time, Thursday Night Thunder was a big deal. I bought a couple of Midgets for him, and it wasn’t long until he got hurt. While he was recuperating, I got bored and hired Jason Leffler.”
While Leffler drove in select USAC races during 1996, Willoughby searched for more day-to-day help on the cars while he focused on his primary job at his parents’ trucking business. The man who stepped up to the plate was a Springfield, IL native named Keith Kunz.
“I told John Godfrey from Stealth (Chassis) that I needed help,” Willoughby said. “I just need to go do my job and let somebody else take care of the cars and know what they’re doing. John pointed me to Keith, who was living in California at the time. So, I hired Keith, and he moved over (to Columbus) at the end of ‘96. From 1997 to 2000, he and I raced together under my name.”
“LEFturn” won three consecutive USAC National Midget championships from 1997 to 1999 before stepping into NASCAR at the turn of the new millennium. Before the 2000 season, the family trucking company folded, forcing Willoughby to turn ownership over to Kunz, creating Keith Kunz Motorsports (KKM).
“In 2000, my parents’ trucking company went bankrupt, so I was out of a job,” Willoughby said. “Keith said, ‘What are we going to do?’ I said, ‘Well, we got a couple Midgets and a Sprint Car. We’re fast. Let’s just go race till we can’t race anymore.’
“Jay Drake was driving for us at the time, and the first weekend, we won $17,000 at Terre Haute. It just kept going on and on, and at the end of the season, somebody asked us if we could take care of his daughter’s car. Well, when the trucking company closed, I transferred everything over to Keith’s name because I was going to get dragged into it. So that’s when Keith Kunz Motorsports was born.”
With Kunz at the helm, Willoughby remained as CEO and used his position to recruit potential drivers to join the team. Amongst the countless names that have made stints with KKM are the late Bryan Clauson, NASCAR Cup Series stars Kyle Larson and Christopher Bell, and Winged Sprint Car standouts Michael (Buddy) Kofoid, Spencer Bayston, Rico Abreu, and Tanner Thorson.
In the decade, Jade Avedisian won the 2023 Xtreme Outlaw Midgets presented by Toyota title before moving into the ARCA ranks, and 2025 National Midget champions Jacob Denney (Xtreme, POWRi) and Cannon McIntosh (USAC) have transferred into USAC non-wing competition for 2026. While KKM helps springboard their drivers up the ladder, they focus less on teaching and more on elevating what drivers already possess.
“Keith and I are believers in that we can’t teach a guy how to be a race car driver,” Willoughby said. “Like Jacob (Denney), we haven’t taught him anything. He just needed to go to a place where he had Keith Kunz’s knowledge, then he could start to show what he actually could do.
“I think we’ve had over 200 drivers over the years, and we can tell them what not to do. We can say, ‘Hey, here’s what you did right and what was wrong, what you should and shouldn’t have done.’ But as far as teaching them, they’ve either developed it by the time they get to us or they haven’t. We get credit for developing them, but teaching them is something I don’t think we can do.”
Willoughby’s secret to finding talent for KKM is simple: how do they steer the car, and what do they do when the car loses front-end traction?
“If they’ve got speed, it definitely speeds up that process,” Willoughby said. “But at that point, you start watching their hands. It’s hard to see it, so you watch the left front wheel to see what it’s doing. If it’s not a lot of movement, you know they’ve got some good hands. Then, I want to see them run over the berm. At the Chili Bowl, if they miss it on the bottom, where are the wheels when the thing comes back down? Are they behind the car? Are they ahead of the car?
“Christopher (Bell) was always out ahead of the car. He knew when it came down and where he needed the wheels to be pointed before they touched the ground. That’s when I knew he was gonna be pretty special. It’s a little similar to Jacob (Denney). I wasn’t the one that found Jacob, but I knew he was fast.”
Though Willoughby has left his Late Model past in the rear-view mirror, he cherishes the time spent behind the wheel and the experiences that shaped his handling of KKM, including helping drivers with special talents.
“We used to race around Charlestown (Indiana) a good bit,” Willoughby said. “Mark Martin had just gotten out of NASCAR and was trying to work his way back up to there. The promoter called me and said, ‘Hey, would you consider letting Mark in your car one night? We’ll start him from the tail one lap down and let him race.
“We did that, and Mark ended up winning the Feature from basically a lap behind, and that was pretty cool. Mark would call occasionally about wanting to go to other places, and I couldn’t always go. But, I think that woke me up to thinking, ‘Pete, you’re not good enough to be a driver.’ But, I enjoyed what we were able to do for him and what we accomplished.”
Willoughby will continue serving his keystone role with KKM as the Xtreme Outlaw Midgets return in 2026 for the Ironman 55 at I-55 Federated Auto Parts Raceway Park on Aug. 7-8. The 40th anniversary of the DIRTcar Summer Nationals will begin at Brownstown Bullring on Tuesday, June 9.
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How can you watch every lap of the Xtreme Outlaw Midgets and Summer Nationals? Live on DIRTVision.
As the Würth 400 takes center stage at Texas Motor Speedway, Josh Berry’s No. 21 Ford Mustang Dark Horse will carry the same Würth look on track, with the Würth Group – a global leader in assembly and fastening materials – featured across both the race and the car.Texas Motor Speedway, a 1.5-mile oval near Fort Worth, is one of several intermediate tracks on the NASCAR Cup Series schedule, but its layout presents a unique challenge with two distinctly different ends of the track.“Texas itself is definitely very unique,” Berry said. “Both ends of the track are so much different.“[Turns] One and Two is a good bit less banking and kind of a more disciplined-based corner in a way. It’s easy to get high, easy to get out of line.“Then Three and Four is just hammer down, but obviously you have that bump to navigate through off of Four, so it’s definitely a very interesting place.“It’s a unique mile-and-a-half for sure.”Berry will make his third NASCAR Cup Series start at Texas this weekend as the Wood Brothers Racing team looks to bounce back after getting caught in an accident at Talladega Superspeedway.Practice for the Würth 400 is set for Saturday at 12:30 p.m. ET, followed by qualifying at 1:40 p.m. ET, with coverage on Prime Video.Sunday’s 267-lap, 400.5-mile race is scheduled to take the green flag just after 3:30 p.m. ET with television coverage on FS1. Stage 1 is set to end at Lap 80, with Stage 2 concluding at Lap 165.
Saturday, May 2Berry will sign autographs at the Team Penske/Wood Brothers merchandise hauler beginning at 2:10 p.m. local time in the Texas Motor Speedway fan zone. 100 wristbands will be distributed on a first come, first-served basis.
Josh BerryAge: 35 (Oct. 22, 1990)Hometown: Hendersonville, TennesseeCrew Chief: Miles StanleyIG: @joshberry88X: @joshberry
About The Würth Group
Chevrolet’s trek towards its series-leading 18 Cup Series triumphs at Texas Motor Speedway started in March 1999, the series’ third-ever appearance at the track, when Hendrick Motorsports and Terry Labonte earned the manufacturer’s first trip to victory lane. Throughout its three-decade history with NASCAR, the track has become home to an elite list of monumental moments for Chevrolet, highlighted by Jimmie Johnson’s 2012 victory that delivered the manufacturer its 700th all-time Cup Series win. Hendrick Motorsports also shares in the milestone memories at the Texas oval with William Byron’s 2023 victory marking the organization’s 300th all-time win in NASCAR’s premier series. Chevrolet’s most recent Cup Series win came in 2024 when Chase Elliott drove the Bowtie brand to its fourth-straight win at Texas Motor Speedway – a victory that also set the series’ record for the longest win streak by a single manufacturer at the track.
Chevrolet will head into the tripleheader weekend as the track’s defending winners in the O’Reilly Auto Parts Series. Kyle Larson, the series’ most recent Texas winner, is slated to make his fourth start in the second-level division this weekend as the Team Chevy driver will reunite with crew chief, Mardy Lindley, and the No. 88 JR Motorsports team. 
In an always thrilling trip to Talladega Superspeedway, it was Spire Motorsports’ Carson Hocevar that survived the ‘Big One’ and a three-lap dash to the finish to make his first career trip to victory lane at NASCAR’s highest level. Competing in his third full-time campaign in the division, it was only a matter of time before the Michigan native etched his name into history as a Cup Series winner. In 91 career starts, Hocevar has earned six top-five finishes, three of which have come just this season. The victory was enough to push Hocevar into the top-10 of the points standings for the first time this season with the No. 77 team ranked eighth heading into the Texas race weekend. The 1.5-mile oval has produced a set of ‘firsts’ for the young Team Chevy driver including his first career Cup Series pole (2025) and his first career Craftsman Truck Series win (2023).
O’Reilly Auto Parts Series ‘Rookie of the Year’ contender, Corey Day, led just one lap around the 2.66-mile Alabama superspeedway, but it was the most important one of the race. Sitting at the top of the leaderboard on the final lap when the caution came out, the California native went on to earn his first trophy in the NASCAR national ranks. His rookie campaign has been nothing short of impressive. In 11 races this season, Day has collected nine top-10s to lead the series with fellow Team Chevy drivers and series veterans, Justin Allgaier and Sheldon Creed. 
CHASTAIN LOOKING FOR A MOMENTUM-BUILDING WEEKENDA challenging start to the season took a turn in the right direction for Ross Chastain and the No. 1 Trackhouse Racing Chevrolet team at Talladega Superspeedway last weekend. Earning points in each stage, including the Stage Two win, the Florida native went on to take home a strong seventh-place finish and the team’s second top-10 of the season. Chastain carries that burst of confidence to a track where he’s seen success in recent history, including runner-up results in two of the past three Cup Series events. Chastain will also have extra seat time around the Texas oval under his belt when he takes the green flag for Sunday’s race with the Team Chevy driver also piloting a Silverado RST for Niece Motorsports in Friday’s Truck Series event.
DILLON SET FOR NOAPS RETURNThe 2013 NASCAR O’Reilly Auto Parts Series champion, Austin Dillon, will make his return to the series this weekend to pilot a third entry for Richard Childress Racing. The North Carolina native boasts a strong resume at the 1.5-mile oval, highlighted by top-10 results in each of his 11 career O’Reilly Auto Parts Series starts and an average finish of 5.7. In the Cup Series, Dillon is one of eight active past Texas winners with his 2020 victory, and he has driven the No. 3 Chevrolet to top-eight results in the series’ past two visits to the track. 
ECKES READY TO GO BACK TO BATTLE The NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series will resume its 2026 tour this weekend with the trip to Texas Motor Speedway marking the start of its seven-race stretch. Leading the charge for Chevrolet in the points standings is McAnally-Hilgemann Racing’s Christian Eckes, who was able to close the gap to the leader to just 17-points after a strong points day and his third top-five finish of the season at Bristol Motor Speedway. While Eckes is still looking for his first win of the season, his Texas stats prove that opportunity could very well come this weekend. In his five career starts at the track, the New York native has qualified in the top-10 in each event; earned seventh-place or better points in every stage; and collected a pair of runner-up finishes.