Getting ready at LVMS, Ken Schrader shows what a racer’s racer does

Ken Schrader is what you would call a racer's racer. To use NASCAR chairman Brian France's favorite word, he just might be the quintessential example of it, now that A.J. Foyt has turned 80 and has too many health problems to drive much of anything, except for maybe a tractor on his ranch.

A racer's racer is the kind of guy who announces his retirement from the NASCAR Cup Series in 2013 — and in 2015 drives in 77 races. So far. The snowmobile racing season has yet to start.

Schrader, 60, will drive against men half his age, and some even younger — and maybe one or two just as old — in the 18th Duel in the Desert at the Las Vegas Motor Speedway dirt track this weekend. It's the Super Bowl for IMCA dirt modifieds, a no-frills form of motor racing that caters to guys with big dreams and limited budgets.

When I mentioned that 77 races in one season is a lot for guys who supposedly retired two years ago, Schrader corrected me. "That was just my day job," he said.

A racer's racer arrives at the track early, before they even start engines for hot laps. When I called Schrader on Wednesday morning, I thought he would still be back in North Carolina or maybe in Missouri where he started out, because he and his wacky pal Kenny Wallace are NASCAR celebrities running among Average Joes here.

It's one of those deals in which they could show up at the last minute, and there would be a car waiting for them — and it would be a fast car — and the guy on the public address system would say, "Gentleman, start your engines," or whatever. And off they would go.

Not Schrader. He already was at the track at 10 a.m. Wednesday. The main event isn't until Saturday night.

"There must be 300 cars here, and a lot of guys who have the same disease I do," he said.

Ken Schrader still has the fever. If he were a musician, they would probably prescribe more cowbell. Like in those Geico commercials, it's what you do.

Would he show up early if this race were in Bakersfield or Fresno or some place like that? Maybe. Maybe not. Schrader said he prefers the bright lights of Las Vegas to the truck stop towns. The facility here is fantastic, he said.

For those who aren't familiar with Schrader's record, he started out painting blue streaks on Midwest bullrings. He once was one of the hottest shoes on the USAC circuit. By 1983, he landed a ride for the Indianapolis 500, the race to which all the hot shoes in USAC once aspired.

He crashed in practice leading up to qualifying. It was the team's only car.

Hello, NASCAR.

Schrader won four Cup races in 763 starts over 29 years. He probably would have won more if he drove the fast cars. When Schrader was beginning in NASCAR, the fast cars usually went to guys who were brought up in the Carolinas and small towns in Alabama, not to interlopers from Fenton, Mo.

The racer's racers know what would have happened if you put everybody in the same equipment: Schrader would have won a lot. Put him in a Silver Crown car or a midget in the dirt at Du Quoin, Illinois, or Salem, Indiana, or at the State Fairgrounds in Indy, and we'll see who gets to plant a greasy kiss on the trophy girl.

You could put Ken Schrader in an identically prepared Ford Country Squire station wagon, and the kids could be in the back screaming they had to go to the bathroom, and he still would drive the simulated wood panels off it.

In 2014, Schrader won a race in the Midwest-based ARCA series at age 59. This season, he won one at 60.

He doesn't know how he will do in the Duel in the Desert. He says he has an IMCA car but has never raced it seriously. That's about to change.

Schrader was in the paddock, and the sun was shining, and there were racing cars all over the place. It seemed like the Super Bowl of small scale, grass-roots dirt track racing, he said.

The main event pays $7,777.77 to win. That's a lot of money for guys with day jobs.

Ken Schrader, a racer's racer, was in his element. He said if I needed anything, I had his number, but that I knew where I could catch him.

"We run tonight," he said, and you could hear a youthful enthusiasm in his voice.

Las Vegas Review-Journal sports columnist Ron Kantowski can be reached at rkantowski@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0352. Follow him on Twitter: @ronkantowski.