FORT WAYNE, Ind. – As a kid, Nick Hamilton played with toy Hot Wheels cars and pretended he was racing – and winning – at the Allen County Memorial Expo Center.
Saturday night during the finale to the 20th annual Rumble in Fort Wayne, Hamilton’s dreams came true at long last.
The 20-year-old from nearby Danville, Indiana came out on top of a first half duel with Travis Welpott and then survived a two-lap dash and final gasp effort by Bryan Nuckles to win the headlining 50-lap national midget feature, banking $2,000 and the biggest win of his young career.
His win comes one year to the weekend after his older brother Kyle won the finale to the 2016 Rumble in Fort Wayne for legendary car owners Mel and Don Kenyon.
This time, however, it was the younger brother’s turn to shine – taking a family-owned car to the emotional win.
“I was raised watching races at Fort Wayne and this has been a lifelong dream of mine,” Hamilton said. “It’s definitely a surreal feeling to know that it actually happened tonight. … I didn’t care if I won or my brother won; I just wanted one of us to get the trophy tonight and I’m so blessed that I could get the job done.”
“A lot of guys on these bigger teams … have resources that we don’t. We do this as a family deal – me, my mom and dad and my brother – and it makes it that much more special when you can beat the big guys that dominate this deal time and time again. I don’t know how I held them all off at the end; I knew Nuckles was beating my door down, but thankfully I was able to hold on.”
Welpott started from the pole of the main event and jumped out to lead the first two laps before Hamilton got a run to the inside off turn four and edged ahead to lead lap three at the start-finish line.
But Welpott wasn’t done, charging back in turn three the very next time around to retake the lead and set up a torrid battle for control of the main event.
The first caution of the event flew with 10 circuits down, when Joe Liguori bicycled his car into turns one and two and stacked up the entire field, somehow keeping his car rolling as the yellow lights flicked on.
Once full race pace resumed, it was nine more laps before the leaders found themselves in traffic, allowing Hamilton to close onto Welpott’s bumper and begin applying heavy pressure for the top spot.
The winning move came on lap 23, when Hamilton stuck his nose to Welpott’s inside and got the run he needed to both lead at the start-finish line and be clear by the time he got to turn one, icing Welpott behind him and never looking back.
From there, Hamilton opened up a straightaway over the field, but a spinning Cap Henry drew another caution with 22 laps to go and restacked the field onto his back bumper.
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