By Jeff Pederson
Pedal Down Promotions
(PEDAL DOWN PROMOTIONS) June 28, 2024 – It’s not too often a competitor has enough drive, determination and dogged motivation to return to any sport following a 20-year break. It is particularly intriguing when the chosen sport for a comeback is one of the toughest and most humbling sports on the planet – dirt track auto racing.
However, that’s exactly what former two-time Eastern Wisconsin Stock Car Winged Super Modified champion Billy Kreutz of Kiel has set out to do during the 2024 Plymouth Dirt Track Racing season at The Plymouth Dirt Track.
While he may have been missing from the local racing scene for over two decades, Kreutz’s roots in the sport run deep.
“My dad, Jim Kreutz, was involved in racing since he was young, having worked with Modified drivers, Kenny Painter and Wayne Goetsch,” Kreutz said. “He then went on to own cars for Al Hauck, Dave Deicher and Randy Sippel. During these years, I was under 18 and helped in the pits. Sadly, when I turned 18, he sold his car and got away from racing. Some years later, he started helping Don Smoot with motors, and I got involved as well as helping in the pits.
“At the end of the 1992 season, Don offered me an opportunity to get in the car at Plymouth and I won a heat race that night,” he said. “From then on, I was hooked. I ended up running a couple more times in a non-wing Modified at Wilmot before I bought my own Winged Super Modified car in 1993 and ran it at Plymouth as a rookie that season. That car was destroyed in 1994 in a crash. After that, I bought Frankie Heimerl’s championship Winged Super Modified car, which was owned by Greg Otte at the time.”
After getting his feet wet in an ultra-competitive and deep 1990s Winged Super Modified field, it wasn’t long before Kreutz rose up the ranks to become a top competitor in the division.
“We kept learning more and more and getting quicker over the next few seasons,” Kreutz said. “We won back-to-back Winged Super Modified championships at Plymouth in 1998 and 1999. We came back to defend our titles in 2000. The season started with a great night earning fast time in qualifying. At the end of that night, an opportunity arose to buy a 410 Sprint Car and I also had a buyer for the Super Modified, so I jumped at the chance. However, we ended up only running two nights in the 410 Sprint Car after I had a pretty bad crash at Beaver Dam. I then decided I had enough of racing and sold everything.
“A few years later, I came back to drive a Super Modified for Bob Brion for a season,” he said. “That was pretty much it. I decided I did what I wanted to do in the sport and, at the time, I thought I was done with racing.”
Over the next 20 years, Kreutz’s long and winding road to returning to the cockpit was a bumpy one. During that stretch, his life spiraled to a such low point that it nearly cost him his life.
“A few years ago, I had a close brush with death due to the amount of alcohol I was drinking on a daily basis,” Kreutz said. “The light finally went on, and I have been alcohol-free since. I want to help others who went through what I did, so I am working on completing a course to become a certified counselor to help people struggling with alcohol abuse.
“When I hung up my racing helmet 20 years ago, I was already drinking quite a bit,” he said. “I probably would have been more likely to continue racing back then had I not been drinking. I kind of feel like alcohol robbed me of something 20 years ago and I wanted to take it back.”
With a goal of returning to a sport that had given him so much in his younger years, Kreutz set out to make his dream of a racing comeback a reality.
“I have sponsored Bill Balog’s 410 Sprint Car team for the last two years through the business I own, Rockville Bar and Grill in Kiel,” Kreutz said. “I intended to be around racing more to relearn everything about the sport. The more I kept watching racing recently, the more I wanted to get back into it.”
An opportunity to purchase a top-flight 360 Sprint Car operation following the 2023 season quickly developed into a long-awaited chance for Kreutz to transform himself back into a racer.
“When I heard Brandon McMullen was hanging it up and the McMullen racing team’s equipment was for sale, it worked out well because I didn’t have a thing left from racing other than trophies,” Kreutz said. “I met with Tim McMullen and a half an hour later, I was back into racing.”
With extremely limited Sprint Car experience on his racing resume and two decades of rust to shake off, Kreutz has set modest goals for the 2024 season.
“Our goal this season is to learn the car, relearn how to drive a racecar and try to keep the car in one piece while looking forward to next year,” Kreutz said. “With only a couple of nights in a Sprint Car compared to several years in a Super Modified, we have a lot to learn this year. I don’t want to set goals too high until I feel comfortable with the car. That’s been a struggle with all the rainouts so far.”
Kreutz’s journey back to racing has been made easier through the support of a strong contingent of sponsors and pit crew members.
Kreutz’s sponsors for the 2024 season include Oostburg Concrete Products, Taylor Ready Mix and Trucking, Brockman’s Meat Market, Fritz’s Packerland Well Service, KSI Supply, Kiel Auto Repair, Fresh Prints Design and East Central Coin.
“I have been amazingly fortunate to be blessed with great sponsors, who have come on board right away,” Kreutz said. “Some are new and some are returning from back when I raced. It’s great to have such awesome partners already to help with what is still a very expensive sport.”
The pit crew members for the 2024 Billy Kreutz Racing Team are Rob Zorn, Zach Zorn, Caleb Arbuckle, Tammy Kreutz and Jaiden Fougere.
“Racing without people helping in the pits and at the shop is nearly impossible,” Kreutz said. “I’m fortunate to have great friends helping. Rob Zorn brings with him some 38 years of pit crew experience and is also a lifelong friend. He has been a big help with this effort. Another big key to this has been Tim McMullen, Brandon McMullen, Kris Hansen and Kyle Schwanke from Team McMullen helping and advising me along with shop advisor Jim Klein.”
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This Saturday’s Plymouth Dirt Track Racing program will include an American flag giveaway sponsored by Kindred Heart Families.
In addition, the Super Six Late Model series will be in action with a driver autograph session on tap, as well as Late Model driver introductions. The Late Model A-main will feature an increased purse with $2,500 going to the winner.
The PDTR 360 Sprint Cars, Grand Nationals and B Mods will also be in action.
Spectator gates open at 4:30 p.m. with qualifying at 5:30 p.m. and racing at 6 p.m.
For more information about Plymouth Dirt Track Racing or to inquire about 2024 sponsorship opportunities at the track, call Bill Weinaug at 627-1217, send an email to bweinaug@shebcofair.com or visit www.plymouthdtr.com.
The Plymouth Dirt Track at the Sheboygan County Fairgrounds is located at 229 Fairview Drive in Plymouth, Wis. For more information, visit www.plymouthdtr.com or check out Plymouth Dirt Track Racing on Facebook.
Pedal Down Promotions is a full-service public relations and media services company devoted to helping clients effectively communicate with targeted audiences through a diverse array of promotional strategies and methods, including press releases, newsletters, profile and feature articles, website and social media content development, printed media, editing and layout, graphic design and book publishing services.
For more information on Pedal Down Promotions, email pedaldownpromotions@gmail.com, visit www.pedaldownpromo.com or call 920-323-7970.
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