Shelby sprint car racer takes 2 victories in Ohio and Michigan

SHELBY TOWNSHIP — It was two consecutive victories for a local Shelby Township sprint car racer at the end of August.

Andrew Bogusz, an 18-year-old from Shelby Township, took the victory in the feature event at the sprint car Must See Racing Maxima Racing Oils Midwest Lights Aug. 24 at Lorain Raceway Park in Ohio and Aug. 31 at Owosso Speedway in Michigan.

He led all 30 laps in both events for the win. These are pavement winged sprint cars with GM 602 crate engines that run on methanol fuel.

His first win of the year Aug. 24 took seven minutes and eight seconds from the start of the race to the finish. The track is a 3/8-mile paved oval. Bogusz now has four career victories.

Bogusz said he was very happy to be able to finally accomplish something that has been a goal of his for a long time.

“It’s good to win two in a row, and we finally won here at Owosso, a place that’s just been eluding me since we came here last year,” Bogusz said.

He said he just kept going to get that second win.

“I just did what I had to do there at the end. I wasn’t going to let him take this one away from us,” Bogusz said of driver J.J. Henes, who finished second at Owosso.

Bogusz was proud that he was able to show his fans that he could win the race, and make it back-to-back wins.

“I wanted to do this in front of my Michigan crowd. I’m from north of Detroit, so the Michigan racers finally got our winner’s crown back,” he said.

Racing team owner Eddie Sachs III said they are very happy with all the hard work they have been putting into the races and that their hard work is finally showing.

“We’ve been bringing a well-prepared car to every event and finally our team’s hard work is paying off. This car we built new last year has not finished worse than third place in feature events,” he said.

Bogusz specifically has shown Sachs what he can achieve and is getting better and better every race.

“My driver Andrew has put in the work and stepped up his driving this year. It really shows how he is maturing as a driver.”