After Justin Henderson won last Saturday, his car owner upstaged him. The incident occurred last Saturday during the Midwest Sprint Touring Series (MSTS)/Midwest Power Series feature at the Jackson Motorplex in Minnesota.
“The team is from Tea, which is next to Coffee in South Dakota,” car owner Maximus Henderson, 5, told us. “Anyone who messes with my car, I’ll kick ’em in the nuts.”
The rambunctious car owner is also the driver’s son.
“He loves it when his daddy wins,” said Justin, who has visited victory lane 10 times this season. “Yes, he has a short list of drivers he’d like to kick. Maximus wants to be a badass more so than anything else. Sprint cars are the most badass racing vehicles, so when he races, I’m sure they will be his car of choice.”
Maximus’ mother, Jess, oversees him as he helps in the pits. His favorite duty is scraping mud from the car. Maximus prefers to watch the races from the grandstands.
“I’m told he is really animated and gets amped up during the race,” Justin said. “If someone crashes into me, he gets very angry and holds a grudge against that driver for a long time. He won’t let that driver live it down.”
Justin Henderson has raced sprint cars for 26 years. He won the Midwest Power Series championship last season. In addition to steering 360s, he also competes with a 410. in the 410 class, he leads the division’s point standings at Huset’s Speedway in Brandon, South Dakota. (For more on that track, read “Huset’s Speedway: Improvements Abound for 2021”.) However, among his many visits to victory lane, last Saturday night’s may be one that especially stands out to Maximus.
“I saw a small John Deere XUV brought into victory lane by the race’s sponsor, but I didn’t tell Maximus,” said Justin. “I told him to get on it and drive — it’s yours. His eyes lit up. He’ll never forget the night his sprint car won and he won a John Deere.”
Mike Adaskaveg has written hundreds of stories since the website’s inception. This year marks his 54th year of covering auto racing. Adaskaveg got his start working for track photographer Lloyd Burnham at Connecticut’s Stafford Motor Speedway in 1970. Since then, he’s been a columnist, writer, and photographer, in racing and in mainstream media, for several outlets, including the Journal Inquirer, Boston Herald, Stock Car Racing, and Speedway Illustrated. Among Adaskaveg’s many awards are the 1992 Eastern Motorsport Press Association (EMPA) Ace Lane Photographer of the Year and the 2019 National Motorsports Press Association (NMPA) George Cunningham Writer of the Year.
