It’s been a while since Junior Mikosz last visited victory lane at Grandview Speedway. He won his last race at the Bechtelsville, Pennsylvania, oval in 1997. That is, until this past Friday when he earned a win in the Outlaw Vintage Racing Series feature at age 70.
“Once I put that helmet on, everything changes — I’m a young man again,” Mikosz, of Reading, Pennsylvania, said. “I can do what a younger man could do, and my body doesn’t feel any soreness until I get out of the car.”
While not junior by his age, he still goes by the name he had since he was a small boy. Mikosz started racing in 1974, competing in modifieds at since-defunct Reading Fairgrounds Speedway in his hometown. He took the following year off after suffering a broken neck when he got T-boned by another competitor. Then, Mikosz raced regularly through 2004. He turned laps at some of the most legendary tracks of the area, including Bridgeport Motorsports Park and [since-defunct] East Windsor Speedway in New Jersey, as well as Orange County Fair Speedway in Middletown, New York.
During his heyday, he battled Jack Johnson. These days he runs a vintage 1990s modified for Joe Medaglia, with a paint scheme that Johnson once used.
“Jack was a formidable opponent,” said Mikosz. “I only wish I had a ride back then. I was independent and owned my own car. If it wasn’t for people like Toby Tobias, who helped me a lot, I wouldn’t have had such a long career.”
Mikosz returned to the driver’s seat this year after an absence of nearly two decades.
“Joe [Medaglia] was one of my sponsors back in the day, and he now has the Jack Johnson tribute car,” Mikosz said. “I was helping him out last year when he asked me to drive it a couple times. He won the vintage sportsman championship with it last season. This year, we moved up to the modified division. He asked me if we could take turns, each driving it every other race.”
Despite not driving for years, Junior Mikosz still enjoys his time behind the wheel of a race car, just as he did back in 1974.
“It is a lot of fun to race,” said Mikosz. “It is even more fun to have a good time with good friends at the racetrack.”
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.
