Kyle Lick races 600 sprints at tracks such as Action Track USA. He also spots for Marco Andretti at the Indy 500. Lick befriended Andretti at the Lehigh Valley Grand Prix, an indoor karting facility. Both Andretti and Lick competed in the charity event.
“I was on one team, Marco was on the other,” Lick, of Lehighton, Pennsylvania, said. “I had ‘Senna’ painted on my helmet. After the race, Marco stopped by to comment about my helmet. When we did a second event, Marco invited me over to his house — that was 8 years ago, and we have been friends ever since.”
Andretti attended 600 sprint races Lick raced in. Lick traveled with Andretti to SRX events that Andretti competed in. The now-defunct SRX series raced stock cars on both pavement and dirt ovals.
“I offered Marco some pointers on what dirt tracks do,” said Lick. “Marco did well on dirt and won in 2023. I traveled with him to Knoxville Raceway in Iowa, I-55 Raceway in Missouri and other cool tracks that I had never been to.”
Lick had always wanted to go to the Indy 500. Then 3 years ago Andretti asked Lick if he’d like to spot for him there.
“I felt there were more highly qualified people to do that job and told him so,” Lick said. “He said, ‘You race, you understand racing, you will be a good spotter.’”
Since then, Lick’s worked the Indy 500 as Andretti’s spotter. After that, he returns home to race a TQ midget and a 600 sprint.
“Spotting for Marco taught me to look out for the smaller things, especially the actions and reactions of the car,” said Lick. “A spotter watches every car go through the same corner lap after lap. You study who is running better and why. There are a lot of things to see and think about.”
In this year’s Indy 500, Andretti crashed on lap 1, in Turn 1.
“It was a long month, and a short race,” Lick said. “The 500 was a weird one — brakes on fire, a crew guy on fire, random hits. Sometimes I think it is good he got out of the race early.”
The Wednesday after the Indy 500, Kyle Lick ventured to Action Track USA, where he went onto to win the 600 sprint feature.
“Marco hangs out with me here and there, he comes to watch,” said Lick. “I have to sneak him in so he doesn’t get mobbed by fans, so I won’t say when or where he will be.”
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.
