What chassis does Mike Burbridge use to win with? His own. That’s right, the tool-and-die professional by trade loves to design and build his own cars.
“My family built cars since 1979, and those cars were winning late model and sportsman features through 2000,” Burbridge, of Delhi, Iowa, said. “As a young kid I saw cars with shiny new wheels and bright new bodies. My dad, Jim, said we don’t spend money on looks, we spend it on equipment that makes us win. I’ve lived by those words to this day.”
Burbridge has driven only the cars he’s built, except for one rare instance.
“In 2017, I was going to retire from driving, and I made it a month and a half,” said Burbridge. “A guy wanted me to drive a new Skyrocket. That’s the only car I ever drove that I didn’t build. I found Kelly Shryock to be very informative, and his information was always accurate. After driving his car, I was back in. I bought a new crate engine and built a car.”
His 2018 modified ran six times and won twice. In 2020, he built another car and earned six feature victories. Burbridge said he cut the front stub off six times to try different geometry and experimented with different amounts of Docol and chromoly. Then, in 2024, he debuted a new modified. Burbridge won his first race with it in August at Independence Motor Speedway.
“My car was longitudinally too strong,” Burbridge said. “It had great traction, but a deficit of speed on entrance to the turns. What made the difference? I changed the ride heights.”
Burbridge admits he sometimes gives up wins in the quest to learn more about what his car wants.
“Racing is a bunch of failures that are used to establish success,” said Burbridge.
At the end of this season, Mike Burbridge looks to build a new car, not only because he loves learning and engineering solutions, but he loves the savings, too.
“The new generation looks to buy flash,” Burbridge said. “Spend money in the right way. Would you rather buy a $60,000 to $70,000 modified or build the car with less flash for $48,000? Wouldn’t it be nice to have that $20,000 saved for parts and tires?”
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.
