In only her seventh outing in a late model, Taylor Corum won her second late model feature last Saturday. While she’s making it look easy, don’t mistake Corum for an overnight success at Huntsville Speedway in Alabama.
Despite being only 16 years old, she’s got years of racing experience, competing in the sport since she was eight. At that time, Corum started in .25 midgets. There she caught the eye of late model car owner Johnny Brazier, a friend of her father’s.
“Johnny called my dad and said he had a late model waiting for me when I was ready to move up,” Corum, of Lick Skillet, Alabama, said. “My dad wanted me to get much more racing experience before I drove a late model.”
From .25 midgets, Corum moved into Bandoleros, then Legend cars, and finally, seven years after Brazier made the offer, she moved into late models.
“We had a bunch of bugs to work out at the beginning of the season — I was not that good,” said Corum. “I hit the wall in my first practice. Two weeks later went out and turned 13.8 seconds on the ¼-mile.”
She started on the pole that night and led until she used her tires up.
“I burned them up and had dropped to fourth,” Corum said. “Johnny was pretty mad and I learned a lot that night.”
Corum learned quickly, though, winning her first late model feature on July 27. Now, with two wins under her belt, she wants to gain more experience at tracks beyond Huntsville.
“I’ve been racing ¼-mile ovals my entire life — never anything bigger,” said Corum. “Now I’d like to try the Montgomery Motor Speedway ½-mile. I’ve been doing a lot of iRacing at home and been preparing for that track with Johnny, who has won there, and my spotter, Andrew Whitaker, who has a wealth of knowledge about MMS.”
While Taylor Corum prepares for Montgomery, she also attends high school virtually and works alongside her father in the family’s auto body shop. After Montgomery, Corum looks to tackle bigger tracks and bigger events.
“I want to take my car to Five Flags Speedway in Pensacola [Florida], and Nashville Fairgrounds Speedway,” Corum said. “I’d love to compete in the Snowball Derby, the Snowflake, and the All American 400.”
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.
