Kasey Kahne first competed in the Knoxville Nationals in 2002. Driving for Phil Durst’s 51K team, he finished eighth in the A-Main at a venue he would grow to love. More than two decades later, the 46-year-old is still chasing success at Knoxville.
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This time, however, Kahne was behind the wheel of his own Kasey Kahne Racing car, and he delivered his best result yet as a driver, finishing third behind Kyle Larson and Sheldon Haudenschild.
The biggest question on everyone’s mind after the race was what the future held for Kahne, and whether he would return with his team or as a driver for the 2027 edition. Journalist Matt Weaver asked Kahne about his plans in Knoxville, already assuming he would return in some “shape or form.” Kahne agreed, but gave an ambiguous answer about what role he would have.
“We love Knoxville Nationals, we love Sprint Car racing. Just try and be super competitive all the time. But myself, I mean, more than likely I will be here… but I don’t know, I’m kind of just… this year, I’m doing this, this, and this.
This year I’ve been more really just open to like, yeah, let’s do the next month, see how it goes, and maybe we’ll do the month after that if it goes well, and it’s been really nice,” Kahne said in his interview with Weaver.
KKR (Kasey Kahne Racing) was formally launched in 2006, and it took seven years for the former Hendrick Motorsports driver to win the Knoxville Nationals championship with driver Daryn Pittman. His team won at Knoxville again in 2018 and then in 2024 with Brad Sweet, who is Larson’s brother-in-law and also co-founder of the High Limit Racing Series.
As for Kahne, 2026 was the first time he drove for his own team, and what a weekend it turned out to be. There was little anticipation of a strong showing from the NASCAR veteran — who was voted as one of the sport’s 75 greatest drivers in 2023 — with much of the pre-race discussion centered on his age and sprint racing experience. But his car showed genuine pace.
Kahne qualified fourth for the weather-delayed Nationals on Saturday and went on to finish third. It was his best-ever result at the Knoxville Nationals as a driver — he had finished eighth twice before in two appearances — and also showed that he has what it takes to beat one of Sprint racing’s best drivers.
Mistakes prevented Kahne from going after Larson
Larson was the star of the show in Knoxville on Saturday. He was already the heavy favorite, but add the fact that he raced against time to be there after competing in the NASCAR Cup Series race at Richmond just hours earlier, and almost everyone was rooting for the HMS star. But Kahne drew quite a few eyeballs on him in those fifty laps.
After the race, he admitted that mistakes ultimately affected his chances of going home with the $200k.
“I just made a couple too many mistakes and got in the middle of the track spinning, and, you know, ended up back in third and then back to fourth, then got back to third. So yeah, I felt like I had a great car. This was a great week, and I feel really good about all of it,” Kahne said in the same interview with Matt Weaver.
Larson, who started from pole, took command of the race from the get-go. But Kahne made a brilliant move on Haudenschild on Lap 2 to move into P2. He held that position through Lap 25, when all cars had to come in for the mandatory fuel stop. Unfortunately, it was in the second half of the race that Kahne slipped up, as he admitted afterward.
It began with Kahne hitting the slick middle part of the track, allowing Haudenschild to take full advantage and reclaim second place. Kahne never fully recovered.
Weaver, in the interview, asked Kahne if he was “bummed” about coming so close. Kahne admitted that his car felt as good as Larson’s, suggesting that on another day, he might have avoided the mistakes and gone on to win his first Nationals as a driver. But whether he will brush this off and return to Iowa for another shot at the 2027 championship, he’s not sure yet.