Brad Keselowski is one of the highly regarded drivers in NASCAR circles. He won the Cup Series championship in 2012 and has lived a career that very few can come close to matching. He is today a successful driver and team owner with RFK Racing, but where did this all begin for him? A short trip to Rochester Hills, Michigan in the 1980s provides the answer.
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Brad was the youngest child born to Bob and Kay Keselowski. His father was a professional stock car racer. This led to him spending a lot of time in the garage watching his old man work on things.
But he was too young and too little then to get into a proper race car. So, much like many of the young aspiring drivers out there, he turned his attention to SIM Racing.
He tells fans in a video of his home tour, “One of the most significant things about this house is this is where I would sim race. sim Racing is how I started racing…”
“I was always the late bloomer, a late developer. So, when I was in sixth or seventh grade, I was barely 100 pounds. My dad was like, ‘Yeah, you’re never gonna make it in racing.’ So, sim Racing was the only thing I could do.”
Months of racing on the computer yielded results one day. The son of one of Bob’s friends had outgrown his quarter midget and was getting ready to sell it.
Understanding Brad’s eagerness to race in real life, he’d borrowed the car and taken it to a nearby track along with his son. The little boy won his first three races in it and completely surprised his father. The rest, they say, is history.
The importance of SIM Racing in Keselowski’s career
The veteran believes that he never would have made it into professional racing if it weren’t for his interest in SIM Racing. He said, “I wouldn’t have been able to do that if I didn’t SIM race as a kid. I feel like I was one of the first people to make it through SIM Racing to become a race car driver.”
“That kind of makes the environment where you grow up and the house that you live in so important.” By the time he was 16, Brad had begun racing stock cars in the Factory Stock division. His ventures led him to a Craftsman Truck Series ride in 2004 when he was only 20.
He subsequently entered the Xfinity Series full-time, in 2007, and the Cup Series, in 2010. He has won the highest of accolades there is to win and is currently helping RFK Racing towards glory as a team owner. He certainly has come a long way from the basement in Rochester Hills.
