Clear Lake resident Travis Schulte likes to drive fast. He likes it so much he’s turned it into a dirt track racing success story.

 

Even as a young boy Schulte liked to go fast. At seven he got a go-cart, and from that point on he was always airborne. His parents, Tom and Toni, never saw him with all four wheels on the ground, and it got even worse when he later started riding dirt bikes. 

 

Getting his driver’s license didn’t slow Schulte down; he just ignored the speed limit signs. When he was 20 his dad finally had enough.

 

“I told him if you want to drive fast we’ll put you on a track and you can get paid for it,” he said.

 

Tom Schulte purchased a Hornet class racecar off Craig’s List on a Thursday, and Travis Schulte drove his first dirt track race the next day in Princeton. He was hooked.

 

Racing is in Schulte’s blood. His great-grandfather, Albert Schulte, grandfather, Tom Schulte, uncle, Tedd Schulte, older brother, Tom Schulte the 3rd, and several other uncles and cousins have all raced cars.

 

In 2011 Schulte raced his first full season, averaging two nights a week from April to October. He did so well he won the Princeton track championship and was named rookie of the year.

 

His plan was to stick with the Hornet class one more year, but his dad thought it was time for him to move up and purchased a Wissota Midwest Modified.

 

Schulte kept improving. In 2014 he won his first feature race in the Midwest Modified division, and the following year he won the track championship at Ogilvie Raceway and was voted Sportsman of the Year by his peers.

 

This winter the opportunity to race in the Wild West Shootout at the Arizona Speedway in January unexpectedly presented itself, and as he was in the process of getting a new car built Schulte decided to bring his old car out for “one last hurrah” before it was retired.

 

The Wild West Shootout consists of six races; the driver with the most points at the end of the series wins. Schulte started out strong, winning both the heat, which is the preliminary race that decides how cars will be placed in the starting grid for the actual race, and feature race his first night out. 

 

The next night he placed second in the heat and fourth in the feature, and the third he placed third in the heat and fifth in the feature. 

 

In the fourth night’s feature Schulte had to start from the sixteenth position. On his last lap he passed the seventh place car, putting him in the series lead by one point. That point led to his championship win, as the last two rounds were cancelled due to rain.

 

When asked whom he wanted to thank after his win, Schulte replied, “I want to thank God for keeping all of us egotistical maniacs safe out there.”

 

Schulte is also thankful to Jason and Tara Kaeter from J & T Express in Cold Spring for supplying his ride to Arizona, Jeff Johnson of Chubbs Performance in

 

Clear Lake for sponsoring him and building his motors, Doug Frederick of Frederick’s Race Cars out of Big Lake for sponsoring him and building his chassis, and racecar owner and dad Tom Schulte of Victory Door Systems in Clear Lake, his main sponsor.

 

Schulte plans to continue racing locally, although he may go back to Arizona next year or try somewhere new, he hasn’t decided yet. He prefers to take things one day at a time.

 

“We’ll see what happens,” he said. “Racing is a drug for me. It’s in my blood.”