Gibsonia-based driver Kohan aiming for spot in Lernerville's Firecracker 100

Kelvin Kohan is in his third full season of racing super late models at Lernerville Speedway in Buffalo Township, and every time he hits the track with his bright red No. 15 car, he’s still learning.

That’s the nature of the beast when trying to wrestle an 800-plus horsepower engine around a slick dirt surface.

“The biggest thing with these cars is one wrong adjustment here or there will put you out of the ballpark with the setup,” Kohan said. “It’s kind of hard to figure out how to not go too far one way or another and keep a steady balance while still making the right choices to make the car better each time. We take a lot of notes. We’re figuring it out slowly but surely.”

Kohan, a Gibsonia resident, has shown good speed and is looking for consistency to go with it in time for the biggest race of the year when the World of Outlaws Late Model Series comes to town for the 15th annual Firecracker 100 weekend Thursday through Saturday.

Saturday’s 100-lap feature pays $30,000 to win, and Thursday’s and Friday’s preliminary features pay $6,000 to win.

Kohan was 13th in the Lernerville point standings entering Friday’s Mid-Season Championship, which was the final tuneup before Firecracker weekend.

In his three seasons, Kohan has a career-best finish of second, and his best run of 2021 was a sixth-place finish June 4. He had another good run going June 11 before contact with another car sent him off the backstretch and relegated him to a 12th place finish.

The World of Outlaws present a different challenge. Racing against some of the top competition in the country as a weekly racer is a tall task, but Kohan is eager to see how he stacks up.

“Those guys do it for a living, and I wouldn’t say they’re impossible to beat, but you have to be on your A-game to even think about competing against guys at that level,” Kohan said. “They race pretty much all year round. They might take a day or two off, and then they are already prepping for the next season.

“Local guys work all week and try to get as much time at the shop as we can at night to get ready. It’s tough for us to run with a national touring guy. All you can do is prepare, prepare and prepare some more.”

Kohan raced motocross in his youth. He traded two wheels in for four when he joined the mod lite division and eventually moved into ¾ scale late models.

He had success in both beginner classes and won multiple times in the ¾ scale division at Pittsburgh’s Pennsylvania Motor Speedway before making the jump to supers.

His brother, Karl, is his chief mechanic.

“He’s been here full time for the entire deal,” Kohan said of his brother. “Jake, my tire guy, is a great help. He works very hard. I also have a new crew member this year, Jimmy, that’s been helping out and he’s been a great help.”

For the Firecracker weekend Kohan said time trials will be important. In weekly shows, drivers draw a pill for their starting spot in their heat race, but the World of Outlaws qualify and set the heats by time.

He has not qualified for the 100-lap finale in his career, and doing so would be a dream come true.

“I’d say the goal is to get a good time for starters and then, hopefully, that sets us up well for the heat and we can get a decent run,” Kohan said. “Even if we had to run the B-Main and transfer from there, that would be OK. I feel like making the show would be like a win for us.”