Jacob Denney wears the crown, the robe, and the throne after winning Monday night's Lake Land College King of Coles at Coles County Speedway in Mattoon, Illinois. (Rich Forman Photo) (Video Highlights from FloRacing.com)
By: Richie Murray – USAC Media
Mattoon, Illinois (September 7, 2026)………Jacob Denney has certainly been the king of the 2026 USAC NOS Energy Drink Midget National Championship thus far, evidenced by his 71-point lead in the series standings and his season-leading four feature victories.
On Monday night in USAC’s debut at Coles County Speedway in Mattoon, Illinois, Denney quite literally got the royal treatment, sporting a crown and a robe, while sitting on the winner’s throne in victory lane where he was dubbed “The King of Coles.”
The Galloway, Ohio native led all 40 laps of the feature event to capture victory in the second running of the Lake Land College King of Coles on the 1/6-mile dirt oval in east central Illinois.
Denney ran second and seventh on each night of the King of Coles in 2025, but this year, he took control from start to finish to pick up the win and $6,000 worth of Coles cash.
“Last year, we ran here and I started deep both nights, so I knew how important it was to start on the front row here,” Denney explained. “Luckily, we caught a break with the heat races and bumped up to the pole. So, that helped a lot. You can just run your own race and not have to do anything too crazy whereas you’ve got to race really hard when you're back there. I kind of saved myself and then saved my stuff.”
Denney’s eighth career USAC National Midget triumph made him the second driver in as many nights move himself into 86th place on the all-time series win list after Kevin Thomas Jr. won on Sunday night at Angell Park Speedway. Also on the 86 line are Brady Bacon, Merle Bettenhausen, Tony Bettenhausen, Hank Butcher, Kevin Doty, Dan Drinan, Ronnie Duman, Brian Gerster, Kenny Irwin Jr., Eddie Johnson, Michael Lewis, Andy Michner, and Josh Wise.
Meanwhile, Denney ran his streak of top-three podium finishes with the series to seven dating back to July, a run that includes three wins, two runner-up results, and a pair of thirds in his Keith Kunz-Curb-Agajanian Motorsports/JBL Audio – TRD – Mobil 1 – Curb/LynK/Speedway Toyota No. 67.
For the first 30 laps, Denney practically owned the joint. But with 10 to go, the swarm began to surround him. Thomas Jr. double dipped along the bottom to surge from fourth to second on the 30th circuit, first by Brecken Reese in turn two, then by Justin Grant at the exit of turn four.
Moments later, KTJ was fully alongside Denney who occupied a lane a couple steps higher. Fittingly, in the same city in which the great Gadabout Gaddis hailed from – the host of the first nationally syndicated TV show about fly fishing – Thomas Jr. had been able to reel Denney in. But like a light switch, Denney turned it up and was able to gap himself from KTJ, Grant, the field, et al.
“The last time I got to lapped traffic, they were all running the bottom,” Denney pointed out. “I was just trying to get into lapped traffic because I knew once I got in, it'd be hard to slide me with cars on the bottom and me running on the top. I was trying to pace myself. It was really tricky down there, but once I saw (Kevin Thomas Jr.), I had to turn it back up and get going again.”
Meanwhile, Reese, who had run second for the first 29 laps, had his hopes and dreams of a best career USAC finish go up in a shower of sparks on the back straightaway on lap 34 while running fourth, when a piece of his car let loose and dropped onto the track surface, then immediately began to coast to bring out the caution, thus setting up a restart with seven laps to go and the field bunched up.
Throughout the final stint, ninth place starting Grant moved up to second with four laps remaining as he went top side around the outside of Thomas Jr. That said, Grant still had about six car lengths to make up on Denney, which proved to be too much to overcome. By then, Denney had put his stamp on victory at the Labor Day night show.
Denney took the checkered flag 0.459 seconds ahead of second place finisher Grant. Thomas Jr. took third with Gavin Miller fourth, while Karter Sarff worked his way up from the 12th starting spot to round out the top five in the finishing order.
After 40 laps, you could crown him. Denney is who we thought he was, and he was indeed the King of Coles.
“All these guys bust their tails,” Denney said in praise of his crew. “Keith (Kunz) and Pete (Willoughby) give us great stuff to be able to do this and run up front every week. It's just our job, and hopefully, we do our job every night and run up front.”
Denney also added the K & N Filters Clean Air Award for leading the most laps in the feature – all 40 of them.
Colorado's Bradley Cox rushed up through the field +10 to earn Rod End Supply Hard Charger honors. It was a solid weekend for Cox who earned the two best USAC National Midget finishes of his career over the past two nights. He was seventh at Angell Park on Sunday and 10th at Coles County on Monday.
Two drivers got upside down during the feature in very similar fashion by catching the turn two cushion before tumbling over. Hayden Reinbold was running fourth at the time of his accident on lap 19. Series newcomer Alex Midkiff, who ran as high as third early in the race, did likewise on the turn two cushion on lap 29. Reinbold restarted at the tail and finished 14th. Midkiff’s evening concluded with the crash, but he was able to walk away.
Kale Drake earned the first USAC National Midget fast qualifying time of his career with a new Coles County track record to boot. His quick lap of 9.850 seconds in LearnLab Qualifying surpassed the former record lap of 10.007 set by Jacob Denney with the POWRi and Xtreme Outlaw Midgets in 2025.
USAC NOS ENERGY DRINK MIDGET NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIP RACE RESULTS: September 7, 2026 – Coles County Speedway – Mattoon, Illinois – 1/6-Mile Dirt Oval – Lake Land College King of Coles
LEARNLAB QUALIFYING: 1. Kale Drake, 4, RMS-9.850 (New Track Record); 2. Hayden Reinbold, 19AZ, Reinbold-Underwood-9.865; 3. Kevin Thomas Jr., 14, 4 Kings-9.918; 4. Alex Midkiff, 11, Midkiff-9.944; 5. Mack Leopard, 40L, McDermand-10.020; 6. Brecken Reese, 20Q, Reese-10.030; 7. Jacob Denney, 67, Kunz/Curb-Agajanian-10.076; 8. Ethan Mitchell, 19m, Bundy Built-10.093; 9. Gunnar Setser, 43, Arnold-10.173; 10. Karter Sarff, 21K, O'Dell-10.192; 11. Jake Neuman, 3N, O'Dell-10.193; 12. Kyle Jones, 7TX, Engler-10.213; 13. Gavin Miller, 97, Kunz/Curb-Agajanian-10.225; 14. Zach Daum 1, O'Dell-10.284; 15. Justin Grant, 87, CBI-10.304; 16. Drew Sherman, 19, Reinbold/Underwood-10.309; 17. Bradley Cox, 45, Mason-10.335; 18. Colton Robinson, 67K, Kunz/Curb-Agajanian-10.370; 19. Jakeb Boxell, 54, 4 Kings-10.376; 20. Cody Beard, 91, Harris/Zimmerman-10.670; 21. Chase Hodge, 5J, Hodge-10.737; 22. Devin Feger, 12, Durbin-10.843; 23. Sammy Males, 4m, Males-10.855; 24. Daniel Robinson, 12x, Durbin-10.950; 25. Chris Hartman, 35s, Hodge-11.020; 26. Robert Carson, 99K, Carson-NT.
K1 RACEGEAR FIRST HEAT: (10 laps, top 6 transfer to the feature, starting positions in parentheses) 1. Gavin Miller (2), 2. Jacob Denney (4), 3. Drew Sherman (1), 4. Karter Sarff (3), 5. Alex Midkiff (5), 6. Jakeb Boxell (7), 7. Kale Drake (6), 8. Devin Feger (8), 9. Chris Hartman (9). 1:44.579 (New Track Record)
TJ FORGED SECOND HEAT: (10 laps, top 6 transfer to the feature, starting positions in parentheses) 1. Zach Daum (2), 2. Mack Leopard (5), 3. Jake Neuman (3), 4. Ethan Mitchell (4), 5. Hayden Reinbold (6), 6. Cody Beard (7), 7. Robert Carson (9), 8. Sammy Males (8), 9. Bradley Cox (1). NT
K & N FILTERS THIRD HEAT: (10 laps, top 6 transfer to the feature, starting positions in parentheses) 1. Justin Grant (2), 2. Colton Robinson (1), 3. Brecken Reese (5), 4. Gunnar Setser (4), 5. Kyle Jones (3), 6. Kevin Thomas Jr. (6), 7. Daniel Robinson (8), 8. Chase Hodge (7). 1:45.308
FIVE STAR BODIES SEMI: (12 laps, top 6 transfer to the feature, starting positions in parentheses) 1. Kale Drake (1), 2. Bradley Cox (2), 3. Daniel Robinson (3), 4. Devin Feger (6), 5. Chase Hodge (5), 6. Sammy Males (7), 7. Chris Hartman (8), 8. Robert Carson. 2:12.783 (New Track Record)
FEATURE: (40 laps, starting positions in parentheses) 1. Jacob Denney (1), 2. Justin Grant (9), 3. Kevin Thomas Jr. (5), 4. Gavin Miller (7), 5. Karter Sarff (12), 6. Mack Leopard (3), 7. Kyle Jones (14), 8. Ethan Mitchell (10), 9. Jake Neuman (13), 10. Bradley Cox (20), 11. Drew Sherman (15), 12. Colton Robinson (16), 13. Zach Daum (8), 14. Hayden Reinbold (6), 15. Jakeb Boxell (17), 16. Kale Drake (19), 17. Gunnar Setser (11), 18. Devin Feger (22), 19. Chase Hodge (23), 20. Brecken Reese (2), 21. Alex Midkiff (4), 22. Sammy Males (24), 23. Cody Beard (18), 24. Daniel Robinson (21). NT
FEATURE LAP LEADERS: Laps 1-40 Jacob Denney.
**Hayden Reinbold flipped on lap 19 of the feature. Alex Midkiff flipped on lap 29 of the feature.
USAC NOS ENERGY DRINK MIDGET NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIP POINTS: 1-Jacob Denney-996, 2-Kevin Thomas Jr.-925, 3-Gavin Miller-885, 4-Justin Grant-867, 5-Kale Drake-838, 6-Jakeb Boxell-831, 7-Cannon McIntosh-712, 8-Hayden Reinbold-670, 9-Brecken Reese-651, 10-Colton Robinson-609.
USAC PARALLAX GROUP NATIONAL PASSING MASTER POINTS: 1-Kevin Thomas Jr.-129, 2-Hayden Reinbold-125, 3-Justin Grant-120, 4-Robert Ballou-109, 5-Briggs Danner-108, 6-Cale Coons-105, 7-Jacob Denney-102, 8-Chase Stockon-94, 9-Jake Swanson-87, 10-Mitchel Moles-78.
NEXT USAC NOS ENERGY DRINK MIDGET NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIP RACE: September 24, 2026 – Eldora Speedway – Rossburg, Ohio – 1/2-Mile Dirt Oval – BeFour the Crowns
CONTINGENCY AWARD WINNERS:
Dirt Draft Hot Laps Fastest Driver: Kale Drake (10.061)
LearnLab Fast Qualifier: Kale Drake (9.850)
K1 RaceGear First Heat Winner: Gavin Miller
TJ Forged Second Heat Winner: Zach Daum
K & N Filters Third Heat Winner: Justin Grant
Five Star Bodies Semi Winner: Kale Drake
K & N Filters Clean Air Award: Jacob Denney (40 laps led)
Rod End Supply Hard Charger: Bradley Cox (20th to 10th)