Mission Valley Speedway bands together for Mitchell family

PABLO — Dustin and Courtney Mitchell are on the cusp of competing for two racing championships in the bandolero class on the Mission Valley Speedway and the Montana Raceway Park in Kalispell.

Dustin and Courtney, who are neck and neck in the points system, were battling for supremacy and racing side-by-side when they both slid into the wall and collided into each other in Kalispell.

“My car got loose and started to spin, Courtney went by and rear-ended my car, and I slammed into the wall into the fence,” Dustin Mitchell recalled. “The rear of my car went into the shape it is and is not supposed to be turning all of the way into the right. I was spinning and tried not to think about it because I’ve been in many wrecks before and just let the car do what it does.”

Initially, Dustin admitted that he was “scared.”

“When the collision happened, I hit the wall and the car bounced,” Dustin said. “I was really scared when it happened. I felt like I was going to get hurt and it was going to be way worse (than it was). The car saved me and that was the safest car you could build. The back was completely destroyed.”

When the Mission Valley race community heard about the crash and what Dustin and Courtney went through, they banned together to successfully raise $3,500 that allowed both Dustin and Courtney to race at both the Kalispell and the Mission Valley Speedway. Their projected return to the track is Aug 11 in Kalispell.

“There isn’t a whole lot of money and (at this level of racing), you always race out of your own pocket,” Bill Mitchell, father of Courtney and Dustin, said. “I would never ask for help but we had to build two race cars and it was our last resort. We have possibly two championships to earn on two different tracks.”

The competition between her and her brother is fierce because the competition in the points standing is so close, according to Courtney Mitchell.

“My brother and I are neck and neck for first place,” Courtney Mitchell said. “We had a huge lead on everyone and he’s been improving to catch up with me. It’s going to be back-and-fourth and he basically caught me in points in Kalispell. Right now, we are 20 points apart…maybe.”

Courtney Mitchell, who hasn’t raced at the Mission Valley Speedway this season, said experiencing a wreck is hard mentally, physically, and financially.

“This (past weekend), I hit the wall too at the Montana 200 and I didn’t think I was going to make it back,” Courtney Mitchell said. “The pit crews really started helping me fix my car and my dad had one of his friends help a little bit.”

Jennifer Mitchell, Courtney and Dustin’s mother, said the two racers are hyper competitive with each other.

“They are very competitive, they race hard, and that is what caused the wreck,” Jennifer Mitchell said.

Jennifer Mitchell also said they’ve gotten a lot of help from various racing families in the community.

“After the wreck, the Knutson family asked ‘what can we do?’ and we started a GoFundMe account for us,” Jennifer Mitchell said. “We weren’t going to be able to do it and crowd funding through social media made raising the money much easier.”

Craig Draper, promoter of the Mission Valley Speedway, said the generosity his racers demonstrated is part of the culture his track is trying to promote.

“That is the whole idea to develop a racing community,” Draper said. “When you get close to everyone, you don’t have to beg and borrow from each other to try to get parts. It’s an open line of communication type deal and we are just one big racing family. I always said I don’t want the monster truck effect where they earn this big money and you never seem again. We ban together in good times and bad,and help keep the unity and help each other. If someone has a big wreck, we just jump in and try to help each other. It’s just a huge racing family.”

The support the Mitchell family has received from other racers has “meant a lot” Bill Mitchell said.

“It just shows the respect the racers have for each other,” Mitchell said. “I’ve been in it competitively and this is our 11th season. I try to help others with parts and set up, and in turn, they help us back.”

There were a couple of unexpected people that aided the Mitchells, Bill said.

“We’ve had a lot of different people just step up and donate,” Bill Mitchell said. “We’ve even had people that we weren’t expecting. It’s nice to see everyone is willing to step up to help get back on the track.”

Bill Mitchell has won two championships with compact cars, ran limited late models, and now races in the legend series. He has raced for 11 years and said it can be difficult to come back from a wreck, especially for a younger racer.

“It took Dustin nearly two years after his first wreck to actually start pushing himself again,” Bill Mitchell said. “It takes time and maturity (to get over a wreck) depending on the severity of it.”

The Mitchells, who will participate in 22 races this year, said racing is a “family thing.” They will race at four different tracks in Kalispell, Spokane, Wash., Pablo and Hermiston, Ore.

“Racing is pretty much a family thing and we pitch in and we do our part to get the cars done for a week,” Bill Mitchell said. “We don’t farm anything out. We do all of our fabricating. Body pudding and painting are all done in house. It takes a very long time to get two cars rebuilt.”