ROSSBURG, OH: Emerson Axsom came into the long 2024 Sprint Car season with a steep learning curve ahead of him. Making the transition to a full-blown winged car is no easy task.

The advantage for Axsom was that he already had 33 starts under his belt. Here is the caveat … it’s come over three seasons, so it’s not like he had much repetition.

Apparently, Axsom doesn’t need it to be competitive. He’s been a quick study with the Dale Klaasmeyer and Scott Petry team, and his performance has been turning some heads in his first full season in the 410 Sprint Car division.

The attention is going to ramp up a little more after Saturday night. Axsom has been to Eldora Speedway plenty of times in his career, but this was his first King’s Royal, and he handled the magnitude of the event with ease, registering a solid sixth-place finish at the racy Ohio facility.

Emerson Axsom passes Sheldon Haudenschild during the main event to finish sixth. (Brent Smith Photography)

“I’m just proud of my guys,” said Axsom while sitting on his tire moments after the 40-Lap race. “We struggled earlier in the week, and honestly, all we did was get the racecar a little better.

“We’re kind of a rookie team this year, and Dale Klaasmeyer and Scott Petry started this deal and let me kind of build the program I wanted to build and put people I want around it. I’m just proud of my guys.”

Continued Axsom, “We are working together and figuring it out. It’s not easy. We could go to a local show tomorrow and struggle, but that’s part of the learning curve. That’s what makes racing enjoyable … the highs are really high, and the lows are really low.”

This would classify as a high.

Axsom timed 13th in the stellar 62-car field. Next up was an intense heat race in which the Franklin, Ind., driver had to finish in the top three to even make the Kings Royal main event.

No problem. Axsom battled California driver Cole Macedo and came out on top in a closing two-lap battle to earn the last qualifying spot, which clinched a crown-jewel position in his first attempt.

“It’s awesome,” Axsom said. “I’ve run at Eldora before, and my first ever Sprint Car race was the 2013 4-Crown. I was running quarter midgets over at Little Eldora, so I’ve been coming here a long time.

“It’s pretty cool to be here, and even just qualifying good and looking up at that board … it just shows how much effort we have been putting into this thing.”

We’ve seen this before. A team qualifies for their first King’s Royal and is content with their accomplishment. The driver usually falls back in the A-Main order or simply maintains to get it back in the trailer in one piece.

Not Axsom. He wanted more and battled throughout the extra-distance race. He climbed up to sixth by Lap 12 and was back to 12th seven laps later. After an open red for fuel, he started to scratch and claw his way toward the front.

Axsom was seventh with 10 laps remaining. The car continued to improve, as did the driver, and he was able to pass Sheldon Haudenschild for the sixth-position on Lap 31, outdueling the World of Outlaws star over a two-lap scrum.

“I felt like we were really good early, and then right before that open red, we started struggling again,” Axsom said. “I told my guys under the red to do the same thing we did but go further. Obviously, our package was working, and we needed to go a little further. That’s what we did, and it paid off.”

Expectations were met and maybe even exceeded the final night of the four-race extravaganza at Eldora. As for the rest of the trip, Axsom wasn’t satisfied with the overall performance.

Axsom was 17th in his Double Down Duel race Wednesday night and failed to qualify for the Joker’s Jackpot. He made Friday’s Knight Before the Kings Royal, but a 23rd-place finish dampened the mood a bit.

But good teams bounce back, and Axsom showed some moxie in one of the sport’s biggest races. It was the type of result that gets you noticed and shows the progress this team has made in the last five months.

“It gives us confidence, but at the same time as I said earlier, we can go to a local show and struggle,” Axsom admitted. “I’m happy with the way our car has been at Eldora. We kind of go to these tracks a couple of nights, and I’m glad we are able to figure it out.

“It’s tough, because we go to a lot of different tracks, but I’m glad to be checking them off. If you can be good here, Knoxville, Port Royal, and a couple of other half miles, you will have a pretty successful Sprint Car career.”

STARS FALL SHORT: The King’s Royal can be the most difficult race to make, regardless of who you are in this Sprint Car world. It features an unforgiving format, and if you get buried, good luck trying to bail yourself out to simply make the 40-Lap finale.

A host of the sport’s best drivers found that out Saturday night. The most notable drivers to miss the main event were Brad Sweet, Kyle Larson, Carson Macedo, Gio Scelzi, and Corey Day.

Obviously, all of those drivers are expected to qualify. Sweet, a two-time King’s Royal champion, had the best chance. He timed sixth overall but struggled in his heat race and fell short in the Last Chance Showdown by one spot. Cole Macedo beat the five-time World of Outlaws champion by .195 at the stripe.

MACEDO’S NIGHT: Carson Macedo had high expectations coming into this year’s event, but he had a head-scratching night in the Jason Johnson Racing machine.

After qualifying 47th, Macedo could only climb to eighth in the 10-Lap heat race. Things didn’t improve in the C-Main, as the California driver climbed to sixth before being forced to pit road with a flat tire.

The team changed the tire, and Macedo headed back on the track. He got back up to 10th, but a blown tire sent his car upside down and ended his night.

MORE FIRST-TIMERS: Emerson Axsom wasn’t the only driver to qualify for the Kings Royal in his first attempt. West Coast drivers Landon Brooks and Cole Macedo, as well as World of Outlaws regular Landon Crawley punched their tickets to the main even.

Crawley and Brooks made it through their heat races and finished 20th and 21st in the main event. Macedo held off Brad Sweet in the LCS and was 22nd in the King’s Royal.

Skylar Gee has competed in the Kings Royal before, but he made his first main event start Saturday night. Gee finished 16th in the final rundown.

TOUGH FORMAT: The King’s Royal is known for having a difficult format. In past years, the event featured a six-car heat invert with the top three qualifying for the 40-Lap main event.

Officials added a twist this season. To prevent sandbagging in time trials, they added the Wheel of Misfortune, which had a zero, four, and six for heat-race inversion. Rico Abreu spun, and it came up as a four.

Seems easier, right? Well, fast qualifiers Anthony Macri (2nd), Donny Schatz (3rd), Kraig Kinser (5th), and Brad Sweet (6th) failed to transfer out of the heat race. The top two in qualifying who didn’t make it through the heat race — Macri and Schatz — started 19th and 20th in the King’s Royal. Sweet and Kinser failed to make the A-Main.

MORE NOTES: Kyle Larson didn’t have a good night. After timing 40th in the 62-car field, he did manage to get to sixth in his heat race. That put him in the Last Chance Showdown, where he finished 11th. … Parker Price-Miller won the third heat race and started third on the King’s Royal grid. Unfortunately, his solid night came to end on the opening lap of the main event when he bounced through the bottom of Turn 1 and got upside down. He was OK.