12 minute read
Living Their Best Lives at 50-Plus Miles Per Hour
Writer // Janelle Morrison • Photography // Submitted
Are you typically more reserved at work but when 5 p.m. strikes, you’re ready to put the pedal to the metal and live your best life? Perhaps you should try kart racing! Now before you shake your head “no” and flip the page, let us introduce you to Carmel residents James “Jim” Enney and his wife, Erin Rake.
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By day, Enney is a CPA, CFO at Central Indiana Hardware and Rake is a dentist at My Dental Care in Fishers, but after hours they are team Dancing Dragon Racing. They are also parents to three adult children.
How Their Love for Kart Racing Got Started
“We started thinking about reliving our youth and doing the things we wanted to do when we were younger but didn’t do, and this was one of the topics,” Enney shared. “We both wanted to be race car drivers when we were kids but never had the opportunity, and we thought why not [be race car drivers] at this age? Neither of us had any expertise in terms of a mechanical side or had even worked on our own cars per se, but we decided that karting might be a good option.”
The duo went out to New Castle Motorsports Park (NCMP) to check out the kart-racing scene, and they fell in love with it. NCMP is their home base and where they have a year-round garage for their karts.
“We both looked at it and said this was something we can do and acknowledged
that it was going to be a steep learning curve,” Enney admitted. “We bought carts in 2015 and had no idea what we were doing and bought a bunch of tools that we had no idea what they were called. It was a challenge because we were fish out of water.”
Rake and Enney explained that there are different engine platforms from “slow and easy” to “insanely fast.” They began with two “slow and easy” karts, and with all the safety equipment, accessories and tools, the pair bought into their new hobby with an initial investment of around $18,000–$20,000.
“There was a lot of research, especially when you just jump into it,” Enney shared. “There are options if you want to get into for as little as $5,000 if you buy a used kart and go with a less expensive engine platform. The ‘slow and easy’ platform or Briggs LO206 has a top speed on a straightaway at Newcastle of 55 mph. The next step up, the X30, is a two-cycle, water-cooled platform, and it will push 70–75 mph. The top-of-the-line shifter cart is also water cooled and is a six-speed transmission that puts you between 82–85 mph, and at IMS, some have done over 100 mph.”
Crushing the Steep Learning Curve
The pair had the rare opportunity to have a driving coach come out to NCMP when they first started—IndyCar driver Pippa Mann. Rake and Enney had tweeted out that they were getting into kart racing and that since they had no idea what they were doing, they were going to hire Mann. To their surprise, she replied and accepted the challenge.
“She [Mann] agreed to come out,” Enney said. “She’s a driver coach [for kids], and we told her that we were adults and she agreed to come out anyway. Her enthusiasm was fantastic! She gave us a lot of written instructions and even showed us how to carry our helmets ‘the right way’ for pictures. We’ve had other interactions with other IndyCar drivers out there. They’ve all come up through karting, like many of the folks we race with, and for us having all that help has been huge.”
As the pair has gained more on-track and pit experience with their karts, they have become more confident about driving them, having learned more about what feels right and when it’s time to pit.
“A big example of that is Jim used to be our ‘wheel’ guy and make sure the wheels were on, air pressured and the hubs were on the karts,” Rake shared. “We’ve had some excitement with lug nuts getting loose and wobbly wheels. This year, I’ve been trying to do it myself so that I know when it happens, I can feel it and fix it.”
Racing at New Castle Motorsports Park
Enney explained that the races last 12–15 minutes per race, depending on how quickly you get through the course, and Rake added, “It’s a mile or a little over a mile long for each race, depending on the course configurations.”
While each driver races as an individual, the couple thought it would be fun to create a team with all the fun merch and accessories that go with a racing team.
“We thought it would be creative to come up a name, logo, colors and outfits,” Enney said. “It was more for us a tongueand-cheek thing. Some people take it very seriously.”
There are several different classes to race in based on engine platforms as well as weight and age classes.
“These are fee-based entries at New Castle,” Enney explained. “It’s regional club racing, so it’s $40 or $45 per entry, which isn’t bad for what you get out of the experience.”
As the years have passed, both Enney and Rake have improved their skills tremendously both in the garage as well as on the track. They both attributed a lot of their growth and success to their friend John Martin, an iconic IKart Indianapolis builder/creator who passed in July. Coincidentally, the weekend before he passed, Enney won his first medals.
“John passed away that following Wednesday, so to me, it was a cool experience because he was there with us and that weekend will always be special,” Enney emphasized. “John was a huge influence and helped us become better drivers and mechanics. He had been driving since he was a kid and knew how karts worked, so having his expertise to navigate us through our learning curves was huge.”
Both Rake and Enney encourage anyone who might be interested in kart racing to come out to NCMP and check it out. Feel free to ask questions, and you’ll find the people at NCMP are very welcoming and willing to help. But once you meet on the track, you’d better hit the pedal, or you’ll be left eating someone’s dust!
Rake concluded, “It’s a fun hobby, and we have met some really great folks along the way!” .
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Dinners on Us of Radiant Christian Life Church
Dinners on Us is an outreach of Radiant Christian Life Church in Westfield and provides free drive-thru dinners and prayer requests on Friday from 6-7 pm to anyone who drives thru. Pictured in the photo are kitchen volunteers Mary Hughes, Jane Catlin, Sharon Chiado, Angela Gately, Kelly Spoor, Jane Uche-Ejekwu, Christians Obasaju, and Helen Barker. Not pictured are Dinners on Us Director Lorana Snyder and April Hensley, as well as parking lot volunteers taking orders for the number of meals, requested and handing out orders: Jim Chiado and Judy Rosenberger. Dinners on Us is a wonderful community service to those in need and making a difference in our community.
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Jon Busch: FORMER MLS ALL-STAR GOALIE ON LIFE IN CARMEL AFTER PRO SOCCER
Writer // Janelle Morrison • Photography // Laura Arick and submitted
For all of you soccer fans out there, I caught up with Carmel resident and former Major League Soccer (MLS) veteran and All-American collegiate goalkeeper Jon Busch to talk about his 21-year career as a pro and why he and his wife, Nicole, decided to settle down in Carmel after his retirement from professional soccer. Busch was an MLS All-Star and also named as the 2008 MLS Goalkeeper of the Year. Busch has grown his businesses here in the city and coaches both youth and adult goalkeepers. It’s worth noting that Busch recently was inducted into the University of North Carolina at the Charlotte 49ers inaugural athletics Hall of Fame class, which commemorated the school’s 50th anniversary as a Division I program.
Busch was the program’s second player to earn All-American recognition and led the 49ers to the NCAA soccer finals in 1996 before embarking on his minor and major league career.
REALIZING HIS PASSION EARLY ON IN LIFE
Busch was born in Queens, New York. His family moved to Virginia when Busch was about 10, and he began to realize his passion for soccer.
“I have an older brother, Mathew, who was striker [forward], and we built a goal in our backyard and he put me in it and started taking shots at me,” Busch shared. “For some crazy reason, I enjoyed it. There really weren’t goalie coaches like there are today, so the little bit of coaching I would get was from my brother’s buddy, Joey, who was a goalie for the high school team. He would come to my practices now and again and would teach me a little bit about goalkeeping.”
Busch continued, “I played in the field and as goalkeeper until about age 14 to 15, and then I realized two things right about then: One, I was halfway decent at this goalkeeping thing and wanted to focus more on that, and two, I learned that I really don’t like running. I figured the ball’s eventually coming to the goalie so I’m the smarter person. Now, whether or not I could save it is a whole different story.”
Busch’s family moved to Pennsylvania during his middle school years and then back to New York to Albany where he finished high school.
“When I was in high school, I played for youth national teams,” Busch said. “I was very fortunate that I played for two straight years with the U-17 national team. We went to the FIFA U-17 World Championship in 1993 in Japan. That was pretty cool. From there, I went to the U-20 national team.”
After high school, Busch went to the University of North Carolina at Charlotte (UNCC) on a full-ride scholarship.
PURSUING A DREAM TO GO PRO
Busch worked with UNCC goalkeeper coach Eric Vaughter—an icon in the nation’s soccer world.
“I was very fortunate to work with ‘E.V.’ [Eric Vaughter],” Busch expressed. “He is like my second father, and we still talk pretty much every day. A lot of pros would come down to UNCC to train with him. I remember after my freshman season, there were like seven professional goalkeepers that started showing up and training with us.”
Busch’s relationship with Vaughter and his commitment to improving his game eventually led him to his dream job—goalkeeper on an MLS team.
“I played close to 150 professional minor league games before I got drafted by the Columbus Crew [Ohio] in 2002,” Busch said. “I was there for five years total before I got traded to Chicago Fire. What was cool about Columbus was they had the first soccer-specific stadium in the MLS. And even though I was disappointed at first to be traded, I had three fantastic years in Chicago, and we had a fantastic team at that point.”
Busch played a total of 21 years of professional soccer—14 of them in the MLS. By the end of his career as a top-performing keeper, Busch had played for the Columbus Crew, Chicago Fire, San Jose Earthquakes and the Indy Eleven.
“My last two years I played here for the Indy Eleven,” Busch stated. “I knew coming towards the end of my career that I wanted to start learning the coaching and administrative side of the game. The Indy Eleven coach at the time asked if I’d be interested in coming over [to Indy] as a player/assistant coach. I jumped at the chance and played for two years while learning the responsibilities as goalie coach and second assistant coach.”
SETTING DOWN ROOTS IN CARMEL
At this point in Busch’s career, he and his wife had decided it was time to set down some roots and call Carmel their home.
“My wife and I love the Midwest,” Busch emphasized. “She had been building her personal stylist/branding specialist business here, and we think that Carmel is very affordable and comfortable. The pace of life is great here.”
Knowing that he’d always wanted to be a goalkeeper coach, Busch has been focused on developing goalkeepers at both the youth and adult levels.
“When I first moved here, I did a little part-time work for the Indy [Indiana] Fire club,” Busch explained. “I want to give back everything that was given to me from different goalkeeper coaches. It is my turn to give back.”
Busch serves as goalkeeper coach for the Indiana Fire professional team and the Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis men’s and women’s programs. He also established High Performance Goalkeeping, which makes goalkeeper gloves that Busch designs and sells to youth and adult goalkeepers at an affordable price. His company offers discounts to the local area youth clubs to help parents with the cost of the gloves. Busch also established his High Performance Goalkeeping with Jon Busch—a coaching academy where he offers private lessons and group sessions.
For more information about HPG, visit hpgoalkeeping. com or visit jonbuschgoalkeeping.com for more information on Busch’s coaching services.
