Come the 102nd running of the Indy 500 in May 2018, along with cars powered by engines up to 700 horsepower, there will be a Bronco on the track: Kyle Kaiser ’20 makes his debut in the big race, piloting the entry for Juncos Racing.
How did he get there? The Santa Clara native started driving at age 7—go-karts, that is—and won a national championship at age 12. A year later he was wheel-to-wheel with 20-year-olds on the Mazda Raceway. He moved to Indianapolis at age 18 to devote more time to training because, he notes, driving race cars that can accelerate to over 200 miles an hour takes physical strength, endurance, and mental agility.
“You have to have an insanely fast reaction time,” he says. “The right decision can lead to gaining a position, the wrong decision could lead to a crash at high speeds.”
In the 2017 season, Kaiser placed first in the Indy Lights Championship, winning a $1 million scholarship and qualifying for the Indy 500—the world’s largest single-day sporting event, which draws more than 300,000 attendees.
His dream? To win, naturally.