Michael Mains (261) leads a group in a novice race in a WERA sprint race at Gateway International Raceway in June of 1986. Mains was always one of my favorite racers. The guy was happy all the time. He’d come by the table where Jackie and I were selling photos and buy every shot we had of him and just light up our day with his smile and cheery attitude. Michael’s dad was Gil Mains, a famous NFL football player for the Detroit Lions. Michael wanted to be a racer and to his dad’s credit he gave Michael the help he needed to chase the dream, but as I remember he gave his son a time limit on his support. Michael was a fast racer and he showed up at nearly every WERA race across the country regardless of region. Michael was a man on a mission. He wanted to get to the top of racing heap and I mean now. From what I recall he just pushed too hard too fast. I think he had the potential to become a very good racer, but it was like he expected to go from novice to factory racer in the course of a year and that just wasn’t realistic even for the best of the best. While he was around the sport Michael was definitely one of the guys you wanted to pit next to. He had a zest for life that was infectious.

Michael Mains leads a novice race in a WERA sprint race at Gateway International Raceway in June of 1986. (Larry Lawrence photo)