This will be Kahne’s first full-time racing job since his NASCAR career abruptly ended three years ago.
Kasey Kahne, once one of NASCAR’s most promising young stars, has been a sprint car racer for nearly three years since getting out of a stock car for the final time. While Kahne had been enjoying a reduced role as a dirt driver, a new opportunity for Kahne to return to the grind of racing full-time has presented itself.
Roth Motorsports announced on Wednesday that Kasey Kahne will drive the No. 83 for the remainder of the 2021 World of Outlaws NOS Energy Drink Sprint Car Series season. Kahne, who raced for the Central California-based team in the early 2000s, will compete in the next 24 World of Outlaws races.
This will be Kahne’s first full-time racing job since his NASCAR career ended abruptly three years ago.
Kahne, who competed in the Cup Series from 2004 to 2018 and had 18 career wins, was forced to retire following the 2018 Southern 500 due to a health issue that caused severe dehydration and a raised heart rate during long and physically demanding stock car races.
“I am really excited and thankful for the opportunity that (car owners) Dennis and Teresa Roth are providing me to race with a great team for the last ΒΌ of the season,” Kahne said in a team press release. “It’ll be really fun, and challenging, going to some new places as we work hard to run up front every night with the World of Outlaws. We had a great trip to Knoxville, and I am looking forward to getting back to it and really getting started this weekend.”
Although Kahne was a backup driver for the first eight races of the World of Outlaws season, he had settled into his role as the owner of Kasey Kahne Racing until he was called into action in last week’s Knoxville Nationals. Roth Motorsports recruited Kahne to fill in at Knoxville as driver Aaron Reutzel was suspended for one month for racing with an illegal chassis. Kahne made the A Main and finished eighth.
During his NASCAR career, Kahne burst onto the scene as a youthful phenom in the mid-2000s, driving for car owners Ray Evernham, Richard Petty, and Rick Hendrick, among others. Kahne’s most notable achievements are a six-race winning streak in 2006, a career-best fourth-place finish in points in 2012, and victories in both the Coca-Cola 600 (2006, 2008) and Brickyard 400 (2006, 2008). (2017).
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