Swanson Captures Belle Sheppard Birthday Bash at Paragon
NXTbets Pro | Published On: July 30, 2026
Swanson dominates at Paragon
Jake Swanson won the USAC AMSOIL Sprint Car National Championship feature at Paragon Speedway, and he did it the hard way from the fourth starting spot. He led all 30 laps, kept the field behind him from the first green flag to the checkered flag and collected the Belle Sheppard Birthday Bash victory in the 39th Annual Indiana Sprint Week. The win paid $10,000 and brought Swanson the clean air award for leading every lap. It also came in a race that carried extra weight for the track itself, since Paragon Speedway hosted a USAC Indiana Sprint Week event for the first time in 28 years. Swanson did more than control the distance. He also logged the fastest feature lap at 15.726 seconds, a sharp mark that matched the way he handled the front of the field once he got there. Starting fourth meant he had work to do before the race settled in, but he turned that position into a clean, wire-to-wire run at the top. The result gave the event a clear headline and put Swanson at the center of one of the marquee stops on the sprint-car calendar.
Cummins sets pace
Kyle Cummins made his presence felt before the feature even started. He set the fastest qualifying time at 14.462 seconds, then backed that speed up with a second-place finish in the main event. Brady Bacon followed in third, Justin Grant took fourth and Mitchel Moles crossed in fifth, giving the front end of the results a compact, high-level finish behind Swanson. The order showed a mix of pace and position across the night, with Cummins proving quickest in qualifying while Swanson delivered the stronger race result. That split matters in sprint-car racing, where one lap can put a driver on the front row of the conversation and the next can leave him chasing track position for the rest of the night. Swanson’s fastest feature lap added another layer to the performance, since it showed his winning run was built on speed as well as control. Cummins’ qualifying mark stood out, but the feature belonged to the driver who converted a fourth-place start into a perfect scorecard at the front. Bacon, Grant and Moles all stayed inside the top five, which kept the finishing order tight and gave the event a competitive look all the way through the field.
Sprint Week standings
The victory also landed in the middle of a tight Indiana Sprint Week points race. After the event, Cummins led Moles by 11 points, 363 to 352, while Grant sat third in the standings, 16 points behind the leader. That puts the championship picture in a narrow window with only three races left in the nine-race series. The tour still has Terre Haute on deck, then Bloomington and Tri-State Speedway, and each stop now carries added importance because the gap at the top remains small. Swanson’s win did not change the fact that Cummins still held the points lead, but it kept the pressure on the front of the standings and added another contender to the mix after a night when speed and execution both mattered. Indiana Sprint Week has already shown a split between qualifying pace and feature results, and the remaining rounds should keep that tension in place. The series returns to Terre Haute Action Track next, then moves through Bloomington and Tri-State Speedway with the title fight still open. In a short stretch of races, every finish now has a direct impact on the leaderboard, and Paragon’s long-awaited return to the schedule added one more sharp turn to the chase.
