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There is very little doubt whom the fan favorite at Spartan Speedway is in the Pony Stock Division.

If there was any doubt, that was erased last Friday Night when Misty Allen pulled her bright purple No. 82 Beacon Sales Dodge Neon into Victory Lane following a heat race win and the crowd roared with approval.

Misty is a 3rd generation racer, so we weren’t surprised when we asked her where here racing addiction came from. Misty said “I was raised around racing.  My grandpa (Charles Allen), my dad (Doug Allen), my uncle (Steve Allen)..  I’ve just always been around it.

For Misty, racing goes back to some of her earliest memories.  “I can remember sitting in the stands at Spartan Speedway with little homemade signs that I drew in my kindergarten class for Uncle.  I don’t really remember when grandpa raced, but I remembered Uncle Steve.” said Allen.

Misty eased into racing over the course of several years.  She knew she wanted to do it, but she was young and she was  “a girl”, so her first racing was limited to Powder Puff stuff at Spartan Speedway.

“My very first race was suppose to be in Jeri Lynn Munn’s car at Spartan.  I was in the car and ready to go and the car wouldn’t start.  I was so disappointed and upset.  I didn’t realize then that things happen.  I do now.  The following year, I finally got to do it in John Conroy’s car and I won.  I did several more powder puff races and won most of them, but I really wanted to race for real.   I just wanted to go out there and kick these guy’s butts.

So at the 2007 Springport Speedway awards banquet, Dennis O’Neil offered me a ride and I took him up on the offer.  Over the winter we repainted and freshen the car.
My first real race was that Spring (2008) at Springport Motor Speedway.  It nerve racking.  I was real nervous and excited at the same time.  A  lot of anxiety.  It was a lot different then the Powder Puff races, the drivers are all way more experienced and way faster.  It was fun.  I was already hooked, but now I was really hooked.”

Like she had in her first Powder Puff race, Misty won her heat race the very first time out.

“I thought, this isn’t so bad, I got a shot to win these things.”  But then the next night she didn’t win.  And then the next.  Pretty soon the entire 2008 season was in the rear view mirror and she hadn’t tasted victory again.
“Wow, this is a goign to be a lot harder then I thought.” said Misty recalling the summer.

“In 2009 I got my first feature win at Springport.  I was pretty emotional, it was the first time I got interviewed.  I was really, really excited.  Now my focus is getting a feature win at Spartan.  That is where the real competition is at.”

Allen knows that racing is a team effort and there are a lot of people who made her racing passion come to life.
One of her early idols was Ron Henny. “He is awesome.  He let my dad race his car.  That is how my dad got started.  Ron really knows how to wheel a car.  He taught us a lot of basic stuff about cars.

“But the people who have been most vital to my racing now are my fiance Scott Casaday, my parents (Doug and Carolyn Allen), Yogi and Todd Metz, Beacon Sales of Charlotte, Bella Grande consignment store of Charlotte,  Michigan Home Finance of Lansing.  Without their support we couldn’t do it.”

“I also want to say Hi to my nephew Tyson, my sister Sirena, my brother in law Jeremy.  They come out Spartan ever Friday night and sit behind the flag stand.  It makes me happy and excited to see them there, I sneak a peak sometimes and I can see him cheering me on.  Its awesome.”