Jonathan Eilen

Jonathan Eilen (born September 1, 1985) is an American professional racing driver. He competed for Cunningham Motorsports for the entirety of his ARCA career. Most recently, he drove in the ARCA Racing Series in 2009 in their No. 38 and 4 Dodge.

Eilen ran the Berlin race for the team, running as high as third before a late spin relegated him to 23rd.

Racing career
In 2007, Eilen became the first ever ARCA Midwest Tour event winner. He took home the victory at his home track of Elko Speedway. Along with becoming the first winner in the history of the series, he was crowned the 2007 Rookie of the Year. In 2010. Eilen hit the turn two wall at Hawkeye Downs Speedway and suffered a broken back, sidelining him for the remainder of the season. Jonathan and his team returned in 2011 and had a rebuilding season. In 2012, Eilen returned with a vengeance and became the 2012 ARCA Midwest Tour Champion. The past few seasons have been full of ups and downs for Eilen and his team, but they are ready to hit the track to fight for another championship in 2016.

Eilen had his eyes on the prize at Oktoberfest. For the first time in his ARCA Midwest Tour presented by Scag Power Equipment career, Eilen had not tallied a win. While he has racked up five top-five finishes and eight top-ten finishes and sits third in the point standings, he hopes to close out the year in Victory Lane. “I am very hungry for a win, LaCrosse is one of those tracks either we hit the setup on the head or where we just struggle. In years past I’ve not been too excited to go just because we have not ran very well there in the past, but for some reason I’m really excited to race there this year. I hope that means something.” said Eilen,

Some of that excitement might stem from the Oktoberfest finale going back to the 200-lap format it had in past years. “Running the 200 lapper will be very cool just because I remember growing up watching the big race that was always 200 laps and thinking how awesome it would be to be there someday racing it,” said Eilen.

The 200-lap event boasted live and threw a little more strategy into the equation for the drivers and crew. Luckily for Eilen he is surrounded by some excellent people and the strategy planning has already started.

“We have thought of a couple different strategies we are hoping we will be able to try,” said Eilen, “But as everyone knows nothing usually goes to plan in racing. One of our biggest helps on being so consistent is because Chad and Spiff prepare the cars so well and don’t let anything sneak past them as far a mechanical failures. With a little luck we would be right there at the end of the 200-laps.”

While the top two in Midwest Tour points battled it out for the race, Eilen had a battle of his own. Third in point standings, Eilen had just a three point edge over Chris Weinkauf heading into the weekend. “Going into LaCrosse I really don’t think about any differently than any other race,” says Eilen, “If I give it my all and don’t hold back that’s all I can do and let us finish where we are supposed to finish.”

Eilen took home the checkered flag in the Classic Calypso Lemonade 100 at Grundy County Speedway in 2014.

“Man, I didn’t ever expect to come from 17th to win it, you know? My hats off to Chris Wimmer and Danny Fredrickson. They put on a really tough battle,” said a happy Eilen from victory lane.

Eilen, the 2012 ARCA Midwest Tour champion, cut his teeth on the Elko track from 2001 forward. “Elko’s only 20-30 miles from home, so I definitely consider it my home track,” Eilen said.

“I won a title there back in ’02 in the Hobby Stock division. I was rookie of the year the first year. Then we moved into the sportsman division, then up into late models. We actually won the inaugural ARCA Midwest Tour race at Elko in 2007, so we’ve built up quite a following there over the years. Being on the (ARCA Midwest) tour over the last few years, we haven’t had the opportunity to race there too much, so I’m definitely looking forward to this one.”

Cunningham Motorsports is renowned for providing great opportunities for up and coming drivers to advance their careers. Cunningham groomed the careers of Parker Kligerman and, most recently, Alex Bowman, both of whom are competing in the NASCAR Nationwide Series tour fulltime. The teams also field the fulltime ARCA entry for veteran Tom Hessert.

“We couldn’t be more pleased to have Jonathan in our car for Elko,” said Cunningham Motorsports co-owner Kerry Scherer.

“He drove for us one time at Berlin back in 2009 and did a spectacular job. We’re excited to have him back, and we know he’s going to do a great job. He’s such a great kid, and comes from such a great family. We’re very excited about this.”

Eilen, who was nearly unknown to the ARCA Racing Series in ’09 at Berlin, had raced his way into the top-five, but got involved in someone else’s wreck late in the race.

“I know that Cunningham Motorsports is one of the leading competitors in the ARCA series, so I’m very excited to back with them. We were either going to win that race at Berlin, or finish second, so I definitely feel like we’ve got some unfinished business to take care of,” Eilen added.

“I know the track (Elko) pretty well, and we’ve got a pretty good following of sponsors and fans over there, so we should have quite a few people cheering for us when we get back in town. A win at my home track in the ARCA series would be as big as it gets.”

Other information
Eilen also drove an ARCA car during open testing at Daytona International Speedway in December of 2012 through ARCA’s “Road to Daytona” program under which champions from ARCA’s additional touring series get the opportunity to drive an ARCA car at Daytona.

ARCA Racing Series
(key) ( Bold – Pole position awarded by qualifying time. Italics – Pole position earned by points standings or practice time. * – Most laps led. )