LEOPARD SET FOR FULL USAC MIDGET RUN IN 2026
Mack Leopard. (Josh James Artwork Photo)
By: Richie Murray – USAC Media
Speedway, Indiana (February 19, 2026)………The Leopard family name goes back to the origins of the United States Auto Club (USAC) seven decades ago.
Now, Mack Leopard, the teenager from Beavercreek, Ohio, is set to make his own mark with USAC’s NOS Energy Drink Midget National Championship in 2026 and will compete on the full series schedule with Chase McDermand Racing.
A 15-year-old high school sophomore, Leopard made his first 11 career starts with the series in 2025, scoring fast qualifying honors at Fairbury, Nebraska’s Jefferson County Speedway and finishing a career best eighth on the very same night at the same track, all while driving for Chad Boat’s CB Industries.
Leopard’s great grandfather, Nelson Leopard, was a scorer for the United States Auto Club in its formative years in the 1950s-1960s. For Mack, short for Mackston, his racing career began at age nine at Ohio’s Kil-Kare Raceway, competing in Quarter Midgets where he scored a pair of championships with the Midwest Thunder series in the Senior Honda and Light 160 classes.
By 2023, Leopard began competing in micro sprints for CBI, notching wins at both North Carolina’s Millbridge Speedway and Indiana’s U.S. 24 Speedway, and in 2024, was triumphant in several marquee events, including the Tom Rieck Memorial at Illinois’ Coles County Speedway.
Along with his USAC exploits in 2025, Leopard also competed with the MARA series, sweeping both weekend events on back-to-back nights in Illinois during the month of September at Jacksonville Speedway and Spoon River Speedway. He achieved each of those victories behind the wheel of a Chase McDermand Racing machine.
Those accomplishments set off a chain of events that ultimately got this combo working together even more going into 2026.
“I’m pretty excited to work with (Chase) because I’m still learning and I feel like he’ll be able to teach me a lot,” Leopard said. “Plus, he has raced very recently and understands everything. I think he and I can relate well to each other, so I’m excited. I’m really excited to do all the races and travel everywhere.”
McDermand is a longtime racer himself, earning a three-peat of Badger Midget Auto Racing Association driving championships in 2019-2020-2021. In 2024, McDermand became a first-time USAC National Midget feature winner during a prelim night of the BC39 at The Dirt Track at Indianapolis Motor Speedway.
For Leopard, it was also with McDermand in which he made history at the Chili Bowl Nationals in Tulsa, Oklahoma during January 2026. There, he set three new event records. He competed in nine features on championship night, transferring all the way from the N-Main to the F-Main, winning four of them along the way all while passing an astounding 73 cars in process!
The reaction to his alphabet soup run was swift, and Leopard truly got to showcase his talents and hustle to a worldwide audience, all after an auspicious start to the week.
“I thought, ‘okay, we’re starting to do pretty well here,’” Leopard recalled in the midst of his run. “Once we got going, I thought, ‘I can’t stop now!’ It was pretty sweet. I started getting interviewed and all that and it was a pretty big deal. I feel like that kind of put my name out there. I didn’t notice it until about a week later and I was like, ‘man, that was crazy.’ ”
Now, Leopard takes the wheel for his first full season of USAC competition in the coming year. The 2026 USAC NOS Energy Drink Midget National Championship season begins with back-to-back nights at Indiana’s Kokomo Speedway for the Kokomo Grand Prix on April 24-25.
