This is a really good article! I suggest everyone who even remotely likes Kasey, read it. It's worth it.

Raising Kahne: Kasey's mom drove home the finer points

Janny Hu/SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER / KaseyKahne.com



Shortly after breakfast, one fall day in 1998, Kasey Kahne answered the telephone and realized his mother was exceptional.

Tammy Kahne was calling home from her cell phone to wish her kids a good day. Normally, she would have made Kasey and his younger brother Kale a hearty breakfast of fresh eggs gathered from their farm and then driven Kale to classes at Enumclaw High School.

That day, however, Tammy was calling from the top of Mount Rainier.

"I remember telling people about it," said Kahne, a hint of awe in his voice still. "Most people don't realize that she really did that. That's a tough climb, too.

"I wasn't really surprised that she could do it because she worked hard for it. But I was really proud of her."

In the six years since Tammy Kahne summited 14,410-foot Rainier, she can claim Mount St. Helens, Mount Adams and Mount Hood among her climbing conquests.

Meanwhile, her oldest son has conquered an uphill challenge of his own -- moving 3,000 miles southeast, where he's become this season's breakout star on the NASCAR auto racing circuit.

Kahne, 24, is the top-ranked rookie in the marquee Nextel Cup Series. He is 11th in the championship standings with three runner-up finishes and a third place in the first 10 races.

Pride has always been a mutual feeling in this closely knit family. And there's plenty to go around.

Empty boxes are stacked four-feet high in the Kahnes' garage on their 50-acre home site on the rural outskirts of Enumclaw.

Red T-shirts and baseball caps emblazoned with Kasey's race car number "9" sit in well-organized piles. Key chains, bumper stickers and license plates are carefully sorted.

It's been months since the family cars were relegated to the driveway; Tammy installed carpet, air conditioning and a heater in the garage.

This is Tammy Kahne's newest pursuit -- mountains of cotton T-shirts and autographed pictures to distribute to her son's loyal fans.

When she agreed to manage her son's souvenir orders and fan club, there were about 150 members, many who had followed Kahne when he started racing around the Northwest's short tracks.

In less than a tenth of a second, that all changed.

That was how close Kahne came to winning the second race of the season at Rockingham, N.C., in March. He was runner-up again the following week at Las Vegas. Suddenly, the NASCAR nation discovered a new hero. The Kasey Kahne fan club quadrupled during those two weeks, and he continues to be among the most popular newcomers since his Dodge team owner Ray Evernham brought along another young driver named Jeff Gordon in the early 1990s.

The result of Kahne's success has been tangible. Working by herself, nearly round-the-clock, Tammy ships 25 to 50 boxes of merchandise a day. She is preparing to open in June a Kasey Kahne apparel store at Enumclaw Chrysler Jeep Dodge.

As Tammy apologetically explains on her son's fan club Web site, there are back orders. Even the merchandise manufacturers didn't anticipate Kahne's rapid rise.

"So many orders were coming in I thought my computer was going to blow up," Tammy Kahne said. "It's all just amazing and exciting.

"I can't go into town without someone talking to me about Kasey. I shook hands with a 5-year-old and he just kept staring at me because he couldn't believe that he was looking at Kasey's mom."

Homespun spirit
It is important to Kasey that his mother, not an outside firm, oversees his fan club. It's not as if Tammy Kahne isn't used to hard work. She thrives on the challenge, and that's obviously been passed along to her children.

With her former husband Kelly a successful logger, Tammy embraced the opportunity she had to stay home with their three children -- Shanon, 25, Kasey and Kale, 21.

In between her mountaineering adventures Tammy developed into an accomplished runner, competing in the 7.5-mile Bloomsday road race in Spokane last weekend.

She tended the large farm and maintained a magazine-cover garden. She packed school lunches, drove her kids -- and their friends -- to and from school and shuttled them to their activities. She insisted dinner be a family sit-down every night.

When Kasey started racing cars at 14, much of the family's activities centered around the sport, too. After overcoming Tammy's initial reluctance to the idea, Kasey starting racing a minisprint car owned by his father. Kelly built a small track on their property to help Kasey hone his talent. The dirt track was only a tenth-mile long, but it was complete with high-banked corners and quickly became a popular attraction for extended family and friends.

"Mom always wanted us around and our friends, too," said Shanon, whose married name is Adams. "It was really like a storybook. When our friends came over, they didn't want to leave.

"She was amazing. I always say I'm a little nervous to be a mom because of having a mom as great as her."

Motherly concerns
The question comes up frequently, from strangers and from longtime friends.

Tammy has long reconciled her feelings about her son's dangerous profession.

"Everyone always asks if I'm afraid," Tammy said. "But I just don't let myself worry too much about it. Kasey could get hurt anywhere, but I know how safe those cars are. It doesn't do me or Kasey any good for me to get upset."

Then she paused.

"It's not as if I don't worry. I still get the jitters. I just really work at staying calm."

As difficult as it is to live so far from Kasey, she takes great comfort in the fact her kids live within an hour of each other outside Charlotte, N.C. She always reminded them the importance of being friends and they still couldn't be closer, literally and figuratively.

Even their cousins -- Willie, 27, and Kole Kahne, 29 -- have moved east.

Shanon cooks dinner for the entire group at least once a week and is so committed to family she took a year off from college to travel with Kasey when he started competing in a national series.

Kale works on the pit crew for Kasey's No. 38 Great Clips Dodge in the Busch Grand National Series and also for the No. 9 Dodge Dealers-sponsored Dodge in the Nextel Cup. He also drives Kahne's luxury motor home to all the races.

"My mom always stressed working hard, truthfulness, being courteous to others and being on your family's side, all the normal stuff parents tell you," Kale said. "But I guess, with us, it all worked."

Often these days Kahne's life is described as being out of a storybook. As far as he's concerned, it always has been that way.

This Mother's Day, he is particularly appreciative of his mom.

The pride and gratitude is abundant both ways.

"An older woman told me just the other day what a great example she thought Kasey was," Tammy said. "For me, as a mother, that is what is so wonderful about all this."

NASCAR: Consistently Inconsistent™

Tiny, you little thief! :lol:

You stole my thread, too bad I got the link from here. :lol: ;)

Guess I should've mentioned that in my post over at J.R. huh? Sorry!