A fast-paced, bubbly hum will often fill the air at Bill Rentschler’s property where an alfalfa field has long been replaced with two Go-Kart tracks, but for the family who’s been organizing Park County Kart Club racing in the area for the last 15 years, it’s a fair trade.

Rentschler first rode a Go-Kart in the 1950s in Iowa when he was in seventh or eighth grade, he can’t quite remember all the specifics, but he thinks it was at an amusement park. After that he built his own kart using materials from his family’s property. Steel fence posts made up the frame of the machine and an engine he took from a lawn mower made it all go. 

Rentschler did some racing later on and he had karts when his children were young but they didn’t start focusing on racing at the level they do now until his grandson wasn’t into horses like the rest of the family. So Rentschler built him a kart and “we [messed] around out here [the] first couple of years.”

“My brother raced with us and I’ve raced,” Rentschler’s daughter Jane Faulkner said. “So we’ve all been involved and we’ve all had to kind of work together to make the races even happen.”

In 2008 the family called a meeting at the Park County Fairgrounds and they began racing there.

“It was not easy at the fairgrounds because we kind of had to make our own track there. I had a road grader at the time so I’d drive it in and fix the track,” Rentschler said. “But it was fun, we had a good time.”

Back in their days at the fairgrounds he said they would have between 100-200 spectators per race but they never charged the audience and kept registration prices low. Faulkner said that the kart racing has never been a money-making thing, it’s about providing a family fun event. So they moved to her father’s property where they could keep costs low and keep providing fun for families.

With the help of GK Construction, whose owner and some employees raced, a track was built on Rentschler’s land within two days. 

“He said, ‘Bill, I heard that we gotta go somewhere else for racing,’” Rentschler said. “He said, ‘I’ll come out to your place and build a track.’”

In 2010, Faulkner’s son J.W. was born. Jane Faulkner continued to race and when her son was 4 Bill stood on the back of a Go-Kart and taught him how to drive, even though the heat from the vehicle burned his leg.

“Now we keep going for J.W.,” Jane said.

She said that he’s been racing longer than most of the adults in their circuit and because of his cautious driving and sportsmanship most adults enjoy racing with him despite his age. J.W. has recently graduated from racing stock karts to spec karts which allows him roughly double the horsepower. 

“I think it was always fun,” he said. “But now that it’s gotten higher horsepower in the spec class I’m just trying to actually win now.”

For J.W., kart racing keeps him interested because of the speed, the competitive aspect and the racing community.

His mother likes that J.W. is interested in the sport, but when she raced she also appreciated the speed that the tiny vehicles achieved.

“We have a really fun group of people that love to be here, love to do it and that kind of makes it worthwhile,” Jane said.

But family aside, adults and children alike still race and accompany one another to the races. At one point Jane said there were 45 drivers and 16 children participating.

“Seeing the success on [the track], even the adults … it’s very, very neat to see some that maybe don’t have things in their lives that they can feel successful about,” Jane said. “We’ve got a few other guys up in Billings … and they just love it too, it’s fun to see people feel that enjoyment in something and success.”