Ed Green – Driver

By Chad Meyer

Ed Green’s racing career began in 1993 at the age of 16 with an old Chevelle in Algona’s Econo Stock division. Riding around with his dad, Marv, in his push truck exposed Ed to the drivers and cars at the local speed plant.

“I got to meet all the drivers and just be around the track,” Green remembers. “Gene Schattschneider was racing then and he became a bit of a hero to me. That’s where the orange on my race cars came from and the first racing suit I used was one of Gene’s old suits.”

A family connection helped further Green’s interest in the sport. “My brother-in-law is Ron Reefer, and being down in the pits, helping on race cars got me more involved. In 1993, we decided to race an Econo Stock,” said Green. “The first race was such a blur, I don’t remember much other than I knew we had a lot to learn.”

After a year in the Econo Stock, Green made the move to the Hobby Stock Class, battling the likes of Dan Hanselman, Jermey Mills, Stacey Mills, Rob Hughes and many more. It was in the B-Mod class that Green is most remembered, though.

In 2000, when the track in Algona established the 360 Mod/B-Mod division, Green made the switch to that division. And he did it with a Dodge engine under the hood. “We wanted to do something different than everybody else. My dad had Dodge’s and we were faimilar with them. When the rules came out, we spent the winter figuring out how to make it work.”

Green captured his first of many career wins during that 2000 season, wins that included the Kossuth County Fair race. The next season though, provided the race he remembers most. “In 2001, Chuck Klocke came on board and our program was really starting to go. Before the fair race that night, Chuck said to me, ‘We really need to get one of those fair race trophies.’ When the night was over, both Klocke sponsored cars, mine and Kevin Stoa’s, were fair race winners.”

2002 was Green’s most successful season. He had at least 12 wins just at Algona, along with many wins at other tracks, including Britt and Mason City. At Algona, he collected the season opener, the Mid-Season Championship, Race Days, the Season Championship feature and both nights of the Schattschneider Memorial. Green was the season point champion at Algona, Britt and Mason City at the conclusion of that season.

The next year, he made the move to an IMCA Modified. “2002 was such a successful season, we felt it was the right time to move up,” he says. A rule change regarding the Dodge engine in the B-Mod class at the end of 2002 also convinced Green it was time to do something different.

“The Dodge motor we had just worked. By the second year we ran it, we had all the bugs worked out of it. During the 2002 season, we never had that engine out of the car once. There were nights that I’d get teched before the race even started. We were always legal,” he said.

In the IMCA Modifieds, Green scored a couple of wins at Algona in 2005.

“I’m most proud of making that Dodge engine work and making the car work ourselves. I’m also proud of all the guys who helped me. We were racing three to four nights a week and spent every night it seemed in the shop. And they were there every night. It didn’t dawn on me until later how much they all gave to keeping me racing. I really appreciated all they did for me,” he says.

Today, Green operates Ed’s Service Station in Algona. He joins three other individuals as 2024 inductees into the Kossuth County Racing Hall of Fame.