By Chad Meyer
Humboldt, IA’s Rob Hughes got his racing career started in 1994 in a somewhat unusual way.
“We were going to the races at [the Buena Vista Raceway] in Alta, and a lady we met, who had inherited some money, wanted to buy a race car. She ended up buying a Hobby Stock and we raced it at the Alta and Denison tracks,” Hughes recalls.
Hughes campaigned that car for a short time, until life and starting a family necessitated stopping racing. The return to racing though, occurred late in the season in 1997.
“We had gone to a couple races to watch and had thoughts of getting another car. We talked to my parents and we ended up purchasing a Hobby Stock that Jeff Feaster had,” Hughes said. “We raced the fall special at Algona and then went racing in 1998.”
Success at Algona occurred in his first full season there, winning the IMCA Hobby Stock main on August 22nd. He backed up that win with a victory in the Gene Schattschneider Memorial that fall in Algona.
After spending two full seasons in an IMCA Hobby Stock, Hughes made the move up the IMCA Stock Car class. In 2001, Hughes had four wins at Algona, with the biggest coming in the Kossuth County Fair race that summer.
“I remember that Jim Wickman sponsored the [six-foot tall] Stock Car trophy that year for the fair. Bruce and David Wickman were giving me a hard time about how they were going to win the trophy, but I made sure we came out on top,” Hughes said.
Another Algona memory that stands out to Hughes is the conversation he overheard during driver introductions during the 2002 season championship event. “I remember hearing one say to the other that ‘you already have the point title locked up, let me win the main.’” Hughes got past both for the win that night.
In 2007, Hughes made the jump to IMCA Modifieds. Though he later said he wished he would have stayed in the IMCA Stock Car division, he found success there too. Winning races at both Algona and the Hancock County Speedway in Modifieds, he also won the 2010 Hancock County Fair Race at Britt.
Even though he suffered a couple tore up race cars, Hughes is happy to have competed at the 2019 Race for Hope 74 at the Batesville Motor Speedway [AR] and during the Late Model Nationals at the Knoxville Raceway.
He’s most proud of the two point titles he won at Britt, which include the 2001 IMCA Stock Car and 2009 IMCA Modified championship. He also amassed at least 32 wins at the Algona track over his career.
Hughes joins three others as inductees in the Kossuth County Racing Hall of Fame.
