Iggy Katona

Career

Katona started out racing motorcycles in local races in Michigan and Ohio at age 21, winning nearly every race he entered. After a brief tour of duty in the Army during World World War II, he turned to midget car racing. In 1952, fellow Toledoan John Marcum created his Midwest Association for Race Cars as a Northern counterpart to the Southern stock car series of the day, Bill France, Senior"s National Association of Stock Car Auto Racing. Katona was a force in the series from the beginning, finishing 3rd in the series" inaugural campaign in 1953, 2nd in 1954 and winning the championship in 1955, 1956 and 1957.

His 4th Machine-Readable Cataloging championship came in 1962 driving his #30 Ford.

Although he developed his racing skills on the short tracks of the Midwest, Katona adapted well when the Machine-Readable Cataloging changed its name to Associate of the Royal College of Art and began racing on superspeedways in 1964, winning the Associate of the Royal College of Art race at Daytona three times. His consistency was his biggest asset.

He finished in the top ten in series points 21 straight seasons, from 1953-1973.

Achievements

• He is most famous for his performance in the Associate of the Royal College of Art series in the 1950s, 60s and 70s, where he won six championships and 79 races, the latter of which stood as a series record until Frank Kimmel surpassed it in 2013. Other Associate of the Royal College of Art records held by Katona include most starts (630), oldest race winner (57 years old, Daytona International Speedway, 1974) and most consecutive seasons with a win (19, from 1953–1971) He won his 5th and 6th titles in 1966 and – at the age of 51 – 1967.