The Read Win Race program is in its fourth year and held its very first kickoff banquet Saturday night at the Billings Hotel & Convention Center.
The program inspires kids to read.
"The message I get to them, would you be in a different place today if somebody motivated you to read?" said Dale Sekora, the founder of Read Win Race.
Sekora based the program on the 26-year Race To Read in Morrison, Colorado.
The founder of Race To Read, Tami Bandimere, gave the keynote speech.
"Learn how to read, come to the races," said Bandimere, who is also part of the Bandimere Speedway executive team. "See what we do, have fun and maybe someday when you're old enough to drive a junior dragster or even when you get your driver's license, you'll go, you know, I'm going to I'm going to go to Bandimere Speedway instead of racing on the highway or racing on the side streets. That's street racing. We do drag racing."
"To get all the way through the program where they earn T shirts and tickets to the racetrack, get to see the jet cars run and watch someone from their school race in actual cars, they have to read 32 hours during the six week program, " Sekora said.
More than 1,300 students in kindergarten to 5th grade are participating from Blue Creek, Canyon Creek, Elysian, Highland, Independent and Trinity Lutheran.
Principals and librarians had driven the cars in past years. Read win race culminates with someone from the school staff racing at the Yellowstone dragstrip in Acton on June 4-5.
"Encourage kids to read give them some fun prizes, invite them to the races and hopefully we create lifelong readers," Bandimere said.
"It's Read Win Race," Sekora said. "If you're reading, you're winning in life. We just use racing and race cars to make it more fun."
