The driver killed in a weekend accident at Canandaigua Motorsports Park will be laid to rest this week.

Calling hours for Kevin Ward, Jr. are Wednesday, August 13, 2014 at the Trainor Funeral Home in Boonville from 12:00noon to 4:00pm and 6:00pm to 9:00pm.   Funeral services will take place on Thursday at 11:00am at South Lewis Senior High School.

The Port Leyden resident was born on May 23, 1994 and was just twenty years old when he was killed in an accident involving NASCAR driver Tony Stewart on Saturday.  Ward had walked onto the track after his car spun out and hit the wall while racing on the dirt track.  He was injured, not in the initial accident, but after Stewart fatally struck him while he was walking on the racetrack.

Speaking of one headline announcing Ward's death, the obituary on the funeral home's website reads as follows: "The headline in The Watertown Times was accurate; 'Kevin Ward's Life was Racing.' Since the age of 4, Kevin Ward Jr. had been behind the wheel of a racecar. He began racing go carts at the age of 4 and as a teen he raced a 270 Micro Sprint at Paradise Speedway, Geneva, NY. Kevin was in his fifth year of racing in the Empire Super Sprints 360 Sprint Car Class throughout the northeastern United States and Canada. In 2013, Mr. Ward made racing history at the Evans Mills Speedway when he won the first Empire Super Sprints race on an asphalt track surface despite never having raced on asphalt before."

The Trainor Funeral Home is located at: 143 Schuyler Street in Boonville, New York  13309.

South Lewis Senior High School is located on East Road in Turin, New York.

The family is asking that memorial contributions be made to the Empire Super Sprints Injured Drivers' Fund.  The Empire Super Sprints League is asking those who attend the Lucas Oil Empire Super Sprints at Brewertown Speedway on Friday to wear orange in honor of Ward.

 

 

 

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