Former dirt track racer and Burlington, Iowa native Devon Rouse will turn his first laps on the asphalt in an ARCA stock car on Friday. And he’ll be making history as he does it.
When Rouse takes the track on Friday and Saturday morning (9:00 a.m. CT – 4:00 p.m. CT) for the tour’s annual test session, he’ll be the first openly gay driver in ARCA Racing Series history to take the green flag.
Rouse will be taking the wheel of Andy Hillenburg’s Fast Track Racing car.
“They’re looking for certain things,” Rouse said. “Obviously times (matter), they might ask me to go up a lane from what I’m running so you need to know about placement as a driver. They’re watching for that, times, accuracy … there’s certain aspects that they will be looking for.”
Rouse hopes to use this weekend to launch his stock car career. Should he succeed and eventually make it as a NASCAR driver, he would be just the second LGBTQ+ driver to do so.
Stephen Rhodes was the first openly gay driver to run laps in a NASCAR-sanctioned race. Rhodes competed in two events in 2003 with a best finish of 21st place.
Because there have been so few openly LBGTQ+ drivers in the sport, Rouse struggled with coming out.
For a while, he didn’t think he would ever do it.
“I’ve known since middle school,” Rouse said. “At first, I was going to take that to my grave.”
But as his name grew bigger and he started getting offers to race with different teams, Rouse considered what his career and personal life would look like if he decided to come out.
“I was so worried that it was going to alter any future endeavors such as what I’m doing now,” Rouse said. “That was my biggest struggle.”
But last summer, Rouse came out publicly. He chose June, Pride Month, to do so.
He gradually posted the news on social media on different channels throughout the month.
His Tik Tok video revealing the news has since been viewed over 120,000 times.
“I had no idea they were going to even reach the level that they did,” Rouse said. “It was time to start living for me and not worrying about what others thought.”
It’s been a mostly positive experience for Rouse.
“Ultimately, really 99 percent has been amazing,” Rouse said. “You have a couple of negatives in everything you do. You have a couple of haters everywhere, but you know if people choose to not support it, it doesn’t matter. It ultimately doesn’t matter if you support it or not. I don’t care. Everyone is entitled to their own opinion and everything. It’s just a respect thing for me.”
One of the biggest positives in it was grabbing the attention of 2017 ARCA Champion Austin Theriault.
Theriault, who also ran some races in NASCAR’s national tours, helped Rouse get his ride this weekend at Daytona.
“Austin reached out first on Instagram,” Rouse said. “He said he knew several gay people in the sport. He was more than supporting and told me to reach out with him. He’s really been helping me get through this and get ready for this test as far as what I can expect.”
While Rouse’s current focus is this weekend’s test, he anticipates running a partial schedule in the different ARCA Racing tours, depending on funding, as well as a pair of NASCAR Truck Series races when the tour goes dirt racing in 2021.
As he continues to advance in his career, Rouse wants to use his platform to help others.
“I do want to be there as a role model and an influencer for the people that have ever felt like I have or felt that there was nobody,” Rouse said. “I want to be that person up there where they can say, ‘If he did it, so can I.’”
But in the end, Rouse hopes his talent–not his sexuality–will define him.
“My sexuality doesn’t define me,” Rouse said. “It doesn’t define my skills. It doesn’t define my morals. That will decide itself during my career.”
