From Butler Bulldogs to the Brickyard: How Michael Kaltenmark Leads with Faith at 200 MPH

Most people would consider a job marketing the Indianapolis 500 — the world's largest single-day sporting event — the ultimate career win. Michael Kaltenmark is one of those people. But before he could fully embrace it, he had to wrestle with a harder question: Can God really use me here?

Kaltenmark is the Vice President of Marketing at Indianapolis Motor Speedway, the iconic venue at 16th and Georgetown in Indianapolis that hosts 350,000 fans on race day. His path to that role winds through small-town Indiana, nearly two decades at Butler University, and an unlikely partnership with a bulldog named Blue. It is, by any measure, a remarkable story. But what makes it worth telling is not the career arc — it is the faith that quietly runs underneath all of it.

A Long Road to the Right Place

Kaltenmark grew up in Wabash, Indiana, the youngest of three boys in a family rooted in public education. He credits his parents and his community with laying a foundation that still shapes him. "I think almost daily about my parents and my brothers and all those great people in Wabash who helped raise me," he says. "It's easy to see now as I look back just how much of an impact they've had in my life."

He enrolled at Butler University in 1998, graduated in 2002, and then — almost by accident — never really left. He started in fundraising and development, work that did not come naturally but taught him something invaluable about relationships. His true calling was in marketing and communications, the field he had studied. And his breakthrough came through a dog.

In 2004, Kaltenmark took over Butler's live mascot program, caring for Butler Blue II and eventually Butler Blue III. He spent sixteen years managing the program, all while taking on an expanding portfolio of marketing, digital strategy, brand development, and community relations roles for the university. In parallel, he moonlighted in the INDYCAR SERIES — first as a PR and marketing contractor for Vision Racing, then during each May for teams like Ed Carpenter Racing and Panther Racing, and eventually for Indianapolis Motor Speedway itself.

When IMS President Doug Boles called to ask if Kaltenmark would consider leading marketing at IMS full time, the answer was never really in doubt. In the fall of 2021, after nearly twenty years of employment at Butler, he made the move. "I traded one passion for another," he says simply. "If I was going to leave Butler for anything, it was probably going to be something at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway or Disney World. Disney did not call. Doug Boles did."

The Question That Almost Tripped Him Up

Here is where the story gets honest. Kaltenmark arrived at IMS with enthusiasm — and then quietly began to doubt himself. At Butler, the mission was visible: education, impact, young lives shaped. But selling tickets to a race? He struggled to see where God fit into that picture.

"I thought, what am I doing here? I'm just selling race tickets. Awfully immature and naive of me to question God in that manner — because God can use you no matter where you are. He finally had to hit me over the head with a 2x4 and say, 'I've got you right where I want you. You're not just selling race tickets. You're selling race tickets to the world's largest sporting event inside the world's largest sporting venue. You think I can't use you there?'"

That reorientation changed everything. Kaltenmark stopped asking whether his workplace was worthy of his faith and started asking how his faith could show up in his workplace. The answer, he discovered, was through how he leads.

Servant Leadership at 200 MPH

Running marketing for one of sport's most storied institutions is not a low-pressure job. The Indianapolis 500 demands months of relentless work — fifteen-hour days are standard during May — and the stakes are enormous. Hundreds of thousands of fans, global media attention, decades of legacy on the line every single year.

In that environment, Kaltenmark has made a deliberate choice about the kind of leader he wants to be. Not the loudest voice in the room. Not the one quick to point fingers or defend territory. Something quieter, and in his view, far more powerful.

"I like to lead through servanthood," he says. "Serving my team and my colleagues and showing up for them in a way that I hope shines a light on something bigger — my faith in Jesus Christ. I'd rather show them than tell them about it, but I'm always happy to tell them."

He points to a specific challenge that tests this conviction regularly: the inevitable friction between departments. At IMS, a small full-time staff coordinates an enormously complex set of events. Marketing, ticketing, operations, partnerships, safety and security — each team has its own priorities, and those priorities do not always align. Ego and pride can easily become weapons.

Kaltenmark's approach is to check both at the door. When another department makes a decision that affects his team, his instinct is not to escalate — it is to pick up the phone.

"I don't think scorched earth is the answer. It's not going to do us any good for me to fly off the handle and start pointing fingers. A lot of times it just involves a conversation — calling and saying, 'I understand this happened. Walk me through that, because here's how it impacts us.' If I can model that for my team, then they understand: we're not going to behave like that here, even though that may have been the precedent before."

He is quick to add that this is not passive or naive. He acknowledges when something is wrong. He advocates for his team. But he operates from the assumption that most people are acting from positive intent — and that responding with empathy almost always produces a better outcome than responding with anger. "After all," he says, "chances are that person was trying to do the right thing, not understanding the ramifications."

He ties this directly to Christ's model of leadership. "It's okay to lead from a meek place. Jesus did that. Certainly Jesus flipped tables and got upset when he needed to, but for the most part he took a back seat — and then became the most influential person in the world. If Jesus can do that, that's the model."

Being Where Your Feet Are

Away from the Speedway, Kaltenmark is married to his high school sweetheart, Tiffany, a physical therapist from Wabash. Together they are raising two sons — Everett, fifteen, and Miles, eleven — who are deeply invested in travel baseball. He leads a men's group that meets every other week. He listens to sermons when he cannot make it to church. He works to stay in the Word daily.

He is honest that the balance is imperfect. After the intensity of May, he can look back at his spiritual disciplines and find some grades he is proud of — and others he needs to improve. "We're human," he says. "We have so many demands and calls on our life. But if we're a child of God, that's our main purpose. It's good to take stock and say, 'I need to get better here.'"

A phrase has anchored him through this season: be where your feet are.

"I don't just have to be in the sanctuary to be living on mission and to be useful for God. Whether I'm standing at my desk, standing on a baseball diamond, or wherever I am in between — I can live on mission. I can be a living instrument for the kingdom."

What He Would Tell Every Christian in the Workplace

When asked what he would say to Christian business leaders — especially those early in their journey of integrating faith and work — Kaltenmark does not offer a complicated framework. He offers two reminders that have defined his own career.

First: God can use you wherever you are. The postal carrier. The physician. The race ticket marketer. Profession does not determine kingdom impact — presence does. "When people show up different for the Lord, you notice it. It resonates. It's impactful."

Second: just show up. Lead with servant-heartedness, empathy, and compassion. Let people see something in you that makes them curious about what drives you. Then be ready to tell them.

"When you see somebody respond because of how you showed up, your witness to them — it's almost like a drug. You can almost hear the heavens rejoicing. And that feels good. You do it once and you want to keep doing it, because that's another soul that's going to be in the kingdom of heaven. So show up for the kingdom, and leave the rest to him. Get out of the way and let God use you. It's that simple. You don't have to overcomplicate it."

The 110th Indianapolis 500, held just weeks before this conversation, was a sellout — arguably the greatest race in recent memory, capped by the closest finish in the event's storied history. Kaltenmark is proud of that. But he is careful about how he accounts for it.

"That doesn't just happen," he says. "There's a lot of people working behind the scenes. And frankly, I'm proud of the way those people work to make that happen. There's been a culture shift here, and it's been a lot of fun to be a part of."

A culture shift driven, in no small part, by a VP of Marketing from Wabash, Indiana, who learned to trust that God had him exactly where he needed to be — and to lead accordingly.