By Chris Jenkins

MILWAUKEE (AP) _ Dick Trickle just signed up for Medicare.

But that doesn't mean he won't try to trade some paint with NASCAR star Matt Kenseth and other notable drivers when he comes out of semiretirement Tuesday night for the Slinger Nationals in Slinger, Wis.

``I'm going there to win,'' said Trickle, who turns 65 in October. ``I ain't going there to show.''

Trickle hasn't raced at NASCAR's top level since 2002, but he still races occasionally at minor-league short tracks in his home state of Wisconsin.

``I'm pretty well retired,'' Trickle said by telephone from his home outside Charlotte, N.C. ``I don't have them scheduled yet, but I'll probably run another couple races in Wisconsin this year.''

So, does he still have his skills?

``I don't do it every day, so I'm probably not as tough as I was,'' Trickle said. ``But I'm as good as I was.''

Trickle never won a race in 24 years at NASCAR's top level, then called Winston Cup.

He did win two races in the second-tier Busch Series, and gained a cult following in part because of a name that could induce giggles from any self-respecting eighth-grader. ESPN commentators built the legend by noting where Trickle finished every week.

In the Midwest, however, Trickle was known as perhaps the most formidable grassroots short-track driver in history.

Record-keeping for grassroots racing is sporadic, but a fan website, tricklefan.com, credits him with more than 1,200 career victories in several different forms of racing _ proving, perhaps, that you don't have to be holding a rod and reel to tell fish stories in Wisconsin.

Trickle will try to add another victory to that total _ whatever it is _ at Slinger Speedway's quarter-mile oval on Tuesday, when he faces a field expected to include Kenseth, the 2003 NASCAR champion, and NASCAR regulars Scott Wimmer and Todd Kluever.

Wimmer, who calls Trickle a family friend, said the old man still brags that he can win.

``You can't argue with him,'' Wimmer said before a Busch Series race at the Milwaukee Mile last month. ``He's won more races than anyone in the world, I think.''

Wimmer credits Trickle for helping Wisconsin drivers make inroads into NASCAR, where drivers who weren't from the South used to be viewed skeptically.

``Every time you talk to him, you learn something,'' Wimmer said.

Trickle originally planned to race a 17-year-old car on Tuesday, but said he ``couldn't quite get it whipped into shape'' the last time he ran it. So Trickle had friends build him a new car.

``This'll be a test, but I'm up for it,'' Trickle said.

Trickle is spending his semiretirement on a sprawling property on the outskirts of Charlotte, where he lives with his three children and their families.

Trickle said he now spends most of his time keeping his ``toys'' running, fiddling with a collection of motorcycles, tractors and other mechanical goodies. He sprinkles in a bit of golf, too.

``I tell my kids, 'You're lucky I didn't try to make a living golfing. We'd really be broke,''' he said.