DIRTRACKR Daily Podcast - Episode Transcript

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Plans revealed for "The Most Hated Sprint Car Driver" + More late model shock talk | Daily 1-31-2024

Coming up, Terbo misses out at Ocala, more shock talk, Hoosier adds a late model tire and we aren't sure why, and I've got some breaking sprint car news. Let's go!

It's Wednesday, January 31st, I'm Justin Fiedler. This is DIRTRACKR Daily.

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The Lucas Oil Late Model Dirt Series took to Ocala Speedway last night for the first of two programs this week. There was a lot of talk afterwards about the positive improvements that were made to the facility, and the racing ended up being really solid. Jonathan Davenport was out front early from the pole, but by lap three it was Tyler Erb who was in control. Terbo took the lead with a slider into turn one, that it appeared JD didn't appreciate, as there was contact from the 49 to the rear of the 1 down the backstretch. This was the second time in two races that Davenport felt like he'd been roughed up, and I'll be curious to see how this affects his mood and driving style for the remainder of speedweeks. It definitely feels like the gloves are coming off early here from guys. Terbo was easily the fastest car for the feature, and it looked like he was headed for his first Lucas win in nearly a year. But lap traffic and Ricky Thornton Jr. got in his way. RTJ slipped by the Best Performance machine and led the final two laps to score his second win of the season. Terbo settled for second and Devin Moran was third. The second place finish for Erb was his first Lucas top ten since the Late Model Knoxville Nationals, a drought of nine races. It was his first top five finish since Georgetown last August, and he's still winless going back to East Bay in 2023. Since a top five Lucas championship finish in 2021, a season that included seven wins, it's been a tough past two years for Terbo and Best. They've gotten worse each of the last two seasons, and even though he's signed on with Lucas to start 2024, if speedweeks don't go well, we could see this team peel off to race elsewhere. Post race, Terbo mentioned the work of Integra Shocks to get him competitive last night, and that's been an interesting subplot here to start the year. We talked last week about some shock drama, but this extends beyond thru rods and what is or isn't legal. Several other Rocket Chassis teams have switched away from Integra to Fox, including the house car and Dennis Erb Jr. Most of the main Longhorn teams run Bilstein, and you've got other top guys like Brandon Overton and Chris Madden on Penskes. We'll see if those Integras can keep Terbo fast the rest of speedweeks. The Lucas late models will do it all over again tonight at Ocala, and then action shifts to All-Tech later in the week. The show will again be live on FloRacing tonight.

In some other dirt late model news from yesterday, Hoosier has made an alteration to it's national late model tire program for this season. I talked about this program last week when I discussed wanting to know what teams choices were for features. The NLMT program originally included four options, with the 1 being the softest, 4 being the hardest, and the 2 and 3 being in between. At this point, Lucas and the Outlaws only usually allow the 2, 3, and 4 for their races. In a press release, Hoosier announced they are adding a 2.25 version, which will be just a bit harder than the current 2 tire. According to Dirt on Dirt though, in a clarification from Hoosier's Shannon Rush, this new tire will be region specific, with him mentioning the northeast. And Lucas series director Rick Schwallie told those guys that Lucas will not be adding the 2.25 tire to their legal choices. If Lucas is not allowing it, I would assume that Steve Francis and the Outlaws would be aligned on that. This is a curious decision, and seems to go against the initial plan of creating a simplified tire offering via the NLMT program. It sounds like some around the sport are questioning this move.

I teased yesterday that we might break some sprint car news on the show today, so let's do that, shall we? Back in December I did a DIRTRACKR Conversations episode with sprint car driver Zach Hampton, and after a couple of years of trying to grind it out on his own, he talked about being on the hunt for a new deal for 2024. For a lot of the time he was a one-man band, and he knows it's going to be tough to succeed that way. After working through the last several weeks and months, Hampton has his plan now in place for this season. He's going to move his own equipment from Indiana to the Knoxville area to be ready when the season starts in April. He's got a place to live and space to keep his 35 car lined up there. During the week, he'll work in the shop for Dennis Gainey keeping up the Team DGRD sprint cars, which at the moment includes 410 stuff for Brandon Wimmer and a run at the 360 Knoxville track championship for Darin Naida. When he's not working for Gainey, he'll be able to keep his own cars ready, as he'll be taking on the Knoxville 410 track championship in 2024 as well. He finished sixth in the season finale at Knoxville last year, among several other appearances at the Sprint Car Capital of the World. From there, Hampton will fill in other 410 races as his schedule and resources allow. This will be a big shift for Hampton, who spent 2023 racing all over, including in Indiana, Ohio, Illinois, and elsewhere making starts with the Outlaws, All Stars, High Limit, and more. He did pick up a FAST Series win at Circle City in June. This will be a good year to hit Knoxville weekly, as they just upped their regular purses, adding nearly $5000 each night for feature finishers. Races are $6000 to win now, up from $5000. And they are $700 to start, up from $625. If you haven't checked out the interview I did with Zach, I would encourage you to do so. He talks about being what he called the most hated sprint car driver, and the challenges of trying to grind out a career as a driver a little further down the pecking order.

Around the other dirt racing shows this week, Quicktime has Clinton Boyles, Dirt Tracks and Rib Racks has Dillan Baldwin, Dirt Track Confessions has Jerry Higbie, Hoogie's Garage has Scott Winters, Turn 2 Terribles has Austin Berry and Kody Hartlaub, Plum Wild has Dylan Yeager, and there are new episodes of the Dirt Reporters, the Dirt Nerds, TJ Slideways Open Wheel Spectacular, and Across the Groove. To see the full list of shows and episodes, head over to dirtrackr.com/podcasts.

That's it for today's Daily. You do have several streaming options for today, so don't forget to hit up the streaming schedule at dirtrackr.com/watchtonight.

Hope you guys have a great Wednesday out there, we'll see you back here tomorrow!