DIRTRACKR Daily Podcast - Episode Transcript

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Doing this will get you kicked out of late model races | Daily 2-18-2024

On the show today, don't put your late model tires in swimming pools or you'll get kicked out, plus weekend results, Ryan Timms' trying to bounce back, and scary crashes at Ocala. Let's go.

It's Sunday, February 18th, I'm Justin Fiedler. This is DIRTRACKR Daily.

As I'm sure you are well aware, rain knocked out most of Saturday night's racing down south, so DIRTcar Nationals, USAC, and 360s at East Bay all concluded their Florida trips on Friday night.

At Volusia, Nick Hoffman and Devin Moran closed out DCN with World of Outlaws Late Model wins. Back on Thursday, Hoffman made a last lap pass on Chris Madden to steal the victory in an entertaining feature. That one had four different lap leaders, and as we've seen all week, the elbows were out. It was Hoffman's second career Outlaw late model win, and he joins Kyle Strickler, Ryan Gustin, and Kyle Bronson as the only drivers to win gators at Volusia in a late model and a modified. Friday night in what ended up being the finale, Devin Moran took the lead on lap 15 from pole sitter Cade Dillard and was unchallenged the rest of the way. It was his second Outlaw win of the season and Volusia seems to have become a Moran favorite. In his past eight races there, he has four wins, six podiums, and seven top tens. Knowing that Saturday was probably going to rain out, the Outlaws did boost the Friday purse to $16,000 to win, up from $12,000 originally, so hat tip to them for that. Bobby Pierce was crowned the weeklong gator champion, and leaving DIRTcar Nationals, he has a six point lead over Brandon Sheppard in the Outlaw standings after these first four races. We won't see the Outlaws again until later in March, with a trip to Thunderhill Raceway planned for the 22nd and 23rd.

Another thing I learned this weekend was that national touring late model competitors are now not allowed to put their tires in swimming pools, freezers, ice baths, or allowed to apply direct heat to them using things like torches or other sources of heat. This treatment of tires will get you suspended indefinitely from both the Outlaws and Lucas, as will washing tires, or spraying any substances on them within three hours of hot laps. This information was shared with drivers and teams back on Thursday, through rules bulletins from both Lucas director Rick Schwallie and Outlaw director Steve Francis. When you see something like this released, with such specific information and processes called out, it's pretty clear this is being directed at a very precise team or set of teams. Word is this behavior had been going on during speedweeks, and complaints had been made to both series. It's not hard to look around online and find the rumored team that is suspected of being the main participant here, and if you look, that team was at Volusia Monday and Tuesday, but suddenly didn't participate the rest of the week. I'm not going to pass judgement on the rules bulletin, mostly because I don't really care, but I do think it's funny to picture teams dunking tires in kiddie pools in the pit area to get them quote unquote ready for racing that night. Clearly nothing is outside the realm of possiblity when trying to find advantages over your competitors.

Week ending Super DIRTcar Series wins went to Mat Williamson and Matt Sheppard, with Williamson claiming the big gator trophy. Sheppard's win on Friday came after he took the lead via a very strange sequence of events. Larry Wight tangled with the lap car of Brett Hearn inside ten to go, and in the aftermath, Wight ended up tipped over and Rudolph got collected. So on the restart, Sheppard went from third to first and drove on to the win. It was absolute chaos. The next time we'll see the Super DIRTcar Series is March 30th at New Egypt. That race will kick off their 2024 championship season. Remember these early season DCN nights are non-points.

Before we move on, I sent two new issues of The Slider email newsletter in recent days. One included a Lucas speedweeks wrapup from Spence Smithback, and the other was another great piece from Pat Sullivan about the current state of midget racing. To see those pieces and sign up to get the emails for free, visit dirtrackr.com/theslider. If you would like to contribute to a future issue, drop me a message or email.

The USAC sprint cars ended their Florida trip with two more nights at Ocala Speedway after Volusia. Justin Grant and CJ Leary picked up those two victories. Grant now has three wins in six races. The Friday win for Leary was his first USAC win since Kokomo last July. He was strong for the entire couple of weeks, never finishing worse than ninth. Nobody though was able to keep pace with Logan Seavey over the six races, with the reigning midget and Silver Crown champion finishing on the podium every night, including two wins. Clearly no "get up to speed" period here for the new Abacus Racing sprint car operation. Seavey's last 11 USAC sprint car starts include four wins, nine top fives, and 10 top tens. They leave Florida as the championship leader, and unless someone shows us otherwise, these guys have to be the favorite for all three titles this season. It definitely feels like a USAC triple crown is in play for 2024. We did have two nasty crashes at Ocala, with both Zach Daum and Trey Osborne leaving the ballpark in turn three on Thursday in separate incidents. Daum's crash happened in the fourth heat race, and Osborne's was in the feature. Daum's wild ride ended with his car near those turn four bleachers, and on fire. He was okay though afterwards, but didn't compete the rest of the weekend. Osborne's trip over that same wall resulted in a fractured back, and he didn't race Friday either. The USAC season doesn't start back up again until April 5th at Terre Haute, so we'll see if that's enough time for Osborne to heal and get back to racing. If not, this would be a significant blow to his rookie season with the series. I hate that it's 2024 and we still have race cars leaving the ballpark because of there not being fencing all the way around. Ocala has catchfence down the backstretch and around to the front, but nothing in turn two or turn three. The dangers to the drivers aside, we can't be in a situation where cars are ending up close to where spectators are, like we saw with Daum's crash. Race fans in the seats and in the pit area did not sign up to be included in the danger for the night.

In some sprint car racing of the winged type, Austin McCarl and Ryan Timms picked up 360 wins at East Bay to close out the very last WinterNationals ever. Timms has had a strong start to his 360 season, already winning three times. There is still work to do though with the 410. Just one feature appearance against the World of Outlaws at Volusia, an 18th place finish on February 8th. He had a 10th and a 15th against High Limit at East Bay. He's a guy you have to wonder if has been affected by the new sprint car tires that came into affect early in 2023. Back in 2022, he had eight 410 sprint car wins in 44 starts, including 29 top tens. Those wins came at Huset's, and with series like POWRi and NOSA. He also had good runs against the Outlaws. But 2023 was a significant step back for the young Oklahoma driver, with just two local 410 wins, and ten top ten finishes in 59 races. The tires and the addition of a sizeable midget schedule seem from the outside to be the only real differences from one year to the next. For 2024 though, there have been changes inside the team, with longtime crew chief Billy Lawhead now over working for Brady Bacon's USAC operation. We'll see if things can get going back again in a good direction for Timms. He'll be in action later this week at Golden Isles with High Limit.

That's it for the daily show today. Hope you guys have a great Sunday out there, we'll see you back here tomorrow!