DIRTRACKR Daily Podcast - Episode Transcript

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That's it! Heat races are cancelled! | Daily 3-4-2024

Coming up, we'll talk a pivotal win for sprint car driver Anthony Macri, the World of Outlaws sprint cars at Volusia, and a late model series that had had enough of their drivers not following the rules. Let's go!

It's Monday, March 4th, I'm Justin Fiedler. This is DIRTRACKR Daily.

On the YouTube channel on Sunday we released the third episode in the 410 sprint car build series with driver Zach Hampton. In the first two parts, Zach got started with a bare frame, and spent a bunch of time on interior and the dash. In this newest video, he shifts to the rear end, and shows us things like the rear brake setup, rear end installation, the torque tube, and drive line. Lots of detail, and I hope you pay attention to Zach's dialogue, because there are some sneaky hilarious moments through these first few episodes. If you'd like to support Zach and his sprint car career, check out the video descriptions on those episodes. They include links to his merch site and social media channels. At this moment, Zach is transitioning from Indiana to Knoxville, where he will race this season while also working for Dennis Gainey's Team DGRD. I'll put links below to the series and latest video for you to check out.

Down in Florida yesterday, the first of two World of Outlaws nights at Volusia was rained out. It was a typical Florida setup where it looked like things were okay, but there were storms about, and the track ended up getting hit, ending the day's action. They will try again today with $12,000 on the line. I'm sure you'll hear at some point about the car count, as they will probably end up being somewhere around 20. MyRacePass showed 18 yesterday, but there was at least one or two cars that were there that weren't shown as signed in yet. It sounds like had the weather not gone south, they would have been really close to the number they had in 2023 at this event, which was 23 cars. I was told both Justin Peck and Kevin Newton decided to head home because of the weather. Peck and the Buch 13 did have these two races on their schedule intially. I wouldn't read too much into this event having a low car count, but folks will certainly latch onto it. MRP did show three High Limit drivers at Volusia, with Jacob Allen, Corey Day, and Corey Eliason all signed in. The bulk of the High Limit roster though chose to take the weekend off after Volusia, East Bay, and Golden Isles. After today, the sprint car teams will haul ass to Texas, with Kennedale Speedway Park coming up Friday and Saturday with the Outlaws. I have heard we'll see some of the other High Limit guys run some of the Texas races, including Brent Marks who has sponsor and owner connections there. If you want to watch tonight, racing will be streamed live on DIRTVision.

At Lincoln Speedway yesterday, Anthony Macri won his first sprint car race since July of 2023. He had a mid race battle with Kyle Moody, but got the lead back on a restart and drove away in lap traffic for the victory. Moody and Danny Dietrich rounded out the podium. Macri hadn't won a race since he'd left his family 39M team hours before the Eldora Million last summer. He returned late in 2023, and he and crew chief Joe Mooney have been working to get back to their form since. They had some solid runs down south to start the season, including a second on the final night at Volusia, and a fifth against High Limit at East Bay. You figured it was only a matter of time until they broke through. Before things went sideways last year, Macri and Mooney had already won eight times together, including against the All Stars, Outlaws, and High Limit. In the 37 starts between their first win at BAPS in March, and their final race together at Port Royal in July, it was eight wins, 29 top fives, 31 top tens, and average finish of 4.97. That final nine race stretch before Macri left included a weekly show at Husets, two Ohio Speedweek shows, and PA Speedweek. It was nine straight top four runs, including three wins. When these guys get rolling again, and Macri is comfortable, they can easily get and stay hot. Now that this first win is knocked off, I'd say some of the pressure might be off Macri. There is no doubt he struggled at times away from the 39M, and his confidence definitely took a beating. It was a vivid illustration of just how difficult sprint car racing can be. Macri went from one of the most talked about and highest earning drivers, to looking very pedestrian almost overnight. Yesterday's win though shows things are back on track again though. Weekly racing at Lincoln continues this coming Saturday, and Port Royal is slated to have their season opener as well.

The other big show from yesterday was the $20,000 to win March Madness super late model show at Cherokee Speedway in South Carolina. The Southern All Stars sanctioned event saw Trent Ivey dominate, leading all 50 laps from the front row. He held off Brandon Overton late, who ended up bowing out with two to go with a flat tire. Donald McIntosh and Chris Madden joined Ivey on the podium. I don't know what it is about this race and this race track, but there always seems to be some measure of drama, and yesterday was no different. A year ago at March Madness, we had Brandon Overton and Chris Madden scuffling in the pits, and yesterday things got weird before the feature even started. Jack Cofer (who is a great follow by the way if you're a dirt late model fan, @JackCofer94 on Twitter) tweeted at 4:30PM that Southern All Star officials called off the program's four heat races because the super late model drivers wouldn't go to staging. They decided to just start all 25 late models on hand by qualifying times. Supposedly after multiple passes through the pits calling for heats, only two cars were in the lanes ready to race. And this happened after the drivers had issues with the track surface during hot laps, and I was told there was also drama the night before at North Alabama. There was even talk of moving the super late model feature to the end of the night as an added punishment against the drivers, but that eventually didn't happen. Apparently some drivers didn't want to heat race after qualifying, it was a topic of discussion at the drivers' meeting, and there was plenty of finger pointing happening between the track, the series, and the drivers. Fans in the stands and watching at home were none too pleased that they didn't get to see heat races, which is understandable. They are really the ones who lose out in a situation like this. But who do you blame here? Is it the drivers for not going with the schedule and following the series directives, or the series for putting their foot down? I would tend to side with the series, as you can't let the inmates run the asylum, but this is bad no matter how you slice it. Either way, they don't call it March Madness for nothing.

That's it for the Daily show today. You can see your Monday streaming options over at dirtrackr.com/watchtonight, and while you're there sign up for The Slider email newsletter and see the day's dirt racing updates.

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