DIRTRACKR Daily Podcast - Episode Transcript
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POWRi gets ASCS dates, clarity on Hudson O'Neal's immediate future | Daily 3-25-2024
Chase Briscoe is going back sprint car racing, Cory Eliason gets a much needed win, Justin Henderson has a new ride, we've had a Lucas championship shakeup, and we've got details on Hudson O'Neal's immediate future. Let's go!
It's Monday, March 25th, I'm Justin Fiedler. This is DIRTRACKR Daily presented by Kubota Genuine Parts.
The Lucas Oil Late Model Dirt Series closed out their weekend yesterday with a stop at Atomic Speedway. Originally scheduled for Friday, it was bumped to Sunday because of weather. The show turned into almost a complete sweep for Jonathan Davenport. Quick time overall in qualifying, a heat race win, and the feature win from the pole. He didn't lead every lap though, as Mike Marlar snuck a couple in before half way in lap traffic. It was all JD late though, with him earning Lucas win number two on the year. It was also a nice bounceback from a 15th place finish the night before at Brownstown. Davenport has now led laps in six of 15 races, and leads the series in total laps led. After the feature though, we've had a bit of shakeup in the Lucas championship standings. Ricky Thornton Jr. still leads, but only by five points over now Davenport. Devin Moran is third after a victory and a third at Atomic, and Hudson O'Neal has fallen from second to fourth. O'Neal started inside the top ten, but had his night derailed by a flat left rear. He ended up 22nd. O'Neal hadn't finished outside the top 20 in a Lucas race since the Show-Me 100 weekend last May. Behind O'Neal, from Mike Marlar in fifth, to Tim McCreadie in ninth, those five drivers are separated by just 105 points. So even with 15 races already done, things still incredibly fluid up and down the order. Lucas now goes quiet for the next several weeks, as some other series, including regional stuff, XR, and the World of Outlaws will be the focus. Lucas is back April 26th at Georgetown.
Back to O'Neal, Kyle McFadden got a chance to talk to him about everything that's transpired here lately, and you can read that full piece at floracing.com and dirtondirt.com. In that conversation, O'Neal revealed that he'll continue racing with Kevin Rumley over the next several weeks. Their plan is to hit I-75 and Tazewell this coming weekend with the Spring Nationals, and then the XR opener at Volunteer Speedway the week after that. From there, O'Neal told McFadden quote "it's a coin toss." He said they are still working to put some things together, and that they think they know the direction they are going. I think it's important to point out here as well that it's no small thing that O'Neal is going from Rocket chassis to the deep end with Longhorn. Rumley and his car are obviously instrumental in Longhorn's development. It will both be an opportunity for comparison for Longhorn, but there is likely to be at least some transition period for O'Neal. We know that it's taken Brandon Sheppard some time to get comfortable over the last year plus since leaving Rocket also. This will continue to be a storyline we follow in the coming weeks.
At BAPS Motor Speedway yesterday, Cory Eliason and the new look Ridge team got a much needed victory after a tough start to their sprint car season against High Limit and the World of Outlaws. Eliason was the beneficiary of first lap issues between Reese Nowotarski and Mark Smith. Nowotarski went into turn three on the opening lap, licked the stamp, and sent a massive slider at Smith. On the restart, Eliason was on the front row, and he grabbed the early lead. Troy Wagaman Jr. did lead some laps as well, and those two battled late to the line, with Eliason taking the win by 0.04 of a second. Eliason and the Ridge eight car were in Pennsylvania to get some races under their belts with new crew chief Jim Shuttlesworth. The team had recently parted ways with Tyler Swank, and it was definitely a good move to try and get this new pairing comfortable before the High Limit season starts back up again in April. Eliason is currently 18th in High Limit points, and has a sizeable hole to climb out of if they are going to contend for a High Limit charter spot. A Sunday show at BAPS isn't the same field he'll be racing again back out on the road, but wins are always good for the confidence.
A couple of other news items for you from recent days. First, NASCAR Cup Series driver Chase Briscoe is getting his sprint car team going again this season. The Mahindra branded five car will run approximately 35 races this season with Ford engines. Briscoe will run something like half the races, and midget racer Karter Sarff will run the rest. Sarff won twice last year with the Xtreme Outlaw Midgets, and added a POWRi victory as well. I don't think Sarff has a ton of winged experience, so this will be a step up for his career. Briscoe made a handful of winged sprint car starts in 2023, including with the All Stars at Outlaw Speedway, where he finished 16th. He also attempted the very first High Limit race back in 2022, and attempted a few super late model races that year. Briscoe comes from a dirt racing background, but we haven't see him participate as much as some of his other NASCAR compatriots, like Kyle Larson and Christopher Bell. No schedule was announced, with that information forthcoming.
And in the midwest, Justin Henderson has a new sprint car ride for 2024. He'll partner up with Guy Forbrook for some measure of races this season. Henderson was originally supposed to run the Don Kreitz 69K a bunch in Central Pennsylvania, but that deal went south not long ago over motor issues for Kreitz. The 69K scaled back to just Port Royal with Logan Wagner, and a few starts elsewhere with Daryn Pittman. Back in February, Henderson told Jeremy Elliott at sprintcarunlimited.com that he was going to focus on his own car in the aftermath, and that he was also looking for other opportunities. Henderson and Forbrook will start their season at Knoxville on April 20th, and I'm sure we'll see them plenty through the year at Huset's as well.
Finally today, I wanted to jump back to some of the fallout in the sprint car world in the aftermath of the World Racing Group deal to purchase the ASCS. We did a daily show where I talked about a bunch of those schedule changes, and POWRi stepping in to get some of those dates that were originally on the ASCS slate. That included the two Texas Motor Speedway weekends that lead into those High Limit races, and the Hockett/McMillin Memorial at Lucas Oil Speedway. Back on March 12th, it was announced that those Texas dates in April are now POWRi and Elite 410 Outlaw nights, paying $4000 and $5000 to win. That will be a tuneup weekend for the High Limit race on April 13th, both for competitors and the race track surface. Remember that the dirt track at Texas Motor Speedway doesn't get used very often. The Texas Motor Speedway website also shows the October ASCS races there as well flipped to POWRi. That weekend of the fourth and fifth, will then lead into the High Limit season finale on October 11th and 12th. And yesterday came the official announcement that the winged sprint car portion of the Hockett/McMillin is now both 410 and POWRi sanctioned. This had been a big weekend for 360 competitors in the past, with the Hockett drawing 85 360 teams last season. Now though, if all those guys want to race, they'll have to bolt in the big power. With that type of support, I am surprised the Hockett is moving away from 360s, and that POWRi didn't just keep this the same. I don't see any way that they can match that car count with 410s. And I wouldn't expect any national level teams to hit this one up, as the World of Outlaws are in California that week in September at Bakersfield and Merced, and High Limit has the $50,000 to win Commonwealth Clash at Lernerville. That Lernerville race a year ago drew 58 cars. You can see more details on the announcements at powri.com.
That's it for the Daily show today. Over at dirtrackr.com, I've made some much needed updates to the site's front page and the news offerings. That included getting rid of the now defunct All Star news feed, and adding High Limit. I also fixed the MARS series news feed, and added the FloRacing Night in America series. If you see any glaring omissions there, feel free to let me know.
Hope you guys have a great Monday out there, we'll see you back here tomorrow!