DIRTRACKR Daily Podcast - Episode Transcript

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Brandon Overton is at it again... | Daily 4-2-2024

Brandon Overton has become one of my favorite instigators in dirt racing, and he's moved from chassis to now dirt late model tires. We'll dive into his weekend trolling with American Racer and talk tire rules, tire wars, and more. Let's go!

It's Tuesday, April 2nd, I'm Justin Fiedler. This is DIRTRACKR Daily presented by Kubota Genuine Parts.

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We are back at it today after a couple of days off, so I wanted to get into a few things from the weekend. There was a fresh Daily show yesterday, where we went deep on the subject of dirt racing on television. Check that out if you are curious about the current state of broadcasting.

Going back to the weekend though, some intriguing dirt late model stuff to talk about, which is interesting because there was no national touring races on the schedule. We had all the heavy hitters scattered around the country, between the Southern Nationals, the Nippy 50 at Maquoketa, the Toilet Bowl at Clarksville, and elsewhere. The one thing that really stood out to me was Brandon Overton continuing to be an instigator. Remember earlier this year when he told FloRacing's Kyle McFadden that we were all just sitting at home and making stuff up about his chassis selection, and then weeks later basically confirming it wasn't a Longhorn he'd been driving in a victory lane interview. That wasn't us trolling, it was him trolling. It's been a pretty poorly kept secret at this point that Overton has been driving a Frankenstein'd together chassis out of the Wells shop, that I've been told is a hybrid of several other designs. We even did a daily show with photos pointing out some of the differences. And Ryan Gustin confirmed it this weekend at Maquoketa, saying there was quote "nothing Longhorn about it" when referring to the current Wells chassis. But Overton's trolling and pot stirring hasn't stopped with just chassis. Now he's moved on to dirt late model tires. On several occasions already this season, Overton has appeared at late model shows, not on Hoosier tires, but on American Racers. There are still series out there that allow other brands and compounds to be run, and Ray Cook's Spring Nationals is one of them. On Friday night at I-75, Overton nipped Dale McDowell late for the victory, and made sure to shout out American Racer in victory lane. He told series announcer Cody Earley quote "I want to thank American Racer Tire. You know they're helping us out, it's nice. It feels good to win on something a little different, shake things up a little bit. Just going to be better for everybody." I've been told, and I know the the Hunt the Front guys talked about this on their podcast as well, but supposedly Wells is getting the American Racers for $60 less a tire than Hoosiers. When top teams are spending probably near six figures a season on tire bills, that would appear to be a significant savings. And it will be a fact that many will point to when arguing that the tire rule should be opened up again to allow more competition. The argument goes something like competition means battles over pricing, and companies needing to produce better quality. Supposedly everyone gains in that scenario. But in reality, it's not that simple. The big dirty secret here, is that price doesn't actually matter in these cases. If the Hoosiers had been the better tire this past weekend, Overton wouldn't go slower or take away his chance to win over $60 a tire. He would have been on the more expensive option to have the best chance to win. So where open tire rules go sideways is teams needing to carry way more tires and options to account for all scenarios. Some places, one brand or compound will be faster, and you better have that in your trailer if you want to not be behind. We've been down this road before in dirt racing. And you don't have to take my word on any of this. Dirt Track Digest did a story about open tire rules in modified racing back in 2022, and a bunch of the top northeast mod guys were against them, with most of them pointing out the additional costs. With the national late model tours, and some of the regional series on just Hoosiers, there are basically three choices. The NLMT 2, 3, or 4. Love them, or hate them, that's pretty simple. But as soon as you add the American Racers in the mix, now there are an additional set of compounds and options. So with the the Spring Nationals, that's four more tires. The American Racer 44, 48, Pro3/56, and Pro4. So yes, they might be cheaper, but now you have to carry four additional options. Because if Overton or someone else just kicked your ass on one of those others, are you going to be okay not running it the next night? That math isn't mathing to me. What I would be curious to know as well, is if a series like the Spring Nationals, that lists American Racer as a sponsor, if they went exclusively American Racer, would that hurt their car counts? Would the teams that usually stay on Hoosiers not show up because they had to buy the other options? Even Overton won't be able to stay on just American Racers this season, that is unless he is okay missing out on the Lucas, DIRTcar, and Outlaw sanctioned crown jewels. Because those will all be Hoosier only events. Overton said this would make things better for everyone, but I don't know that I believe a tire war is what the sport needs at the moment. The can of worms is likely already open though with Overton's victory, and I'm sure teams are on the phones this week to get American Racers for upcoming weekends just in case. I understand that many are not happy with Hoosier's prices and some of the quality issues, but is spending an extra several hundred dollars a night for extra tires the best way to stick it to the purple guys? I don't know about that... One other note here, Overton and Wells Motorsports list Hoosier as a sponsor. It's on the car and on Overton's website. Hoosier by Brian is in reference to Hoosier Tire South.

If you ordered DIRTRACKR merch over the weekend, all orders were packed last night and dropped at the post office this morning. So hopefully you should have them soon, keep an eye on your tracking. I'm down to just a few 2Xs left in the new shirts, I'm already out of 3X and 4X, but I do still have some XLs and larges still in stock. You can pickup a shirt and a sticker over at shop.dirtrackr.com.

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