DIRTRACKR Daily Podcast - Episode Transcript

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Breaking sprint car news, plus is this late model veteran in trouble? | Daily 7-31-2024

On the show today we'll talk breaking sprint car news, Jimmy Owens' status with Koehler Motorsports, Tuesday results, and more. Let's go!

It's Wednesday, July 31st, I'm Justin Fiedler. This is DIRTRACKR Daily presented by Kubota Genuine Parts.

Over the next two weeks, the focus in sprint car racing will very much be on the Knoxville Raceway. The 360 Nationals start tomorrow night, you've then got the Capitani Classic on Sunday, and then this time next week we'll be full on into the 410 Nationals. Looking around at some of my dirt racing media-type colleagues, you're seeing a lot of previews and entry list rundowns, and such. But one driver who will not be mentioned, or talked about is Devon Borden. The Stehman team announced today that Borden will miss the Nationals because of injury. The team was also absent from the Summer Nationals at Williams Grove this past weekend. Last Friday and Saturday, they posted to social media that they weren't racing because of a quote "medical emergency," before later revealing that Borden had suffered 2nd degree burns on his back in an incident at home. And today, along with announcing that they wouldn't be at Knoxville, the team says they will race again in the future when Borden's back is healthy enough to compete. This group has struggled a bit this year, especially when you compare results to a 2023 season that saw seven wins and 44 top tens in 74 appearances and the track championshp at Port Royal. For 2024, they parted ways with Jim Shuttlesworth, rebranded to Stehman Motorsports, and the plan was to travel more with Borden. And to some extent, they have gotten out of Central PA more, running 17 times, including in Florida with High Limit, during Ohio Speedweek, and most recently with the Outlaws and High Limit at Attica and Eldora. But 70% of their races have still come in PA. Some of those races as well were Borden going home to Washington for Dirt Cup in his family car. But just a single win so far, in April at Port Royal, and nine top fives. Once Borden is healthy enough to race, this team will be looking to turn around their season.

Also today in sprint car news, it was announced that Wayne Johnson is retiring from competition after 37 years behind the wheel. The 53 year old Oklahoma driver hasn't raced since injuring his hand and arm in a crash at the Texas Motor Speedway in April running with High Limit. Johnson was a full time competitor with the World of Outlaws in 2020 and 2021, before returning to regular 360 action in 2022. He owns 59 career ASCS wins, was the 2000 ASCS champion, won the 360 Nationals twice, and was the Outlaw rookie of the year in 2020. After the High Limit crash sidelined Johnson, the 2C team ran briefly with Seth Bergman at the wheel, before bringing in Hank Davis. Davis is currently fifth in ASCS points with nine top fives in 10 feature appearances. Davis will be in the car this week for the 360 Nationals as well. Knowing the severity of the injury, this announcement is not at all surprising. This won't be the last news we hear from this team in the coming days either. The bottom of the Wayne Johnson release says an announcement on 2025 is coming soon. Lots of signs here pointing towards a potential return to 410 racing next season. We talked just a few days ago about sprint car silly season ramping up, and this team has been in that rumor mill.

Before we move on to last night's racing action, I did want to double back to Jimmy Owens today. On the Tuesday Daily show, we talked about Ricky Thornton Jr.'s new crew chief in Chris Madden, and what the future might look like for that pairing. There were several of you who brought up Owens in all of this, and I do think it's fair to wonder where he stands with Koehler Motorsports. It seems as though some think that Owens' days with the team could be numbered, especially if Thornton has a bunch of success. Jimmy hasn't exactly set the world on fire in 2024, but he did break through for a Lucas win during speedweeks, and currently sits ninth in the standings. The 52 year old driver has seen a steady decline in performance since that magical 2020 season where he won 11 Lucas races and the title. In his defense though, when he joined Koehler Motorsports for the 2023 season after losing his deal with Ramirez, he did so knowing that he was walking into effectively a startup. The deal started slow, but Owens eventually won four times last season. The difference for 2024, is the team really ramped up their schedule. Last year, they focused a lot more on the southeast, effectively splitting their season in half between the regional and national stuff. But in 2024, they will run something like 80% of their races nationally, including the whole Lucas slate. Wins and top fives are going to be much more difficult to come by. I also think it's important to note that this deal for RTJ probably wouldn't have even been possible before, had it not been for what Owens has accomplished with this group over the last year and a half. I have zero inside information on this, but I don't know that Koehler will be quick to rush Owens out. He can still run well, he brings at least some measure of sponsorship, and RJT was quoted as saying "It's imperative to the Koehler family and myself that we stress the addition of myself to the Koehler Motorsports organization will in no way change Jimmy Owens' status with the team now or in the future. It's really cool for me to be racing alongside him." That doesn't feel like nothing to me. And even though Thornton will be in a Longhorn and Owens in the Rocket, I could see the addition of RTJ and Madden being a boost to Owens as well. Those two teams were parked next to each other during the last run of Lucas races, and I don't see any reason to believe Owens is in trouble.

Indiana Sprint Week at Lawrenceburg last night, making up the show from Sunday that was rained out. We had a shakeup in the sprint week standings, and Logan Seavey has taken control with still four races to go. Seavey drove up from 11th to pickup USAC sprint car win number 12 on the season, and his sixth in the last eight races. CJ Leary also led laps, he finished second, and Brady Bacon was third. Early on it looked like maybe Justin Grant was going to get his season and sprint week back on track after finishes outside the top ten at both Lincoln Park and Kokomo. But a lap six incident with Kyle Cummins ruined both of their nights. Cummins DNF'd, and Grant ended up 17th. JG was leading into turn one on lap six, and Cummins was after him for that top spot when the two made contact, sending Cummins over. The driver of 3P clearly getting things wrong there, and he owned up to it in an interview with Drake York. Cummins climbed from his wrecked car, apologized on track to Grant, which included a fist bump between the two, and Cummins even did a little repair work to the NOS machine, pulling on the nerf bar and looking at the front end. I wish we saw that more often across motorsports. A driver screws up, and gets out of the car and just owns up to it. We need more guys like Kyle Cummins in the sport. Unfortunately for him though, he's fallen to third in the sprint week title fight headed to Circle City today. Seavey's gap out front is now 28 to Bacon in second, and Seavey extended his season long lead as well to now 90 points. Tonight's trip to Circle City will be the second of the season to the Indianapolis race track. Seavey and Bacon split the wins there back in May. If you won't be there, you can watch it live on FloRacing.

At Autodrome Granby on Tuesday, the locals struck yet again, this time with the Short Track Super Series. Mat Williamson led early, but he had something break on the 3 machine and he had a hard hit into the turn one wall ending his night. That left Matt Sheppard and Mike Mahaney to battle it out for the lead. A bit surprisingly though, neither went on to the victory. That instead went to 13th starting David Hebert. He methodically worked his way toward the front and took the lead from Mahaney late. Hebert topped Sheppard, and 16th starting Stewart Friesen at the end. Friesen continues to lead the north region standings after Granby, while Williamson's overall lead was cut down to three points over Sheppard with the DNF. The Short Track Super Series modifieds were supposed to be at RPM tonight, but that show has already been washed out. The series is back next Tuesday at Mohawk.

Elsewhere last night, the Sprint Invaders at Bloomfield was rained out. The next time you'll have a chance to see winged cars on track will be Thursday at Knoxville when the 360 Nationals get rolling.

Checking out some of the other dirt racing shows this week, Winged Nation has Terry McCarl and Jamie Ball, Passing Points has round two with Hank Davis, Quicktime has Kerry Madsen, Hoogie's Garage has Wade Aunger and Dylan Waxdahl, Getting up to Speed has Roger Bell, and the Driver's Project also has Terry McCarl. There are also new episodes of the Dirt Reporters, Dirt Track Confessions, the Dirt Nerds, Dirt Tracks and Rib Racks, Turn 2 Terribles, and Racing Roundup. To see the full list of dirt racing podcasts and their newest episodes, stop by dirtrackr.com/podcasts.

That's it for the Daily today. Besides Indiana Sprint Week, there is plenty of local and regional action happening today, so take a quick look at dirtrackr.com/watchtonight if you want a dirt racing fix.

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