DIRTRACKR Daily Podcast - Episode Transcript

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Sprint car ride news, Pennsboro's future, Chase Johnson update | Daily 8-26-2024

An update today on Chase Johnson, some midwest sprint car ride notes, a cool Scott Bloomquist tribute, High Limit in Oregon today, plus is there actually hope at Pennsboro? Let's go!

It's Monday, August 26th, I'm Justin Fiedler. This is DIRTRACKR Daily presented by Kubota Genuine Parts.

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One of the questions I've gotten most often recently is what's happening and what's the future at Pennsboro Speedway. If you aren't aware, the West Virginia dirt track was originally home to some of the biggest events in the sport, but it eventually closed and has been mostly dormant for many years. After aiding in the rebirth of North Wilkesboro, the XR team decided to resurrect another race track, and they turned their focus to Pennsboro. It's a story we've been following for a few years, but after fits and starts of progress, including an abandonded reconfigure, things have been pretty quiet since the spring. Work had begun on making the half mile track raceable, but a wet spring that included a flood of the facility set work back. Since then, there has been basically no information about next steps. The full summer of racing that was planned got cancelled, and XR's hopes were to have the first event there late in October with their XR Super Series. Back on Friday, XR's Barry Braun posted to his personal Facebook account, which then got shared to Pennsboro's page, that they have cleared their schedule for September with plans to get Pennsboro opened by that late October date. He said that updates won't get shared unless there is a change in plans. This news came alongside the announcement that the XR Super Series late model tour had cancelled eight events remaining on the 2024 schedule, which included stops at Kokomo, Jackson County Speedway, Volunteer, Crossville, Grayson County, and Hunt County. Races at Ultimate Motorsports Park in November were also dropped, while the Kokomo Klash in October was added, along with the National 100 at East Alabama. The National 100 was originally sanctioned by Hunt the Front, then flipped to unsanctioned, before now adding back a sanction. So as of today, that's where we are with Pennsboro according to XR. If things change, I'll keep you updated. The XR Super Series is scheduled to be racing this week at 300 Raceway along with a $100 grand to win stock car race for the Yankee Dirt Track Classic. The late models pay $15 grand to win Friday, and $50,000 to win Saturday. I wouldn't expect any of the Lucas teams to be in attendance, as they have races in West Virginia and Ohio Saturday and Sunday. 300 Raceway to Portsmouth is a 10 hour tow. Not impossible, but a longshot I think. With the Outlaws off though, Bobby Pierce is one driver scheduled to appear. Ricky Thornton Jr. is slated to participate in the stock car portion of the event that culminates Friday night.

Sort of related here as well, because you'll see this car at 300 Raceway this week. Wisconsin driver Luke Lemmens is running a Scott Bloomquist tribute wrap on his stock car that will run at 300, before then also appearing at the IMCA Super Nationals. I shared it to the DIRTRACKR Facebook page over the weekend because I thought it was cool, so I figured I'd share it here as well. Great looking car, hopefully he has some success with it.

In Sunday racing action, Ryan Timms was a winner in weekly action at Huset's Speedway. It was his second 410 sprint car win of the season, with both coming in weekly competition at Huset's. Timms spent the weekend driving for Guy Forbrook, instead of his usual family owned 5T. Timms finished 6th on Saturday night at Knoxville, before the Sunday win. And according to his post race interview, it sounds like he'll be back in the Forbrook 5 for the World of Outlaws nights at Huset's coming up this week. Aaron Reutzel and Dusty Zomer also on the podium last night. A couple of other area sprint car notes for you, Hunter Schuerenberg debuted on Saturday at Knoxville with the TKS Motorsports team and finished 15th. No word what their future plans are at the moment. And after Schuerenberg departed the Heidbreder 19 to take the TKS ride, Heidbreder was back in action as well, competing Saturday night at Knoxville. They had Ayrton Gennetten in the car, who finished 11th. I would expect to see Gennetten in that car a few more times before 2024 is over. He's currently leading the POWRi 410 championship over Blake Hahn, with still 14 race nights left on that series calendar. They are I-35 and Lake Ozark coming up this weekend.

We talked yesterday on the show about the nasty crash that Chase Johnson suffered at the Gold Cup on Saturday night, and thanks to a few social media posts yesterday, we know at least a few more details about his current situation. The NARC series posted that Chase was transported to the UC Davis Medical Center where he is being treated for neck and back injuries. His grandfather shared that he went there via helicopter and that he was undergoing quote "major operations." His 24 car appeared to come down hard on all four wheels, which has been the cause of back injuries for sprint car drivers in the past. Him suffering those types of injuries would be why they took such care to get him extracted from the car during that lengthy red flag. We are all hoping for good news from Chase and thinking about him, his family, and friends.

Before we move on, there is a new issue of the Slider email newsletter in your inboxes from over the weekend. Mike Ernst wrote a good piece about Scott Bloomquist's career. If you don't subscribe to the Slider, you can find the article over at dirtrackr.com/theslider. While you're there, sign up free to get future pieces just like this one sent right to you.

After having Sunday off to reset and recover from the Gold Cup, the Kubota High Limit sprint cars are back to racing tonight at the Douglas County Dirt Track in Roseburg, Oregon. The track was previously a paved track, but converted to dirt and reopened in 2023. Since then it's hosted a variety of racing, including the NARC 410 sprint cars. Corey Day won there in NARC action in 2023, and Cole Macedo won there earlier this summer. Landon Brooks, Tanner Holmes, and Colby Copeland all have 360 wins there as well. I'll be interested to see how many California cars tow north this week for the races in Oregon and Washington. I would assume we'll get a few, but likely not the whole contingent. At the moment, Brad Sweet leads Tyler Courtney by 96 points for the High Limit championship, with Rico Abreu third, Brent Marks fourth, and Corey Day fifth. The Jason Meyers 14 team has the final charter spot in fifth, with the Roth 83 trailing by 24 points, and the Buch 13 62 back. After tonight's $12,000 to win show, they'll continue north to Grays Harbor in Washington to race on Wednesday, before a big three day weekend at Skagit starts Thursday. That's another $100,000 to win race on Saturday night. Some things to watch tonight include can Corey Day get to double digit sprint car wins on the season. Brad Sweet has three straight finishes outside the top ten and is still winless since May, can that team bounce back. And James McFadden has five straight top tens. Can he win again on the west coast. If you can't get to Douglas County, watch live on FloRacing.

We'll call it good there today. Make sure to stop by dirtrackr.com today to see all the latest from around the sport, plus the streaming schedule.

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