DIRTRACKR Daily Podcast - Episode Transcript
Dirt racing news, results, discussion, analytics. Sprint cars, late models, modifieds, you name it. From national series, to top local shows. Brought to you five days a week. Email the show at info@dirtrackr.com.
What I know about several sprint car situationas... At least right now anyway | Daily 10-17-2024
The sprint car landscape is shifting rapidly as plans for 2025 start to get confirmed, and today I'll run you through a bunch of the different scenarios and situations, including the CJB announcement, what's next for Spencer Bayston, where does Justin Peck go, and what I know on several other deals. Plus we'll talk a big weekend of racing ahead and a lot more. Let's go!
It's Thursday, October 17th, I'm Justin Fiedler. This is DIRTRACKR Daily presented by Kubota Genuine Parts.
Eldora Speedway's final big event of 2024 starts today, with the 44th Dirt Track World Championship. The Lucas Oil Late Model Dirt Series finale highlights the weekend, with modifieds, super stocks, and steel block late models also on the card. If you're going to be in town, make sure to stop by The Whistle Stop and grab something good to eat. It's just a seven mile ride straight south of the race track to Ansonia. All week you can get breakfast, lunch, dinner, pizza, and you can get some food to bring back to the track with you. And when you stop in, they've got a full bar so you can enjoy a nice adult beverage. Andrew and his staff do a great job, so if you stop in, tell them DIRTRACKR sent you. If you want to ride a little further south, head to Sure Shot Tap House in Greenville, Ohio, a great place to eat, drink and play. They've got a full menu, plus all sorts of adult beverage options on tap, self pour, plus the Bullseye Game Lounge upstairs with duckpin bowling and 24 arcade games. When you're not at the track, keep yourself fed and entertained with these two establishments, the Whistle Stop and Sure Shot Tap House. Thanks to them for their support of Eldora and this show.
A big show today, a lot to get to, so settle in, this one is going to be longer than usual.
As expected, with the end of the Kubota High Limit sprint car season, we are starting to get confirmations on team changes, and yesterday it was one we have known was coming for a while. If you watch this show regularly, you knew that things were going to be very different for the CJB ride for 2025. They had already announced Barry Jackson stepping back from the road, and we know that Tye Wolfgang will move from his car chief role at Kasey Kahne Racing to take over as crew chief. The next big question is driver, and at least half that part is now confirmed, with CJB announcing yesterday that after three seasons together, Spencer Bayston is moving on. Bayston joined the team late in 2021, and they were a full time Outlaw team in 2022 and 2023. Two Outlaw wins that first year, and another one the second year, but eighth in the standings both seasons. And then they moved to High Limit for 2024, but it didn't spark any boost in performance. No wins, and again, eighth in the standings. So now the two sides split, and I can't stress enough how much things have changed drastically here in recent days with CJB's plans. The sentiment all along had been that Justin Peck was getting this seat. Jumping back to some messages I have, the first mention of Peck to CJB I can find was sent to me back in late July. Then by early September, everyone was saying this was a done deal. And I was told that even as late as this past weekend at Texas Motor Speedway, Peck thought everything was still good to go. But supposedly there may have been issues with sponsorship, and late in the process another driver entered the picture. I don't think we'll get an announcement from CJB on this next driver right away, as it sounds like a few details are still being worked out. But this move will definitely shock some folks. I've been all over social media since the announcement that Bayston was out, and I have yet to see a correct guess on who it is. The usual suspects that keep popping up, names like Justin Sanders, or Chase Randall, or I saw Danny Sams, Emerson Axsom, all of those are not the name we are hearing. As for the Bayston side of this, I'm sure many of you have seen and heard the rumors about him replacing Corey Day in the Jason Meyers owned 14. The idea being that Day will have to pull back from full time sprint car competition, and Meyers will need a driver to fill that spot. This still might end up being true, but I don't know if this is quite the lock some are saying it is. I've got lots of friends on the NASCAR side of things, and I have yet to hear a final plan and schedule for Day's 2025 season. Until that's finalized, I don't see Meyers making any decisions. So again, it could still be Bayston, but I don't think this one is done yet. And in the meantime, I've heard Bayston could be in line for other rides, including one that was around in 2023, but disappeared for 2024.
Real quick before we talk more silly season, hit that subscribe or follow button wherever you tune into the show. There is going to be a lot to figure out as we get into the offseason, and subscribing will make sure you don't miss a thing. As news breaks, we'll be here to talk about all of it, and if you weren't aware, the daily show doesn't go dark in the offseason months. We will be here, as usual, five days a week all the way through, keeping you informed on everything that happens. And subscribing and following, it's free.
Taking this sprint car silly season stuff a bit further, there are a bunch of other moving pieces. We talked yesterday about the Rudeen 26, that situation will remain fluid. And now that Justin Peck is back on the market, he'll be scrambling this week to try and put a deal together, even though it's starting to get late. He's racing Trophy Cup at Tulare with Clayton Snow, and I wouldn't be surprised if he has meetings lined up for the next few days. I know he's been making a lot of calls. Another ride we talked about this week was the second Roth Motorsports entry, and it was confirmed yesterday that Ryan Timms will be in a Roth car for Trophy Cup. I first alerted you guys to this one last week, and he could be a serious candidate for that ride, and others for 2025. Other drivers who are shopping for rides still include Chase Randall. He's still trying to lock something down after departing TKS several weeks ago, but I've had several friends tell me he comes with sponsorship, so I have hard time believing somebody won't take a chance on him. And there are rumblings that Chris Windom is exploring his options. He was full time with Vermeer Motorsports this year with High Limit, but they struggled also, finishing 15th in the standings with just 10 top tens. And all of this is to say nothing of some of the other stuff we've already talked about, like Brent Marks maybe coming off the road, questions with Parker Price Miller, and series choices. There are also likely crew changes coming, and one top driver could potentially be working with a new crew chief next year. I tweeted this yesterday, but everything is very fluid right now, and some stuff is changing hour by hour. I really felt like this year would be a bit quieter, especially after what we had in 2023, but things have ramped up significantly. Literally by the time I get this episode posted, things will likely have changed again. But as of me writing this show, this is a lot of what I know right now.
Before we move on to some of the racing happening this weekend, I just want to acknowledge some of the Josh Richards stuff. There have been a few whispers in recent weeks about some sort of a return to the dirt late model world, and I know that hit social media pretty hard yesterday. I've had that one sent to me a bunch, and multiple DMs about it. I have zero confirmation on this one, and some other industry friends are on the trail, but they have very little as well. So yes, I have seen and heard it, but if it's true, I don't know, and I don't have a feel for what it could look like. A part time schedule, full time, some sort of management role, who knows.
Alright, moving on to the dirt racing weekend ahead. I'm going to start here in a non-traditional place, and that's the USAC CRA sprint cars. RJ Johnson currently leading Tommy Malcolm and Austin Williams for that championship with five races left. They are at Imperial Valley Raceway this weekend for two nights. If you know Southern California at all, Imperial Valley is not far off Interstate 8, on the south side of the Salton Sea. It's about 100 miles south of Palm Springs. The reason I bring this up though, is the track has made general admission tickets free for both nights. So you can see the CRA 410 non wing sprint cars, plus ecotec midgets, lighting sprints, and heritage cars all free. This is obviously a massive risk, so if you are in the San Diego area, or Palm Springs, or not far away, head out and support these guys.
At Eldora, it's championship weekend for the Lucas Oil Late Model Dirt Series. The 44th Dirt Track World Championship starts tonight with modifieds and super stocks. Friday will see Lucas qualifying and heats, plus modifieds and steel block late models. And then Saturday night, you'll get the steel block finale, plus the $100,000 to win main event for Lucas, and we'll see a champion crowned. Brandon Sheppard the defending Dirt Track World Championship winner, remember he won that wild race a year ago driving for Kevin Rumley. The Lucas championship chase at the moment has Ricky Thornton Jr. leading Jonathan Davenport and Devin Moran by 50 points, with Tim McCreadie fourth, 165 back. McCreadie is effectively out of the fight, and this will come down to the other three. If my math was correct, RTJ wins with a fourth place finish on Saturday, or sixth if neither Moran or JD go quick time. With all of the teams going to Eldora, I do think it's possible that we could have dueling celebrations like we saw last season. A non-championship driver wins the event, while the champion celebrates elsewhere. Bobby Pierce won the World 100 last month, and this is an event he does not have on his resume. He's a potential win pick for sure. It will be a very good weekend to head to the track.
The other late model championship that will be decided this weekend is the Comp Cams Super Dirt Series at Texarkana 67 and Super Bee Speedways. Logan Martin enters with 21 points on Morgan Bagley and 30 on BJ Robinson. That one could come down to the wire.
The World of Outlaws sprint cars will be back on the dirt at Route 66 Friday and Saturday. The Joliet, Illinois race track hasn't seen the Outlaws in seven years. Donny Schatz the most recent winner there, on a night that saw both Jason Sides and Kraig Kinser also lead laps. All that's left on the Outlaw schedule is these two nights at Joliet, then two more at Riverside, and three races at World Finals. David Gravel's lead over Carson Macedo is 72 points, so that's about 10.3 points per race that Macedo needs to gain. That's right around 5 positions per night. If Gravel doesn't have trouble, that feels like it's probably not doable.
Out California, Trophy Cup 30 starts tonight at the Tulare Thunderbowl. $300,000 will get paid out over three days, and there should be a boat load of 360 sprint cars in the pits. We haven't had an entry list update this week, but things will likely be very different than what we see on the Trophy Cup website. Several entries with TBAs do have drivers, including the Roth car with Timms. And we know that Trey Starks is in the 26, and not Zeb Wise. Another change is that we will likely not see Rico Abreu, even though he's listed as participating. The Trophy Cup isn't on his schedule on his website, and his social media accounts have been quiet since before the High Limit finale. Trophy Cup runs through Saturday night, and is available to stream as pay per view on The Cushion.
A couple of other notable events. The ASCS National Tour is at Riverside for two nights, with $10,000 to win on Saturday and more than 60 sprint cars expected. As others have pointed out, this event has a little bit of Short Track Nationals vibes. Seth Bergman leads the ASCS title fight right now, having pulled away from Sam Hafertepe in recent weeks to well over 100 points.
Lincoln Speedway ends their 2024 season on Saturday with $15,000 to win for the 410 sprint cars. Troy Wagaman on his way to the Lincoln track championship, but with no competition and good money on the line, this one should draw a nice field.
And the USAC Silver Crown Series will close out on Saturday. This one is on the pavement at IRP. The championship will come down to Kody Swanson and Justin Grant, with the two separated by just six points. Swanson with the edge on pavement, but he can't afford any issues.
That's the daily show for today and this week. The support from you is always appreciated. Thanks to everyone that tunes in, the comments, the messages, the tips, all of it. Enjoy a big weekend of dirt racing out there, and we'll see you back here on Sunday!