DIRTRACKR Daily Podcast - Episode Transcript

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Rocket and Brandon Sheppard were formidable before, they need to find the speed again | Daily 11-12-2024

The Rocket house car has officially named their next driver, and we'll dive in today, including what it means for all involved, including Tim McCreadie. Plus we'll talk expectations, the growing Lucas full timer field, news from the Hunt the Front and more. Let's go!

It's Tuesday, November 12th, I'm Justin Fiedler. This is DIRTRACKR Daily presented by Kubota Genuine Parts.

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The big news from Monday evening was something I hope you weren't surprised by, as we've been talking about this exact scenario for several weeks at least. We finally got the official confirmation that Brandon Sheppard will drive the Rocket house car starting in 2025. Sheppard returns to the Mark Richards' and Steve Baker-owned team after two years away driving Longhorns. Sheppard will race in his family owned B5 at the Gateway Dirt Nationals and the Wild West Shootout before beginning with Rocket full time to start the 2025 Lucas season. And yes, as expected, the Rocket 1 will continue on the Lucas tour next season as Sheppard chases his first championship on that side. He's now won five Outlaw championships, and Rocket does have a Lucas title with Hudson O'Neal. After O'Neal departed the one car early in 2024, Tim McCreadie was hired to replace him, and he's going to stay in the Rocket orbit (see what I did there), next year. He's going to pilot a Rocket chassis owned by Boom Briggs on tour with Lucas, in an alliance with Rocket Racing. The FloRacing article characterized it as the two drivers and teams will work closely together. Briggs himself will scale back to a part time schedule. Sheppard is not expected to race this coming weekend with the Flo series at Senoia, but he did reveal that he'll participate in a test session this week at Golden Isles with Rocket to start getting himself re-acclimated. If you are keeping track at home, the confirmation of McCreadie and Sheppard to Lucas brings us to six full time teams so far. That list also includes Daulton Wilson, Clay Harris, Carson Ferguson, and Dan Ebert. We can probably push that six to nine drivers if we assume Ricky Thornton Jr., Devin Moran, and Hudson O'Neal will all return also. Looking at the other 2024 full timers, we don't yet know plans for Jonathan Davenport, Garrett Alberson, Mike Marlar, or Max Blair. And then beyond the top 10 in the standings, you've also got Drake Troutman and Ross Robinson. Not that this would be any sort of revelation, but Lucas will continue to be a very difficult series next season. And I think now that this Sheppard/Rocket move is official, that's the next big question. What exactly can we expect from this reunited driver team combo. Sheppard did win the Outlaw title this year, but it was not a season of performances that we expected from him. And even though McCreadie got Rocket into the Lucas chase, that car was not the same after O'Neal departed. Bobby Pierce was significantly better than Sheppard on the Outlaw side, and RTJ, Moran, and Davenport were all clearly better than Rocket and McCreadie down the stretch. Both driver and team will need to take a big leap forward to contend for race wins and the championship in 2025. If my math is correct, Rocket cars only won six Lucas races this season, and five of those happened before the series left East Bay in February. And I think it was only two wins on the Outlaw side; O'neal at Volusia in January, and Dylan Knowles in a split field show at Talladega in April. When it came to making a driver decision for 2025, I think Richards and Baker looked around at who was possibly available and they are clearly hoping that they can recapture lost magic and glory with Sheppard. It's definitely going to be one of the main questions and storylines to follow when 2025 gets going. The one part of this story we still don't have clarity on is where Josh Richards fits in. Rumors pointed towards some sort of return for him, although I think what is most likely is a very limited schedule. I'd venture to guess that the B5 will be prepped and ready to race all season, and that could be a landing spot for Josh if he decides to make a few starts. In his post, Sheppard did mention the B5 running a limited schedule next season and he's keeping crew members James McGee and Lucas LeBlanc around for the B5 and 5S.

I do want to take you back to the August 28th Daily show where I made some bold late model predictions about what was to come for silly season. On that show I predicted RTJ would stay at Koehler, at least three top 25 drivers would change teams, and that at least one if not both house cars at Rocket and Longhorn would have new drivers. With the Shepp announcement, I'm three for three on those predictions. RTJ is staying; McCreadie, Sheppard, and Overton are your first three top 25 guys on the move, and both house cars have new drivers for next season. I don't want to toot my own horn here, but I'm going to toot my own horn. Looking ahead, there is still some more silly season stuff to figure out, including GR Smith's full time driver, where Max McLaughlin goes, and a few more things floating around. Stay tuned.

Sticking with dirt late model racing, the 2025 Hunt the Front schedule was released yesterday. 23 races, 15 tracks, and again a $50,000 check for the champion. They did add money to the point fund, and they are paying tow money through their loyalty program. They'll start in January at Needmore Speedway in Georgia with a pair of non-points events, with the championship season starting in March at I-75. They'll close out at Cherokee Speedway in October. The schedule also includes stops at Whynot, Talladega, Lavonia, Sugar Creek, Smoky Mountain, Swainsboro, Lake Cumberland, Florence, Senoia, Duck River, and North Georgia. Along with the schedule, Hunt the Front also announced a new partnership with Cherokee Speedway where they will co-promote the South Carolina track with Tony Adair. Cherokee will continue with their regular racing programs, plus add a new super late model series called the Cherokee Chief Series. This six race mini series will include the track's top events and pay $10,000 to the champion. The mini-series will be streamed via Hunt the Front TV.

Finally today, I wanted to do a quick update on the growing list of drivers that is going to participate in the USAC midget west coast swing coming up. We talked last week about guys like Tanner Thorson and Buddy Kofoid joining the midget regulars, but a lot more are coming as well. In recent days that list now includes Cale Coons making his USAC debut, Spencer Bayston driving for RMS, Chris Windom back with Chad Boat, Shane Golobic, Kaylee Bryson with Abacus, Tyler Courtney will run with Silva Motorsports, and Carson Macedo will run again with Dyson. This final stretch of the USAC midget season begins Friday and Saturday at Placerville for the Hangtown 100.

Alrighty friends, that's the Daily show for today. If you want to get into even more dirt racing content, head over to dirtrackr.com. There you can find updated news and releases, plus the analytics section, podcast stuff, and a lot more.

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