DIRTRACKR Daily Podcast - Episode Transcript

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You can't fill your bumpers and nerf bars with lead | Daily 2-10-2025

Don Kreitz, Davey Brown, and the most intriguing sprint car team in the country. Plus USAC's new rules target weight issues and fuel tanks among other things, racing coming up tonight, and the future of Gas City. Let's go!

It's Monday, February 10th, I'm Justin Fiedler. This is DIRTRACKR Daily presented by Kubota Genuine Parts.

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Lost in the shuffle of all the wing talk yesterday, I didn't get a chance to really talk about the 69K at DIRTcar Nationals, and I wanted to do that today. This has to be one of the most intriguing sprint car teams in the country. I know they've gotten plenty of attention over the years, especially when Lance Dewease was melting faces in this car, but this squad just keeps showing up to race tracks with different drivers and running well. Two of the four nights at Volusia they had issues, but there is no reason to believe that if they don't get a flat, and have mechanical gremlins on Saturday, that they don't leave with at least four top fives. Christopher Bell was running fourth on Wednesday when they blew that tire. They then won Thursday and finished second Friday. Saturday was cursed from the jump with a busted engine which ruined their qualifying, and then a rear end went south in their heat race. This team has won races in the last year now with three different drivers, and got Bell back to an Outlaw victory lane for the first time since 2019 after sitting out from sprint car racing for basically two years. Early in January, I sat in on an episode of The Driver's Project podcast, and we talked a bit about Bell getting in this car, and Sam Hafertepe had some interesting comments about the situation. He talked about Daryn Pittman saying how well that car drove after racing it at the Grove, and Hafertepe got into how good of a combination it would be to have Bell drive for this team. Those comments from Hafertepe came ringing back into my head watching Bell win. The 69K doesn't race that often. Something like 40ish shows last year. Logan Wagner drove it 28 times, mostly at Port Royal, and won five races. They didn't run all the Port shows, and still finished third in the track championship. And Daryn Pittman raced just 13 shows, and had a win, six top fives, and eight top tens. In there was an impressive showing at the Knoxville Nationals, top fives against the Outlaws, and two second place finishes to close the season at the Texas Motor Speedway Dirt Track against High Limit. And I know Pittman is an Outlaw champion, but he hasn't run more than 18 shows in a year since 2020. This isn't a team with a big budget, and brand new truck and trailer, and big time sponsors. They have a 90 year old crew chief, Kreitz himself is 63, and basically the same group of crew members they've had for years. But none of that matters. They just show up with fast race cars and beat people. Two years ago after they parted ways with Dewease, Kreitz said he had inquiries from 75 different drivers about wanting to get into the 69K. Watching what they've done in just the last year, I'm surprised it wasn't more.

After a brief Sunday off, racing at Volusia for DIRTcar Nationals turns over to some new series starting tonight. You'll get the first race for the USAC National Sprint Cars plus DIRTcar sanctioned late models. The sprint car feature is $6000 to win, and the late model main event is $7000 to win. The next two nights for USAC are full points paying events, and teams had a chance to get on track Sunday at Ocala for some practice. CJ Leary in his new ride with Team AZ Racing led the speed charts there over Daison Pursley and Kyle Cummins. Pursley is set to run full time with High Limit this year with the wing on, and he was at Volusia all weekend with the Outlaws. He's debuting the new sprint car team for Chad Boat Industries. Pursley will run a part time schedule for Boat in this car, in between his winged commitments. Pretty close to 30 cars at Ocala yesterday, and after Monday and Tuesday at Volusia, USAC will head back to Ocala for four nights, this coming Wednesday through Saturday. They've officially got 14 full time drivers chasing that championship, with Logan Seavey back in the Abacus ride to defend the title, plus Kevin Thomas Jr., CJ Leary, Mitchel Moles, Robert Ballou, Kyle Cummins, Justin Grant, Jake Swanson, Briggs Danner, Jadon Rogers, Joey Amantea, Ricky Lewis, Kale Drake, and Hayden Reinbold. You'd have to think everyone is chasing Seavey, but then from there it should be wide open. Pursley and Brady Bacon were second and third last year, but they aren't full time anymore, and that will create opportunity for others. Previous USAC winners at Volusia include Swanson and Pursley from 2023, and Seavey swept these races last season.

As for the late models, the next three nights being DIRTcar sanctioned mean we could see guys sit out and take nights off. Outlaw nights don't start until Thursday. We should see a different mix of drivers as well, as we know that some Outlaw guys ran Screven, so they should be coming back. And it sounds like a few guys that ran Lucas aren't staying. I heard the Flo guys say on The Drive Home after Saturday that Hudson O'Neal wasn't sticking around. His website schedule still has it listed, but we'll see. We should have most of the big players in attendance all week though. It does look like tonight is one of those stupid streaming nights, where you have to watch DIRTVision to see the late models at Volusia, then flip to FloRacing to see the sprint cars. These situations happen so infrequently during the season, I wish the two sides could just figure these out. All the racing is available on the streaming schedule at dirtrackr.com as well.

Sliding back to USAC here for a second, I did want to double back to some rule changes they announced a few weeks ago. Some of these put them in line with some things we've seen from the World of Outlaws, and others are in response to things that happened during 2024. One of those 2024 situations was the added weight situation we talked about way back in June last year. There was drama at Macon Speedway where it appeared as though cars had added weight outside of the areas allowed in the rulebook, and some were quite vocal about it. That included Robert Ballou. Nothing seemingly happened in the aftermath, but there are rule updates for 2025 in the area of weight. 302.F says additional weight must be mounted or fastened in a secure manner, and that the weight must be indentified with car number. Also, 306.B says nerf bars and bumpers must be constructed of magnetic and or stainless steel, and that they may not be filled for the purposes of adding weight. This is something I've heard a lot of teams were doing, and the Outlaws made a similar rule update. These two weight rules were also added for the midgets and Silver Crown cars. Among the other changes to USAC rules, is effectively the same fuel tank rule the Outlaws added. Tanks must have four mounts to the chassis, with six suggested for 2025. Six mounting points will be mandatory for 2026. This change is in response to all the tank separations we saw in 2024, and I'd talked previously about this being an area under scrutiny for rules makers. USAC's rules are available on their website, and graphics for these changes can be found on the USAC social media channels.

Finally today, the future of Gas City I-69 Speedway remains in doubt, but a group is doing anything they can to try and save it. That includes a petition, meeting with local officials and business folks, and more. If you'd like to get involved or sign the petition, I'll leave the link below in the video description on YouTube. The Indiana track hasn't hosted racing since October of 2023, and despite a few rumors here and there, nothing concrete has happened since in terms of bringing racing back.

That's the Daily for today. Hope you guys have a great Monday out there, we'll see you back here tomorrow!