DIRTRACKR Daily Podcast - Episode Transcript

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Sprint car teams barred from race and a surprising new deal for top crew chief | Daily 4-8-2025

A future hall of fame crew chief resurfaces with a team you probably wouldn't have seen coming, another sprint car series moves to protect their brand with restrictions on full timers, and more today. Let's go!

It's Tuesday, April 8th, I'm Justin Fiedler. This is DIRTRACKR Daily presented by Kubota Genuine Parts.

Ever since the end of the previous iteration of the All Star Circuit of Champions, we've had several conversations on this show about the ongoing state of regional sprint car racing. If you probably remember, Tony Stewart sold the All Stars to Brad Sweet and Kyle Larson to make way for the full national touring version of High Limit. For 2024, the FAST series run by Aaron Fry made a push to try and fill some of that space, as did POWRi, and the now defunct Maverick series. Fry and FAST sanctioned Ohio Sprint Speedweek last year, and it was a solid bit of cooperation between streaming services and area race tracks. Coming into 2025 though, Maverick is gone, FAST is back to a footprint that looks more like it did previously, and the All Star brand was revived. High Limit, who still owned it, handed things off to promoter and car owner Rich Farmer. Farmer set up a 27 event schedule across five states, got control of Ohio speedweek even though another effort was attempted to create a speedweek, and signed 12 full time drivers. Along with his racing exploits, Farmer is also a business-owner, including being a NAPA franchisee, and he used those connections to name NAPA title sponsor of the new look All Stars. And this week, the series makes it's season debut with two nights set for Attica Raceway Park. But even though the All Stars are back and Maverick is gone, the competition behind the scenes for regional supremacy rages on. Kenny Brown and POWRi have continued to expand their footprint with their own POWRi 410 Outlaw series, and they also got into partnerships with the Elite Outlaw series and owner Nathan Moore, and Aaron Fry and the FAST series. FAST and POWRi are even co-sanctioning a three race trip to Indiana, with June stops at Lincoln Park, Paragon, and Terre Haute. FAST getting support now from POWRi helps their side, and Brown and his organization get a foothold in Ohio and Western PA. The FAST series has already started their 2025 season with a show a few weeks ago that AJ Flick won at Pittsburgh's PA Motor Speedway, but the two sides, FAST and the All Stars, are set to go right up against each other this weekend. Following the Friday and Saturday All Star events at Attica, FAST has a Sunday show at Millstream. But don't hold your breath that the full time All Star teams will make the one hour drive west from Attica to Findlay. I've been told this week that the All Stars and Farmer have barred full time teams from racing that Sunday show. Speaking to some friends in Ohio, the rumor is Millstream decided against having their Sunday race be All Star sanctioned, and the series responded by not allowing their drivers to attend. Supposedly teams must get All Star approval to run races within a certain window of All Star events. I've heard 24 hours and 100 miles, and I've heard 24 hours and 200 miles. One source told me that tracks that run regular 410 shows won't be a problem to get approval for, and that this policy is more aimed at other tracks and series trying to take advantage of the close All Star shows to pull in extra 410 teams. It's not explicitly a FAST ban for All Star full timers, but it will affect the races this weekend. It also looks like it could come into play in August if teams wanted to race Waynesfield with the All Stars and Millstream with FAST. These types of restrictions are certainly something we see elsewhere in sprint car racing, most notably with the World of Outlaws. We just don't usually see them on a local and regional level. And they are almost non-existent in other divisions, like late model racing for example. Farmer making the move here to protect his business, but I'm sure there will be some drivers and fans that aren't a fan of the policy. I did reach out to Farmer for comment on the situation, but as of me putting today's show together, I have not heard back. If you are curious, there are 13 FAST shows that would be options for All Star teams to run if they chose to. Those 13 races are either not direct conflicts, and/or are outside the travel window based on the policy I've heard. Also for context, the Tony Stewart-owned All Stars did have a policy in place that was similar, where teams had to get approval in certain situations, we just rarely saw it actually affect any teams or events.

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Decorated sprint car crew chief Eric Prutzman didn't stay on the unemployment line very long, although he's resurfaced with a team that I don't think many would have guessed. Going back to right before the High Limit season opener at Las Vegas, Prutzman and Kasey Kahne Racing parted ways fairly abruptly. Prutzman led Brad Sweet's 49 team to five straight World of Outlaws Sprint Car titles, and followed that up with the High Limit championship in 2024. For 2025 though, his initial plan was to scale back, be home more often, run KKR as a team manager, and crew chief Kasey Kahne's car when he wanted to race. But Kahne ended up back full time with High Limit, and Prutzman was again set for a full season on the road. Things went sideways just a few weeks into the season though, and Kahne has raced since then with Andrew Bowman and Tate Williamson on the wrenches. It's gone pretty well for him with two recent second place finishes. As for Prutzman, it's being reported this week in Area Auto Racing News by Steve Barrick that he's picked up a temporary gig helping the Sandy Kline-owned 22 in Central Pennsylvania with driver Doug Hammaker. Hammaker told Barrick that the deal will be for a few weeks, and that Prutzman is traveling back and forth between PA and North Carolina, where Prutzman still lives. The 34-year old Hammaker is a 410 sprint car rookie this year after having previously raced for years in the 358 division. He's made three starts so far this season, with a best finish of 14th. That happened at BAPS on March 30th. He was running 11th at Williams Grove last Friday before the rest of that main event was postponed. I would imagine that a guy like Prutzman will be a big help for Hammaker, but I am a bit surprised this is where he popped back up. I would have figured his phone would have been ringing off the hook with offers from top teams, but maybe he's not interested in that right now and this part time deal with Kline and Hammaker is more his speed.

We'll end it right there for today. I do have a fresh Slider piece in my email that I need to send out, so if you want to check that out, head over to dirtrackr.com/theslider and sign up for the free email newsletter. I'll have that out to you in the coming days.

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