DIRTRACKR Daily Podcast - Episode Transcript

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Surprises! Upsets! Chassis stuff! Ride news! | Daily 9-7-2025

Dale McDowell shines, lots of different chassis fast, and somehow Ricky Thornton Jr. was an underdog winner at Eldora. Plus another shocking Ryan Timms win, more High Limit championship movement, some sprint car driver and team notes, and a whole lot more today. Let's go!

It's Sunday, September 7th, I'm Justin Fiedler. This is DIRTRACKR Daily presented by Kubota Genuine Parts.

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It's weird to think of Ricky Thornton Jr. as an underdog, but it felt that way last night as he was driving to his first ever crown jewel win at Eldora Speedway. He'd never before won the Dirt Late Model Dream or the World 100, but now, no more. With Jonathan Davenport starting on the front row, and the 49 out front early, it felt like we were in for another dominant Superman performance. But a rash of cautions before half way kept everyone tightly bunched, and RTJ pounced after a restart to take the lead on lap 42. It was a lead he never then relinqueshed. Davenport eventually lost a right rear late, but charged back to finish seventh. Behind RTJ, Dale McDowell went 19th to second, and Nick Hoffman finished third. On any given day over the last couple of years, you could make the argument that Thornton was and is the best driver in dirt late model racing. JD and Bobby Pierce also in that conversation, but knowing he's one of the top guys is why it's hard to think of him as an underdog. But I don't know how many were picking him to win last night. He was okay in the prelim features, finishing eighth and 11th, and he was eighth back at the Dream. But even knowing they brought a brand new car with a brand new engine, it didn't seem like he had the pace to beat Davenport or McDowell. Those two drivers taking the four prelim features between them. RTJ though was definitely the best car last night, and there isn't much left for him to accomplish that he hasn't already put on his resume. I did say last week that the bet was probably Pierce/JD or the field, but that I thought RTJ was probably a good not JD/Pierce pick. Knowing that the Lucas Oil Late Model Dirt Series championship could come down to the final laps at the Dirt Track World Championship next month, I'd say Thornton and Davenport are by far the two favorites. Devin Moran had a decent weekend, including nearly winning the opening night feature, but he wasn't on the same level as these guys. And Hudson O'Neal and his SSI team will have work to do before they come back. They were well off the pace last night and retired early. McDowell didn't end up with hard charger, as that went to Chris Ferguson and his 26th to eighth run. But McDowell's 19th to second, along with the two prelim wins definitely had a lot of folks talking. He can clearly still get it done on the big stage, and his charge was fun to watch last night. The other thing I liked from last night was seeing the big mix of equipment combinations through the top ten. RTJ and Hoffman in Longhorns towards the front, McDowell in the Team Zero, Tyler Erb and Brandon Sheppard with the Rockets, Ryan Gustin in the Infinity, and Chris Ferguson in the Stinger. It's nice to see there are multiple ways to go fast in even the biggest events on the calendar. I will say though, Longhorns have won all the Dreams back through 2021, and all of the Worlds, except one; Hudson O'Neal's score in 2023 with Rocket. Drop your comments below on the World 100 weekend.

The other surprise from Saturday night was Ryan Timms taking the win in the Tuscarora 50 with High Limit at Port Royal. In 13 previous starts at the track, Timms had only made six feature appearances, and had just one top ten finish, an eighth in a weekly show there back in 2022. Even earlier this weekend, while Anthony Macri and Aaron Reutzel were taking prelim wins, Timms was finishing 21st and 16th. Whatever they did for Saturday though worked out. Quick time in his time trial group, moved one spot in the heat to get into the feature transfer, and then an eighth to the lead charge by lap 26. Timms was on his way to the lead and had actually taken it from Justin Peck before the fuel stop break caution was thrown. He wasn't credited though with the lead until after he retook it on the restart. Nobody had anything for him over the second half, and Timms going home with another big sprint car pay day in 2025. He now has 14 sprint car wins this season, including two of the biggest in the Knoxville Nationals and the Tusky 50. Peck will again be wondering what if, as he led big paying sprint car races two weeks in a row, and settled for second both times. He's now led laps in three of the last six High Limit shows, but is winless since May. Hat tip to Reutzel for winning the Friday show with that broken foot. He and Justin Grant both doing that this weekend. While Rico Abreu did extend his High Limit driver's championship lead a bit to 45 points over Brad Sweet, Reutzel's strong weekend pushed the Ridge team to the top of the owner's standings. They lead Rico's team by 21 points with 12 race nights left in 2025. Rico solid the first two nights with finishes of fifth and seventh, but they missed it a bit last night. And Brad Sweet with two runs of 10th and a 12th. The Kubota High Limit sprint cars back to racing this coming Friday and Saturday with stops at Lernerville Speedway.

At Vado Speedway Park with the World of Outlaws sprint cars, just one race completed of two, that was a Friday night David Gravel win. Logan Schuchart and Kerry Madsen also leading laps in that one, and they finished behind Gravel on the podium. That was just the second time this season that the Tony Stewart Racing 15 had led laps in a World of Outlaws feature, and their first podium since Donny Schatz finished second on the first night of the Ironman 55 weekend back in early August. We'll see if they can keep that speed up as the teams head to California. Schatz did make his debut in the Works Limited sprint car with Paul Silva. No magic bullet there though, with an 11th place finish after starting 13th. Landon Crawley and Skylar Gee with good runs in fifth and sixth. The Outlaws head to Kern and Perris next weekend.

In other sprint car action, Zeth Sabo and Kasey Jedrzejek were AFCS winners, but it was Cap Henry who locked up both the Attica and AFCS championships. Kalib Henry and Brandon Spithaler split All Star wins, JJ Hickle and Max Guilford were IRA winners at Cedar Lake, Justin Sanders won the NARC show at Placerville, and Ayrton Gennetten and Joe B Miller split POWRi wins. Joe B now with a 40 point lead over Gennetten for that POWRi sprint car championship. Briggs Danner and Justin Grant split USAC sprint car wins at Tri-City and Lucas Oil, with Grant now the winningest driver in USAC sprint car history. Not bad for a guy who is still dealing with broken bones. The trio of ASCS races were won by Blake Hahn, Matt Covington, and Sam Hafertepe. And Jacob Denney swept the Xtreme Outlaw midget weekend.

A couple of other sprint car notes. Cannon McIntosh's debut with Roth Motorsports in that NARC show didn't go to plan. He timed in third, but crashed in his heat race, and ended up 14th after starting 19th in the main event. There are rumblings out there that he will get more opportunities into the future in that second Roth entry with Toyota backing. And Heidbreder Motorsports revealed late last week that Clinton Boyles will finish the season in their number 19 sprint cars. Boyles already with two top fives in that ride in POWRi competition a few weeks ago. Since departing Vermeer Motorsports as crew chief, Boyles has made eight sprint car starts as a driver, including four on both the winged and non-wing side. He was impressive at the Smackdown at Kokomo, finishing eighth on the final night filling in for the injured Robert Ballou. I feel like we don't often see a guy go from driving, to crew chiefing, and then back to driving.

And closing out, IMCA crowned several more Super Nationals winners last night. In modified action it was Tim Ward taking home the big trophy, Dylan Nelson was the hobby stock winner, Jake Sachau took the sport mod crown, and Jack McBirnie was the stock car winner.

That's the Daily for today. If you've gotten all the way to this point in the episode, and you don't already subscribe to the show, maybe consider hitting that button. You can subscribe for free on YouTube and the podcast places, and like and follow on Facebook. New shows are posted five days a week to those platforms, plus dirtrackr.com.

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