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World of Outlaws rookie battle update, Kerry Madsen wins at Bridgeport | DIRTRACKR Daily 4/7/21
It is Wednesday, April 7th, two thousand and twenty one and you are tuned into DIRTRACKR Daily. I'm Justin Fiedler.
Today we update you on the World of Outlaws Sprint Car Series rookie battle, recap last night's racing at Bridgeport, Harli White has a new ride, the Super DIRTcar Series returns this week, plus there are new podcast episodes and more. Let's jump in.
With 11 races now complete for the World of Outlaws Sprint Car Series in 2021, I wanted to take a quick look at the rookie battle so far. If you probably remember, we have four drivers fighting it out for the Kevin Gobrecht Rookie of the Year, and all entered the year having previously won Outlaw races. The four contenders are Aaron Reutzel, James McFadden, Parker Price-Miller, and Brock Zearfoss. Reutzel currently leads the way for the rookie class, sitting tied for sixth in the standings with a win, two top fives, and 10 top tens. The lone blemish for Reutzel is a 20th at Magnolia Motor Speedway, but since then has reeled off six straight top ten finishes. His win came in impression fashion at East Bay, where he ran four tires in the fluff all feature long to beat Brad Sweet and Carson Macedo. He entered the season as the favorite to win rookie of the year, and so far he's shown why. With as tough as the Outlaws are this season, and with what Brad Sweet is doing, I don't believe Reutzel is a serious title threat, but he will continue to run well and win races. The only other rookie in the top ten in points so far is Brock Zearfoss. He sits tenth with three top tens on his stat sheet up to this point. Zearfoss has an Outlaw win at Williams Grove, and past traveling experience with the All Stars, but he chose a tough year to go full time. Top ten finishes and consistency will need to be the focus for Zearfoss and his family owned team going forward. He trails Reutzel by 140 points in the standings. Down the order in 17th is the third rookie, Parker Price Miller. PPM actually ran the full Outlaw schedule in 2020, and had a strong season, finishing with a win, five top fives, and 23 top tens. He ran much of 2020 with Philip Dietz, but switched to his own operation in the offseason and it's been a struggle so far. His best finish so far is an 8th at Volusia, and he has seven finishes outside the top 15. We know he has the talent, with two past Outlaw wins on his resume, but what he's going through shows how difficult it is to run your own team and battle the Outlaws nightly. And bringing up the rear is Kasey Kahne Racing's James McFadden. JMac sits 20th in the Outlaw points, but not because of bad finishes. He missed the opening six races of the year awaiting the birth of a child in Australia, and didn't debut with the series until March 19th at Cotton Bowl. He's trying to dig out of a massive hole, but if anyone can do it, it's JMac. He won at Lake Ozark in 2020, and so far through five starts has two top fives and four top tens. He started on the pole Friday at Pevely, but finished 11th after having a tire go flat. He will be a win threat as the season progresses. The Outlaws are back this weekend at Kokomo and Haubstadt. We'll preview the weekend on Friday.
Bridgeport Motorsports Park in New Jersey was in action last night for their Invasion of the Posse event featuring 410 sprint cars and northeast modifieds. Dominick Buffalino won the $3000 mod feature over Ryan Krachun, Mike Maresca, Billy Pauch Jr., and Alex Yankowski. 30 sprint cars were on hand for the 410 portion of the night, and included a bunch of Central PA drivers along with a few of the All Star regulars like Justin Peck, Brent Marks, Lucas Wolfe, and Kyle Reinhardt. In the night's $5000 to win feature, Tim Shaffer in the Heffner 72 led the first five laps from the pole, but Kerry Madsen grabbed the lead on lap six, and held off the field on a late restart to take the win. Shaffer was second, Anthony Macri third, Brent Marks fourth, and Ryan Smith was fifth. The win was the first of 2021 for Madsen who is running Mike Barshinger's number 24 this season in Pennsylvania. That was the ride previously filled by Lucas Wolfe. Freddie Rahmer finished 7th, Danny Dietrich 8th, and Justin Peck battled back to 10th after spinning during the feature running top five. While not a Pennsylvania track, Madsen's win last night continues to show how wide open the Posse field is this year. Justin Peck and Lance Dewease are the only two drivers with multiple wins in the area so far in 2021. And Tim Shaffer continues to be impressive paired with Heath Moyle in that Heffner car. He's already got multiple wins this season, and was strong last night. The Central Pennsylvania season continues Friday night at Williams Grove. If you missed last night's show, you can watch it on-demand on FloRacing.
Harli White has a new sprint car ride that will see her compete a lot in Ohio this season. Starting with the April 23rd weekly race at Attica, White is joining Ed Neumeister Racing and his 11n to run 410 and 360 shows through the season. Currently the time has nine confirmed events on their schedule which include weekly shows, the World of Outlaws at Eldora, NRA Sprint Invaders, and Ohio's FAST Series. White has been a regular with the ASCS National Tour in recent seasons, including a top five points finish in 2020 that included her first ever series win. The win at Riverside last July made her the first woman to ever win with the ASCS National Tour. The Neumeister 11n is no stranger to victory lane itself, with names like Christopher Bell and Buddy Kofoid wheeling that car in recent years.
After only completing one series race in 2020 and not crowning a champion, the Super DIRTcar Series returns to racing this Saturday at Can-Am Speedway in New York. The stars of the big block modified series did race in Florida back in February for DIRTcar Nationals, but those are non-points races, so the season really kicks off this weekend. Stewart Friesen, Max McLaughlin, and Mike Maresca picked up series wins down in Florida. The $7500 to win Thunder in the Thousand Islands 100 is expected to draw plenty of heavy hitters, including defending series champion Mat Williamson, Matt Sheppard, Stewart Friesen, and many more. Friesen was the winner of the only SDS race last season, and will be in and out of modifieds this summer as his NASCAR truck series schedule allows. Money Mat Williamson has won plenty of high paying shows in recent years and will be looking to repeat as the Super DIRTcar Series champion, following his fantastic run in 2019. Also racing on Saturday with the big blocks will be sportsman modifieds and pro stocks. A change for the series in 2021 sees the racing action move from FloRacing back to DIRTVision full time. With a fast pass, race fans can watch every race of the 2021 season live, including Super DIRT Week in October at Oswego. So if you can't be at Can Am on Saturday, watch all the action live on DIRTVision.
There are plenty of new dirt racing podcast epsides to check out this week including Cole Duncan, Billy Dietrch, and Blake Anderson on Winged Nation. Stick Signals is talking the World of Outlaws Late Models at Bristol, the Dirt Nerds have Rick Eshelman, Foward Bite has Blake Harris and Stormy Scott, Quicktime has Buddy Kofoid, Passing Points has JJ Hickle, and there are new episodes of Wednesdays with Wayne and the Midwest Autosports podcast. To see all the dirt racing shows with links to their episodes, visit dirtrackr.com/podcasts.
There are two items on the streaming schedule today. FloRacing has Flo 24/7, and DIRTVision has DIRTcar eSports action from Williams Grove Speedway. To see the full daily streaming schedule with links to watch, visit dirtrack.com/watchtonight.
That's it for the show today, hope everyone has a good Wednesday. If you have thoughts about the topics on today's show, leave them in the comments below or tweet at me.
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