DIRTRACKR Daily Podcast - Episode Transcript
Dirt racing news, results, discussion, analytics. Sprint cars, late models, modifieds, you name it. From national series, to top local shows. Brought to you five days a week. Email the show at info@dirtrackr.com.
David Gravel sweeps Outlaw weekend at Bristol; Thorson, Leary win in PA | DIRTRACKR Daily 4/26/21
It is Monday, April 26th, two thousand and twenty one. Welcome into DIRTRACKR Daily. I'm Justin Fiedler.
Today we are talking Outlaws and big blocks at Bristol, late models at Richmond, USAC in Pennsylvania, and more, so let's get right to it.
The much anticipated World of Outlaws Sprint Car Series weekend at Bristol Motor Speedway is in the books, and I think it went just about as well as we could have hoped for. There were insane speeds, some good racing, and no major incidents. I think it was a major credit to the drivers and teams for keeping things clean on the track and for bringing cars that were well prepared and ready to handle the speeds and loads the track was going to put on them. In the end, it turned into a banner weekend for David Gravel and his Big Game Motorsports team. On Friday night, it was a complete sweep for Gravel, with him getting quick time and a new track record, a heat race and dash win, and the feature win. Aaron Reutzel tried to track him down from ninth, but a late caution allowed Gravel to drive away to his second win of the year. Reutzel was second, Carson Macedo third, Sam Hafertepe fourth, and Donny Schatz finished fifth. Saturday's program was moved to Sunday afternoon because of weather and we were treated to another track record and late race drama. Earlier in the day, Sam Hafertepe bested Gravel's lap from Friday night, lapping Bristol in a time of 13.326 seconds at 142 MPH. With Saturday's rain, you knew things would be fast on Sunday, and were they ever. For the feature Logan Schuchart dominated most of the 25 lap main event, but his terrible string of luck continued. David Gravel passed him with two laps left, and then Schuchart suffered a mechanical failure running second. He finished 19th. Out front, Gravel drove away to $25,000 and the weekend sweep, with Donny Schatz second, Aaron Reutzel third, Gio Scelzi fourth, and Paul McMahan fifth.
Leaving the weekend, it's not hard to say David Gravel was the big winner. Two wins in difficult circumstances showed yet again just how good of a driver he is. You needed to leave your fear at home this weekend if you were going to be successful, and Gravel certainly did that, setting the track record on Friday and running up front all weekend long. But in the bigger picture, the two wins have vaulted him back towards the top of the standings. Brad Sweet continues to lead the points, but Gravel is now up to second, just 60 points behind. And 8th place on Friday and an 11th on Sunday allowed both Gravel and Carson Macedo to close the gap. Macedo now has 7 straight top eight finishes, and is suddenly the hottest Outlaw driver, with an average finish of 4.8 over his last five races. Donny Schatz also had a very good weekend with a fifth on Friday and a second on Sunday. He broke his string of five straight finishes outside the top 10. He's gone 22 races without an Outlaw win, but this weekend he looked much closer to career win 300 than he has in several weeks. Going in the wrong direction though is Logan Schuchart. His last four finishes are 22nd, 19th, 20th, and 19th, and he's fallen to 6th in the standings, 150 points behind Sweet. Friday night he lost the left side wing panel and was forced to park the 1S, followed by the engine issue on Sunday. Schuchart hasn't had a stretch like this in several seasons, and with so many guys doing well this year, it will be a tough hole to climb out of if he's going to contend for the title. The other driver who has lost ground is Sheldon Haudenschild. He had gone eight straight races finishing in the top five, but since Haubstadt has three finishes outside the top 10 and has dropped to fourth in the standings after being second. The good thing for these guys though, is it's a short turn around this week. The Outlaws are back Thursday night at Jacksonville before heading to the revamped I-70 on Friday and Saturday. We'll have more on those races later in the week.
Joining the Outlaws at Bristol over the weekend was the Super DIRTcar Series. And just like with the Outlaws, we saw a weekend sweep of the feature events. On Friday night Stewart Friesen was the victim of a poor redraw, but it didn't matter. He drove up from eighth to grab the $10,000 win over Tyler Dippel, Mat Williamson, Tim Sears, and Mike Mahaney. On Sunday, Friesen battled with pole sitter Mahaney through much of the 40 lapper, but power steering issues for Mahaney's 35 were too much to overcome. Friesen took over the lead past halfway and drove away to another $10,000 win and the weekend sweep. Demetrios Drellos finished second, Max McLaughlin was third, Mahaney faded to fourth, and Ryan Watt was fifth. With three wins in three races so far, Friesen is the points leader by 43 over Mike Mahaney, but with his other racing committments, he won't be able to stay there all season. Billy Decker, Tim Sears Jr., and Matt Sheppard round out the top five. The big blocks are back in action next Tuesday, May 4th at Bridgeport Motorsports Park in New Jersey.
The World of Outlaws Late Model Series lost their Saturday show at Brushcreek Motorsports Park to weather, but they did complete the Friday show at Richmond Raceway. 29 cars were in attendance at the Kentucky bullring and many of the same storylines we've been talking about with the Outlaws continued. A series regular didn't win, Brandon Sheppard wasn't a factor, and Kyle Strickler's struggles continued. Tim McCreadie took advantage of a front row starting position to grab the lead at the start and he led wire-to-wire to take his first Outlaw win of 2021, and the 33rd of his career. Pole sitter Chris Madden finished second, Scott James was third, Ricky Weiss fourth, and Tyler Bruening continued his solid season finishing fifth. While not a terrible result finishing 9th, BShepp was yet again not towards the front. He maintains the series points lead, but he hasn't won an official Outlaw feature since September 26th of last year at Thunder Mountain Speedway. And early season points leader Kyle Strickler's slide continued. Since leaving Volusia, he has seven straight finishes outside the top ten, including a 22nd on Friday night at Richmond. He and Chris Madden are now tied for second in the standings, 46 points behind Sheppard. As I talked about last week, Madden is looking like a real challenger so far. His second place finish made it four straight top six finishes for Smoky, and he's marched right through the field. He has the best average finish in the series over the previous five races at 6.4. Through 11 features, only three have been won by World of Outlaws full timers, and only by two different drivers. Strickler has two and Madden has one. The Outlaws continue their season Friday and Saturday at Boone Speedway in Iowa.
It was a busy weekend in Pennsylvania for the USAC National Sprint Cars, which started last Thursday night with Brady Bacon's win at Grandview Speedway. Friday night at Big Diamond Speedway, we saw a first time series winner in Tanner Thorson. He got by pole sitter Jake Swanson with 11 laps left and drove away to his first win in just his 13th career series start. Swanson finished second, Kevin Thomas Jr. was third, Brady Bacon fourth, and CJ Leary was fifth. Chris Windom's top ten streak came to an end at 21 straight races with an 11th place result. Thorson entered the night with three straight top eight finishes, so the win wasn't suprising. And it was a great run for Swanson, who initially wasn't coming to Pennsylvania because of engine issues. He partnered with Joe Daming and it worked out in a big way. He finished the weekend with four top ten runs. Saturday at BAPS Motor Speedway, CJ Leary grabbed the lead from pole sitter Matt Westfall on the opening lap and led the rest of the way for his first victory of 2021. Justin Grant finished second, Chris Windom was third, Alex Bright hard charged from 16th to the finish fourth, and points leader Brady Bacon finished fifth. Sunday at Path Valley turned into a battle between Friday and Saturday's winners, Tanner Thorson and CJ Leary. Thorson led early from the outside pole, but things got wild near half way. The two traded sliders for three laps, with Leary officially leading laps 19 and 20. On lap 21, Thorson's slider attempt into turn one didn't clear Leary, and the two made contact, with Leary getting shuffled back and Thorson assuming the lead. It was only a short time later that Leary ended up over the turn three cushion, and contact from KTJ ended Leary's day. He finished 20th. Out front, nobody could track Thorson down and he drove away to this second win in three races. Justin Grant was second, KTJ third, Alex Bright went 18th to 4th, and Brandon Mattox finished fifth. With the Pennsylvania weekend complete, Brady Bacon maintains the points lead by 23 over Justin Grant. Kevin Thomas Jr., Tanner Thorson, and CJ Leary round out the top five. The sprint cars are back May 7th and 8th at Eldora for the Lets Race Two weekend.
In other late model action this weekend, Jonathan Davenport overcame a flat tire and out-dueled Devin Moran on a green white checkered finish to take the $8000 win in the first race at the newly revamped West Virginia Motor Speedway. Moran, Drake Troutman, Colton Flinner, and Ed Shuman rounded out the top five. Ross Bailes grabbed a Carolina Clash win at Lavonia, Mark Whitener was the winner on Saturday at All-Tech, and Dan Stone won the super late model feature Sunday at Selinsgrove. For more on the late model weekend, check out dirtondirt.com.
In weekend open wheel action, Zeb Wise was the winner at Attica on Friday night, Sye Lynch won at Lernerville, Shane Golobic grabbed two wins, Saturday Friday night at Ocean, and Saturday at Petaluma with the Sprint Car Challenge Tour. Lucas Wolfe won at Williams Grove for his first track win since 2019, Bill Balog won the IRA opener at Beaver Dam, Austin McCarl won the 410 weekly show at Knoxville, Damion Gardner won the USAC CRA show at Perris, Tyler Ross won at Lincoln, Steve Buckwalter at Port Royal, Brent Marks won in his own car at Selinsgrove, and Emerson Axsom and Daison Pursley won the POWRi midget features at Lucas Oil and Valley Speedway. For more open wheel winners, check out TJSlideways.com.
The only thing on the streaming schedule today is FloRacing 24/7. To see the full daily streaming schedule with links to watch, visit dirtrackr.com/watchtonight.
That's it for the show today, hope everyone has a good Monday. If you have thoughts about the topics on today's show, leave them in the comments below or tweet at me.
You can find DIRTRACKR Daily where you get podcasts, plus YouTube and Facebook. If you like what I'm doing, please subscribe and leave a review.
You can email the show at info@dirtrackr.com. I do check those every day.
You can follow dirtrackr on Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, and tiktok. at D I R T R A C K R
And you can checkout the website for all kinds of cool dirt racing stuff by visiting dirtrackr.com.
Thanks for tuning in, I'll see you tomorrow for more DIRTRACKR Daily!