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.
Brandon Overton wins first Dirt Late Model Dream, Outlaws at Knoxville | DIRTRACKR Daily 6/11/21
It is Friday, June 11th, two thousand and twenty one. Welcome into DIRTRACKR Daily. I'm Justin Fiedler.
Today on the show we are breaking down everything from last night's Dirt Late Model Dream, talking Indiana Midget Week, and looking ahead to a busy weekend. Let's get going.
The 27th Dirt Late Model Dream is now in the books and what a night it was. We had a little bit of everything last night, including a rain delay, big wrecks, scale drama, big movers, and at the end, a first time event winner. In the big show Brandon Overton started fourth, stayed right with leader Brandon Sheppard through half way, and with 39 laps to go made his move. Following a restart, Overton slipped past Sheppard and drove away to his first ever career Dream win and the $127,000 pay day. It was the second crown jewel win for Overton and his 13th overall win this season. It was an impressive performance for the Georgia driver. Even though he doesn't run full time with a series, Overton continues to cement himself as one of the best in the business, and a threat anytime that Wells 76 rolls into a race track. Overton was one of the big three we talked about all last year, and thus far in 2021 is the only one of those three, which also included Sheppard and Jimmy Owens, that continues to win on such a torrid pace. Much of the field last night was right along the fence, and there were plenty of crinkled right rear quarters because of it. But not Overton. He found speed right through the middle for a lot of the feature and boy did it pay off. And the crazy thing is, we aren't done. Overton has a chance to add a lot more money to his weekend with Dream 26 on tap starting tonight.
Behind Overton at the finish, Tim McCreadie, Kyle Bronson, Dale McDowell, and Sheppard completed the top five. McCreadie started 11th and methodically picked his way towards the front. He was very good at the end, but didn't quite have enough to run down Overton in lap traffic. With the way he ran last night, I would not be surprised to see McCreadie again be a factor on Saturday. The current Lucas points leader always rises to the occasion in big races. Bronson was strong through the entire 100 laps, starting third and staying right with the leaders all race long. And Sheppard faded to fifth at the end after leading the first 61 laps. It was a strong showing for the Rocket house car, but they still seem to be missing just a little bit of something. Dennis Erb Jr.'s 25th to sixth run might have been the most impressive run of the night. He started 23rd in the night's first B main and drove all the way to third to grab the transfer, and then drove through the field to sixth in the feature. Erb was the beneficiary of Ross Bailes being light at the scales following that first B. Bailes had the transfer spot, but didn't make minimum weight, which allowed Erb in. Another thing we saw last night that we haven't seen in a while was a Kyle Larson mistake. He's been on such a roll lately, but last night while trying to put a big move on Dale McDowell, he spun out of the top five with 37 laps to go. He ended up 13th. It was a shame because it looked like he had some speed late in the going. Another driver who I expected to be a serious contender which I talked about yesterday, but never really challenged for the lead was Jonathan Davenport. He started 13th, and raced right around the middle of the top ten for most of the race, before ending up seventh. He's been so good this season, and his dominating prelim win left me thinking he was the guy to beat. Big shoutouts also to Nick Hoffman on a 21st to 9th run and Hudson O'Neal on a 23rd to 10th run. The night was marred by a lot of cautions and a huge crash for Jason Feger in the five lap scramble. Cars wrecked in front of him into turn one and he was collected, and ended up flipping wildly. He did walk away from the incident.
Looking ahead to tonight and the weekend, we are going to do it all over again. Tonight's program will again showcase a full program and two split field features paying $10,000 to win. The results will set up tomorrow's heat race lineups for Dream 26 which will pay $126,000 to win. Stay locked to FloRacing all weekend long for live coverage.
Elsewhere last night, Indiana Midget Week continued with round number six at Lincoln Park Speedway. After the 30 lap feature we had another different winner and a new midget week points leader. Tanner Thorson started on the pole with his Reinbold Underwood teammate Chase Randall to his outside, but once green it was all Thorson. He led every lap to become the sixth different winner in six nights. Daison Pursley ended up second, Emerson Axsom third, Buddy Kofoid fourth, and Wednesday's winner Corey Day went 12th to 5th to also earn the night's hard charger award. Chris Windom was the points leader entering the night, but he suffered a flat tire in the feature and could only get back to 13th. That allowed Kofoid to take back the season long points lead, while Daison Pursley has suddenly jumped to the top of the midget week points. He's got a one point cushion over Windom, with Kofoid three points back in third, and Logan Seavey only 11 points back in fourth. Pursley has yet to finish outside the top ten in a midget week feature. There are two nights left to decide things, with the midgets headed to Gas City tonight and Kokomo on Saturday. If you can't be there, watch live on Flo.
I feel like we haven't talked about the World of Outlaws sprint cars much lately, but there has been a lot of other racing going on and the Outlaws have only raced twice in the last 20 days. David Gravel is the most recent winner back on Granite City last Saturday night and Brad Sweet maintains the points lead by 56 over Gravel, with Carson Macedo third, Donny Schatz fourth, and Sheldon Haudenschild fifth. The series takes on Knoxville this weekend for two shows, with tonight paying $6000 to win and Saturday night paying $10,000 to win. This will be the Outlaws' first appearance at the sprint car capital of the world in 2021 and the midwest guys will be in attendance to try and knock them off. The Outlaws raced at Knoxville six times in 2020, with incredibly only two guys getting wins. David Gravel won on May 8th and August 14th, and Kyle Larson won four times between June and August, including the $50,000 win on August 15th. Looking at win predictions for the weekend, the competitors don't have to worry about Larson, as he's in Eldora with the late model. With that being the case, it would seem Gravel is the favorite, and the dirtrackr.com analytics prediction formula agrees. He tops Logan Schuchart and Donny Schatz in win chances. But don't count out Brad Sweet or Carson Macedo tonight. Both drivers have previous Knoxville wins and they will all be hungry to try and get a victory and make more moves in the standings. And you've heard me say it before. We are still waiting on win 300 for Schatz. It's been 35 World of Outlaws races since we had a Donny Schatz victory. You'll have to go back a lot of years to find a winless streak that long for Schatz. Grandstands open tonight at 5:30 local time, and DIRTVision will have live streaming coverage.
We've gotten to watch a lot of dirt racing so far this month, and that won't slow down any time soon. The All Star Circuit of Champions are at Attica tonight for the Ohio Sprint Speedweek opener, and we're about to get eight sprint car races in nine nights. The series heads to Fremont Saturday, has Sunday off, and then continues for six more nights starting Monday at Wayne County. Tyler Courtney is the All Star points leader by 92 over Ian Madsen, with Hunter Schuerenberg third, Bill Balog fourth, and Cory Eliason in fifth. This will be a grueling stretch for the teams, but if someone can string together some good nights, this could go a long ways towards cementing good points finishes later in the year. A strong contingent of outsiders and Ohio regulars will be ready to challenge the All Star full timers and you can probably count on a few of these nights being won by somebody who isn't an All Star regular. One of the guys I would look at there is Rico Abreu. He's running the entire speedweek and only Tyler Courtney has a better average finish then he does over the previous five races. Rico bagged a speedweek win in 2020 at Muskingum County, was an Attica winner in September, and according to the dirtrackr.com analytics prediction formula, is the favorite tonight. Other recent Attica winners to watch out for include Cap Henry, Tim Shaffer, and Justin Peck. Henry will be a good pick for tomorrow at Fremont as well. Another driver I'm going to be watching is past conversations guest Tanner Holmes. The Oregon driver is towing out to run all of speedweek and will be turning 18 years old during the trip. He made his 410 debut earlier this year at the Wild Wing Shootout and was very respectable against some tough fields. You can watch all eight nights live on Flo if you can't be there.
If you're looking for other racing this weekend to check out, make sure to hit up the schedule pages at dirtondirt.com and tjslideways.com. There is an IRA double header, WAR sprint cars, a NARC 410 double header, and plenty of local and regional action. It should be a great couple of days for dirt racing.
If you can't get to the track, there are 38 shows on the streaming schedule for tonight, with a lot more to come this weekend. That includes the Dream at Eldora, Indiana Midget Week, Ohio Sprint Speedweek for the All Stars, the World of Outlaws at Knoxville and a whole boatload more. To see the full daily streaming schedule with links to watch, visit dirtrackr.com/watchtonight.
If you're near the Belleville High Banks this weekend make sure to check out the Kansas Sooner Klash on Saturday featuring the Sooner Limited Modified Series and the Sooner Late Model Series. The event features $20 grand in purse money and things get underway starting at 6:30. For more details, check out soonerlimitedmodifiedseries.myracepass.com.
That's it for the show today, hope everyone has a good Friday. 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 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!