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Overton sweeps Dreams, wins $273k; Macedo takes both Knoxville Outlaw wins | DIRTRACKR Daily 6-14-2021
It is Monday, June 14th, two thousand and twenty one. Welcome into DIRTRACKR Daily. I'm Justin Fiedler.
On the show today we are talking Brandon Overton's insane Dream sweep, a big weekend for Carson Macedo, and speedweek action from the All Stars and USAC midgets. Before we start though, a quick request. If you don't already, please subscribe to the show where you get podcasts, or hit that subscribe button on YouTube. Also, that YouTube like button and podcast reviews help others find the show. I appreciate all of you that tune in regularly. You are why I spend so much time making this happen. Now, let's dive in.
If you checked out any of the pre-Dream coverage from the various media outlets, you would have heard that with the way it broke down, one driver could walk away from Eldora with $273,000 between the two Dreams and the prelim nights. But when that was talked about, I don't know that anyone actually thought one driver would sweep the weekend and walk away with all the cash. Incredibly though, that's exactly what happened. After winning the Dream 27 prelim night and the $127,000 feature earlier in the week, Brandon Overton kept it rolling on Friday night and Saturday night. In the first prelim feature on Friday night he slipped past Ryan Gustin on lap nine and drove away to the $10,000 win. And then on Saturday, Overton moved up quickly from his seventh starting position and he stalked early leader Darrell Lanigan through half way. Then following a restart he drove by Lanigan on the outside to take the lead on lap 53. Through the second half of the race though, it wasn't a cake walk for Overton. He traded the lead with Chris Madden multiple times before Overton took control for good on lap 86. From there, the 76 stretched it out and grabbed the weekend sweep by over three seconds. Madden, Chris Ferguson, Jonathan Davenport, and Lanigan completed the top five. It was an incredible performance from Overton and his Wells Motorsports team to win every feature they competed in over the four days. In a season where we've seen some parity emerge in the dirt late model world, I certainly thought we'd see some different winners, especially with guys like Davenport, McCreadie and even Larson having had success in 2021. But Overton was having none of it. With all the winning we've seen from Overton recently, his talent was not a question, but now his resume is starting to match what we knew he was capable of. He now has three crown jewel wins in his career, and at age 30, there is a lot of time left in his career for him to do a boatload more winning. Where this weekend ranks in the history of dirt late model racing, I'll leave for others to comment on. But I do know that the pandemic created a situation at Eldora we may never seen again, and Brandon Overton turned it into one hell of an epic weekend.
Before we move on to the other racing from the weekend, I appreciated Kyle Larson's Overton hat tip on Sunday night. After winning the million dollar NASCAR All Star race, Larson said in his post race comments that he was glad Overton wasn't in the field to steal the cash. Larson went 8th, 13th, 5th, and 6th at Eldora, won the All Star race, and is now headed to Ohio for some sprint car racing as part of speedweek. His incredible season continues.
It was a big weekend for Carson Macedo and his Jason Johnson Racing number 41 team at Knoxville with the World of Outlaws. Both on Friday and Saturday night, he slipped by Kerry Madsen late in the features to sweep the weekend. On Friday night it was with four to go following a restart, and Saturday night he did it on the final lap. The wins were Macedo's first at Knoxville in Outlaw competition, but this was just par for the course for JJR. Whenever the 41 rolls into Knoxville, Philip Dietz has that thing ready to win. They've now won with Jason, David Gravel, and Macedo at the sprint car capital of the world, including multiple Knoxville Nationals wins. I've said this before, and I'll say it again. Dietz does not get enough credit or attention for the job he does crew chiefing that car. Macedo has run well at Knoxville in the past, but this has to put everyone on notice for August that this team will be one to beat if you want the big money. Besides being two big wins at Knoxville for the 41, the weekend also tightened up the World of Outlaws points battle even more. Sweet finished a solid 6th on Friday night, but a 16th place result on Saturday left the door wide open. Gravel was able to close another eight points, so the gap to second is now only 48. But Macedo was the big mover. The two wins allowed him to chop 44 points out of Sweet's lead, so what was now a 104 point gap to Macedo in third is now only 60. The 16th place finish on Saturday night for Sweet was his worst in an Outlaw race since he finished 24th at Knoxville on August 13th of 2020. His average finish over the last five races and last ten races are both trending down versus his 2021 averages and his averages over the previous three seasons. Over his last 12 races, he has five finishes of 11th or worse. Three guys that have had incredible success at Knoxville in the past in Sweet, Gravel, and Donny Schatz, all finished outside the top ten on Saturday night. That's definitely not what you expect to see. On the flip side, Logan Schuchart is going back in the right direction. He and Sheldon Haudenschild have the best average finish in the series over the past five races, and Logan now has eight straight top ten finishes after a tough stretch in April and May that saw him slide out of the top five in points. Looking at the rookie class, Brock Zearfoss was cleared to return to action this weekend, but his bad luck continued. He had a big crash on Saturday night, and left with finishes of 19th and 24th. If he didn't have bad luck, he wouldn't have any luck at all. And we still haven't seen Jason Sides since Eldora and Mason Daniel since I-70. The Outlaws are back on Thursday to kick off a three race weekend between Iowa and Wisconsin.
We are neck deep in Ohio Sprint Speedweek for the All Star Circuit of Champions right now with two of eight races complete. Friday night at Attica it was Ian Madsen winning the speedweek Opener over Cory Eliason and polesitter Skyler Gee. Justin Peck led the first 12 laps, but he made a mistake onto the frontstretch coming to lap 13, and that allowed Madsen to slip by. It didn't look like there was any contact between Peck and Madsen, but I wonder if Peck thought that Madsen dirtied him a bit out of four. I wonder, because two laps later, Peck tried a seriously reckless slider into turn three that had no hopes of clearing the 11. The two leaders made contact, with Peck ending up spun out. Madsen kept his car going and was able to keep the lead. Peck later finished 12th. From that point Madsen went unchallenged to get his first win of 2021 and fourth career All Star win. It was his first series victory since 2016. I hate it for Peck, because I think he allowed his frustration to get the better of him and it cost him a shot at the win and at the very least probably a top five run. On Saturday night at Fremont, Danny Dietrich was dominant for most of the feature, leading 39 of the 40 laps. With ten to go though, we had a three car battle for the lead, with Justin Peck and Cole Duncan closing on the 48. Dietrich was able to keep them at bay in the closing laps, but coming to the checkered, Duncan made his move. He used the top side in three and four to get some momentum, and slipped past Dietrich right at the line to grab the win. Dietrich had to pinch his line off out of four and it killed his run. The win was the fifth All Star victory for Duncan, and his first since 2018. With two nights complete, Dietrich leads the speedweek points over Eliason and Cap Henry. In the season long standings, Courtney's lead is 98, with Hunter Schuerenberg 150 back in third. Ohio Sprint Speedweek continues tonight at Wayne County Speedway.
The other speedweek we had going on was Indiana Midget Week, and racing wrapped up over the weekend. Daison Pursley led the weeklong points standings entering Friday at Gas City, and we'd had six different winners through six nights. But Buddy Kofoid spoiled the party with a dominating win. He led all 30 laps to become the first repeat winner on the week. Emerson Axsom and Logan Seavey completed the podium. The win for Kofoid and a 4th for Pursley was good enough for Kofoid to grab the midget week points lead by three headed to the finale on Saturday at Kokomo. In that feature, we had great racing in the early going, with multiple lead changes between Justin Grant and Logan Seavey in the first 13 laps. But on lap 14, Chris Windom took over the top spot from Grant, and Big Daddy led the rest of the way to get his first win of Indiana Midget week and second USAC midget win of the season. Grant and Jason McDougal rounded out the podium. A seventh place finish for Kofoid was good enough for him to lock up his first ever Midget Week championship over Seavey and Pursley. Kofoid's strong finish to the week keeps him in control of the season long standings as well, with his lead now 47 points over Windom. Emerson Axsom has jumped from sixth to third in the standings after a strong last four nights of midget week where he never finished worse than fourth. Axsom has taken big steps forward this season and will be a serious threat for wins through the summer. The USAC national midgets return to action July 11th at Sweet Springs.
Other weekend winners include Mario Clouser sweeping the POWRi WAR races, Scotty Neitzel swept the IRA weekend, Harli White was again an NRA winner at Limaland, Freddie Rahmer won at Lincoln, Jeff Halligan at Port Royal, Dominic Scelzi and Tim Kaeding split the King of the West weekend, Justyn Cox grabbed the Sprint Car Challenge Tour victory at Placerville, Mark Smith won the 410 race at Action Track USA with a 360 motor driving for Mike Heffner, and Austin McCarl was the Sunday winner at Huset's. For more from the weekend, visit tjslideways.com.
This insane stretch of racing continues into this week. Besides Ohio Sprint Speedweek continuing, Eastern Storm for the USAC National Sprint Cars starts tomorrow at Grandview, and the Summer Nationals kick off tomorrow night at Brownstown for both the late model and modified competitors. So there will be plenty to watch and talk about coming up.
There are two items on the streaming schedule for today, both on FloRacing. Besides Flo 24/7, Ohio Sprint Speedweek for the All Stars continues at Wayne County Speedway. 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.
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