DIRTRACKR Daily Podcast - Episode Transcript
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Alex Bowman getting in a sprint car, Davenport chasing McCreadie | DIRTRACKR Daily 7/20/21
Today is Tuesday, July 20th, two thousand and twenty one. This is DIRTRACKR Daily. I'm Justin Fiedler.
Coming up we will preview tonight's action for the Lucas Oil Late Model Dirt Series, World of Outlaws, and Super DIRTcar Series. I've also got an update on a busy night on the streaming services.
Before we dive in, if you like what I'm doing here, please subscribe to the show, leave a review, and hit those follow and notification buttons depending on where you consume this. Make sure to follow @dirtrackr on Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, and TikTok. And don't forget dirtrackr.com has a bunch more cool dirt racing stuff. Now, let's get going.
It's been a rough stretch for the Lucas Oil Late Model Dirt Series, but they are poised to begin a busy five day stretch at I-80 Speedway starting tonight. It's going to be warm all week in Nebraska, but it looks like we should be in line to see plenty of racing. The next three nights make up the I-80 Nationals, with Tuesday and Wednesday paying $7000 each to the winner, while Thursday is a $30,000 to win show. We then start into the Silver Dollar Nationals Friday and Saturday. The big show on Saturday night pays a cool $53,000 to the winner. Jonathan Davenport's win over the weekend at Lucas Oil Speedway has tightened up the standings with McCreadie only out front now by 70 points. Depending on how things play out, that is 14 positions or less that separate McCreadie and Superman right now for the championship lead. Remember that the top four in the results are separated by 10 points, while every other position is five points. If JD keeps winning, he could cut that lead down quickly. Hudson O'Neal has lost ground to the front two, and is now 195 points behind McCreadie. I was worried about his ability to stay consistent, and he's struggled in recent weeks since winning the Show Me 100. He has two finishes outside the top ten in his previous four starts, and is suddenly in jeopardy of losing third to Kyle Bronson. Lucas ran five races at I-80 in 2020, and we had a variety of winners including Jimmy Owens, Brandon Sheppard, Kyle Strickler, and McCreadie. If we put McCreadie's finishes last season against Davenport's, the advantage goes to McCreadie. He had a win, three top fives and an average finish of 7.2. Davenport had an average feature finish of 10.75, with a best result of sixth. But he did miss one of the features, ending up fourth in a B main on September 18th. With good money on the line and the Outlaws off, I'd expect some really nice car counts through the week. I'd guess somewhere in the neighborhood of 40 or 50, even with the Summer Nationals ongoing. Other drivers to keep an eye on this week include Ricky Thornton Jr. and Josh Richards. Both were strong at I-80 last year, with Richards coming off that second place result at Lucas Oil Speedway and Thornton needing to bounce back from a rough patch in his last four starts that includes three finishes outside the top ten. If you'd like to watch live this week, MAVTV Plus will have live streaming coverage.
Following the double Kings Royal week at Eldora, the Month of Money for the World of Outlaws Sprint Car Series continues tonight at Lernerville Speedway for the $25,000 to win Don Martin Memorial Silver Cup. Donny Schatz is the defending winner of the event, with he and Kyle Larson and Brad Sweet putting on one hell of show at Lernerville in 2020. We had five lead changes, with three of them coming in the last five laps. We had 39 cars for this event last season, and I don't see any reason why we wouldn't be close to that tonight. David Gravel was the winner of the Silver Cup in 2019, while Larson won it in 2018. Brad Sweet continues to lead the way in the race for the championship, but a few more good runs from Carson Macedo, and we might have a battle again. Macedo is 114 points back and over his last 11 races hasn't finished worse than sixth and has two wins. He leads all drivers with an average finish over the last five races of 2.8. As for David Gravel, he's slid to third behind Macedo, now 140 points back. It was a good thing for him that the Kings Royals were show up points only, as results of 24th and 16th would have seen him slip even further back. Over his last ten starts, his average finish is 10.9, which includes six double digit finishes. That's just not going to get it done against Brad Sweet. Another driver who I'd hoped we'd see some more growth from this season is Sheldon Haudenschild. He's still fifth in the standings, but hasn't really been a factor in the championship chase this season. It looked like he took a nice step forward in 2020, but so far this season is off his pace from last year, as he's not winning or finishing top five and top ten as often as he did in 2020. His average feature start is seven tenths of a position better, but that isn't translating into better finishes. He's actually about three tenths of a position worse in average finish this year versus last. Sweet and Macedo are finishing in the top ten in better than 80% of their starts so far, while Sheldon is in the low 70s. He's going to need to find some more consistency in seasons to come if he really wants to be a contender. One driver we won't see tonight at Lernerville is Brent Marks. He's taking the night off to get his equipment and his body back in order after a tough Eldora. He'll be back with the Outlaws this weekend at Williams Grove. You can catch all the action live tonight on DIRTVision.
And since we are talking about sprint cars, we'll have another Hendrick Motorsports Cup driver in a sprint car this week and next. Alex Bowman is jumping behind the wheel of his own number 55 410 in several races coming up, including Thursday at Circle City, Friday at Attica, Saturday at Fremont, Sunday at Tri-City, next Friday at Attica, Saturday at Fremont, and Sunday at Tri-City. The car has had Valvoline on it recently when CJ Leary has been behind the wheel, but Bowman introduced a new look yesterday for the car which features his Cup sponsor Ally in a killer purple scheme designed by Sean Cain, AKA Blackbeard. Bowman joins his Hendrick teammates Kyle Larson and Chase Elliott as having competed in an open wheel car on dirt this season. Bowman's experience in the sprint car is limited, but I'd expect him to be up to speed fairly quickly.
The Super DIRTcar Series is supposed to be in action tonight at Land of Legends Raceway in Canandaigua, New York. The series has only raced once through the months of June and July because of both rainouts and ongoing issues with the pandemic. Last week's show at Albany Saratoga was cancelled for rain, and the series was supposed to race yesterday and today in Canada, but those shows were scrapped because of issues getting across the border. For tonight, there are some rain chances in the evening, so stay tuned to the Super DIRTcar Series social channels and websites to make sure the racing gets going. Stewart Friesen currently holds a 28 point lead on Matt Sheppard in the standings, with Mike Mahaney, Mat Williamson, and Billy Decker completing the top five. Friesen, Sheppard, Williamson, and Tim Fuller have all won races so far in 2021. The last time the series visited Canandaigua was sort of last October. I say sort of because it was during DIRTcar OktoberFast, which weren't technically series races, but still DIRTcar sanctioned big block events. Matt Sheppard was the winner that night over Money Mat and Mahaney. Sheppard also won at the track in 2019, while the Doctor Danny Johnson took the victory in 2018. Other drivers to keep an eye on tonight include Justin Haers, Erick Rudolph, and Tim Sears Jr. If you can't be at Land of Legends tonight, you can check out the action live on DIRTVision with your fast pass.
And speaking of the Super DIRTcar Series, it was announced a few days ago that Super DIRT Week is now accepting driver entries for this year's 49th edition of the event. Super DIRT Week returns to Oswego Speedway October 6th through the 10th, and drivers can register and view competitor notes at superdirtweek.com. The event features big block modifieds, sportsman and 358 modifieds, and pro stocks, and it all culminates in the Billy Whittaker Cars 200 that will pay $50,000 to win and $1500 to start. For more details, visit superdirtweek.com and superdirtcarseries.com.
Last night's Southern Nationals late model event at Volunteer Speedway in Tennessee was rained out. Officials have postponed it to Sunday, August 1st. With one event complete and drivers in attendance last night receiving show up points, Donald McIntosh is the current series points leader. The Southern Nationals continue tonight at I-75 Raceway in Tennessee with ten shows on the scheduled through August 1st. For more, visit southernnationalsseries.com.
It's a busy Tuesday across the streaming services with nine shows on the schedule. DIRTVision has the Outlaws at Lernerville and the Super DIRTcar Series from Canandaigua. FloRacing has the Southern Nationals at I-75, IMCA racing from Jackson, and Flo 24/7. The Lucas Late Models are on MAVTV Plus, there is 410 racing on SprintCarUnlimited.tv, and weekly action on The Cushion and Speed Sport. To see the full daily streaming schedule with links to watch, visit dirtrackr.com/watchtonight.
That's it for the show today, hope you have a good Tuesday. If you have thoughts about the topics on today's show, leave them in the comments below or tweet at me.
Thanks everybody for tuning in, I'll see you tomorrow for more DIRTRACKR Daily!