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.
Gateway Dirt Nationals open in St. Louis, All Stars sanctioning Silver Cup at Lernerville | Daily 12-2-2021
Coming up we'll get you ready for the opening night of the Gateway Dirt Nationals in St. Louis, plus we've got news from the All Stars and Lernerville, the Chili Bowl, and the Short Track Super Series. Let's go!
Today is Thursday, December 2nd, two thousand and twenty one. Welcome into DIRTRACKR Daily. I'm Justin Fiedler.
Before we dive in, I just wanted to say welcome to all of the newer folks tuning into the show. The podcast and YouTube channel continue to grow at an incredible rate, and as of today we are approaching 4000 YouTube subscribers. For the month of November the shows averaged 2000 plays a day, which was the second best month to date, and we have already blown through half a million plays for the year between the audio and video versions of the show. If you are new, don't forget to also check out dirtrackr.com for a lot more dirt racing content, including news, the full analytics section, the daily streaming schedule, and more. You can also follow dirtrackr across the spectrum of social media channels, including Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and TikTok. Now, onto the show.
After having to cancel the event in 2020 because of the pandemic, the Gateway Dirt Nationals are back starting tonight at the Dome in St. Louis. The brainchild of promoter Cody Sommer, the indoor dirt racing event first took place in 2016, and this year features a full slate of dirt late models, modifieds, and midgets over the next three nights. Competitors have been split into two groups, with Thursday and Friday being prelim action for each group, before Saturday's main events. Each prelim night will include a full slate of hot lap qualifying, heat races, and features. The top eight in each division after the first two nights will be locked into Saturday's main events. The prelim features are worth $3000 for the midgets and modifieds, and $5000 for the late models. Saturday's features will pay $10,000 to the midget and modified winners, and $30,000 to the late model winner. The past late model winners of the event include Scott Bloomquist, Bobby Pierce and Tyler Carpenter. Tommie Seets Jr., Ray Bollinger, Mike Harrison, and Derek Losh are the four past modified winners. And Kyle Larson and Christopher Bell won the two previous midget features at the event. All three late model past winners will be in attendance looking to repeat, while only Ray Bollinger and Mike Harrison are expected to try and win again in the modified ranks. Neither Bell or Larson is expected in the midget field, so we'll have a new event winner there. As for the track and facility, the Dome at America's Center used to be the home of the St. Louis Rams before they moved to LA. Inside the arena, Tri-City Speedway's Kevin Gundaker has built a 1/5 mile track that should be conducive to tight quarters racing. Because of the indoor nature of the event, moving cars in and out is a unique challenge, as is the pit area. The competitors take over the convention center next door as an indoor pit area, but cars can only be refueld outside and you'll see cars out along Cole St. being pushed into the Dome for their racing action. Besides the aforementioned winners, the late model field is stacked and includes names like Brandon Sheppard, Shannon Babb, Tanner English, Jason Feger, Ryan Unzicker, Jonathan Davenport, Rusty Schlenk, and many others. The modified field is filled with guys like Tyler Nicely, Jeff Leka, Will Krup, Mike McKinney, and more. It looks like Kyle Hammer and Ricky Thornton Jr. will compete with both the late models and modifieds, while Nick Hoffman is going to be busy running a Bloomquist late model, an RMS midget, and his own modified. The event hasn't released an entry list for the midgets, so I'm not sure outside of Hoffman who else is confirmed to be racing. Today's action at the Dome gets underway with spectator gates opening at 2PM, and on track action starting at 3PM. These times are central. If you can't be at the Dome and would like to watch from afar, FloRacing has the livestream.
An interesting side bar for Gateway, the Niece Motorsports NASCAR truck series team announced yesterday that the winner of the late model portion of Gateway will be offered the seat of a Niece truck for the Knoxville dirt truck series race in June of 2022. They are calling it win and you're in. Not a bad little bonus on top of the $30,000 check. Win a big late model show and get a chance to race in a top level of NASCAR.
In other news from yesterday, in a not unexpected move, Lernerville Speedway and the All Star Circuit of Champions announced a pair of sanctioned sprint car events are happening at the Pennsylvania track in 2022. The first will be a $6000 to win show on April 29th, which will be the All Stars first appearance at Lernerville since 2019. The second, on July 6th, will be the $25,000 to win Don Martin Memorial Silver Cup. This now becomes one of the richest events on the All Stars' 2022 calendar. This all stems back to the track's decision to swap the sanction of the Firecracker 100 weekend from the World of Outlaws to Lucas. In response, World Racing Group didn't put Lernerville on the World of Outlaws Sprint Car Series schedule for 2022, leaving events like the Silver Cup without a major sanction. With the All Stars' base of operations, this move just made a lot of sense for both parties to fill that hole left by the Outlaws. The All Stars get to add a marquee event, and the track gets the guaranteed roster of All Star regulars for their big sprint car show. I believe this now bumps the All Star schedule to 60 races for next season.
I mentioned on the show yesterday that Chili Bowl entries are starting to be released, and the list includes the first driver allowed in by the new age rules. If you might remember, the event dropped the requirement that drivers be 16 years old, and added in the ability for younger competitors to submit themselves for approval to race by an event committee. The first to be approved is 13 year old Gavan Boschele. Boschele has been racing in the micro ranks with Swindell SpeedLab in recent seasons, and appeared several times in 2021 in a Keith Kunz midget. Even at only 13, he's a super talented driver and will have no problem racing inside the Tulsa Expo. Boschele is one of a small group of young drivers this rule was meant for. At chilibowl.com, the entry list still shows 133, so no new additions in the previous 24 hours.
If you're a northeast modified fan, the Short Track Super Series has put additional money on the line next season around their marquee events. The six race Elite Series will tack on a $25,000 championship around the Rebel 50 at Cherokee, the Joseph Memorial at Georgetown, the Hard Clay Open at Orange County, the New Yorker at Utica-Rome, the Fonda 200, and the Speed Showcase at Port Royal. All of those races pay at least $25,000 to win, so this championship will be in addition to whatever money the drivers can take home from those big races. Nice to see some additional money on the line as the profile of northeast racing continues to rise. More details about the series can be found at shorttracksuperseries.com.
There are two shows on the streaming schedule today, both over on FloRacing. They've got Flo 24/7 plus night one of the Gateway Dirt Nationals from St. Louis. 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 Thursday. 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 in a few days for more DIRTRACKR Daily!