DIRTRACKR Daily Podcast - Episode Transcript
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Lucas Late Models kick off tonight, new safety rules from the Outlaws make everyone big mad | Daily 1-27-2022
Coming up we're going to get you ready for the Lucas opener at Golden Isles, including win picks, we'll talk sprint car safety and more. Let's go!
Today is Thursday, January 27th, two thousand and twenty two. Welcome into DIRTRACKR Daily. I'm Justin Fiedler.
Before we get into the show, today's episode is supported by our friends at Rotor Ron. If you're into RC cars and racing, head over to rotorron.com. They've got a full line of new and reconditioned motors, plus batteries and all the accessories you could need, including gears, radios and receivers, and more. And if you need your RC motor dyno tuned, check them out. Being located in Illinois, they can get it turned around quickly for you. As a bonus for my DIRTRACKR audience, use code DIRT10 at checkout and get 10% off any order of $50 or more. So pop over to rotorron.com, grab some RC parts, and use code DIRT10 at checkout.
If you're a dirt late model fan, today is a good day. Speedweeks kicks off tonight at Golden Isles with 20 race nights on the schedule through February 19th between Lucas, the Outlaws and DIRTcar. We've got Golden Isles, Bubba Raceway Park, All-Tech, East Bay, and Volusia coming up. That includes 14 Lucas race nights, and six late model shows at DIRTcar Nationals, two of which are DIRTcar and four are for the World of Outlaws. Last night the teams got a chance to practice at Golden Isles before racing gets underway for real tonight. They had 43 cars take time, with Brandon Sheppard going overall quick time and Brandon Overton second quick. According to series announcer James Essex, they are expecting more cars to show up today, so we could be near 50 for tonight and the weekend. The field will be packed with good cars, including Jonathan Davenport, Hudson O'Neal, Tim McCreadie, Ricky Thornton Jr., Earl Pearson Jr., Shane Clanton, Josh Richards, Kyle Larson and a whole host of young drivers. For drivers and teams eyeing the Lucas championship, only their best five nights of the next 14 will count towards the season long championship hunt. But drivers do have to have perfect attendance to earn those points. If you watched my DIRTRACKR Conversations episode earlier this week with Joshua Joiner, you know there are some question marks with the group of Lucas full timers. Of the full time field that competed last year, we can expect champion Tim McCreadie to be back to defend his title, it also sounds like Hudson O'Neal, Tyler Erb, Kyle Bronson, Ricky Thornton Jr., and Earl Pearson Jr. are all coming back. Two notables that we are probably losing are Jonathan Davenport and Jimmy Owens. Those two drivers represent three of the last four Lucas championships, and a boat load of wins. It sounds like the draw of chasing the money in 2022 is just too strong to keep them as full fledged Lucas regulars. Some other drivers will step in to fill those gaps though, and a few names we should expect to be in the mix early are Spencer Hughes, Garrett Alberson, Ashton Winger, and Cody Overton. Those guys would all be chasing the Lucas rookie of the year as well. And from there, depending on how Speedweeks plays out, we could either lose or add some guys. Golden Isles Speedway looks to be in good shape for the weekend, and while the temperatures will be chilly, the forecast for precipitation continues to improve. Kyle Bronson is now the owner of the facility, so he'll be playing host this weekend, while also racing in multiple divisions. Looking at tonight specifically, this will be the first Lucas event at the track since 2020. This event was cancelled in 2021 because of covid. Back two years ago, Tim McCreadie won the opener in February, and then the series returned in May to reopen the season after the covid shutdown. Those three nights were won by Jimmy Owens, Kyle Bronson, and Josh Richards. Thanks to the added stat tools of DIRTRACKR Plus, we can see that in those four races in 2020, Jimmy Owens had the best average finish at 3.75. Of drivers that made multiple starts, McCreadie, Bronson, and Davenport trail Owens. The dirtrackr.com analytics prediction formula likes McCreadie tonight, and I'm going to pick Brandon Overton. So far, both me and the formula are 0-1 after the Outlaws at Volusia. We'll see how we fare tonight. As for the series championship, I think McCreadie is still the guy to beat. We know Erb and O'Neal can win races, but can they find that consistency to stay in the hunt. TMac won the title in 2021, and his average finish was more than two spots better than O'Neal who finished second. Those guys will have to close that gap up big time if they are going to compete. If you are in the area, make sure to dress warm for tonight, if not, MAVTV Plus will have live coverage of the whole night, and the MAVTV broadcast network will go live for the feature only.
In some rules news from yesterday, the World of Outlaws Sprint Car Series announced they are working towards making onboard fire suppression systems mandatory for the 2023 season. They are currently working with SFI and the manufacturers to create a set of rules which they plan on completing by May of this year. That will allow teams to have plenty of time to get things purchased and their cars outfitted before next year. I personally saw this announcement, and was like hey, more safety, that's good news. But apparently not everyone agrees. There was quite the reaction from the sprint car community on social media yesterday following the move. There were a lot of drivers saying instead of mandating more parts, why don't we make tracks safer, etc. We saw tweets from Gio and Dominic Scelzi, Logan Wagner, and plenty of others. Which to some extent, I agree with. The problem here though, is these things aren't mutually exclusive. We can both mandate onboard fire suppression, and work towards safer race tracks. It doesn't have to be one or the other. It should be all of them. What I don't understand here though, is guys complaining about unsafe tracks, no ambulances, etc, but they don't go into details or mention the tracks by name. If this is such a problem, why aren't they more vocal about which tracks. Put some pressure on these facilities to get better. Also, nobody is forcing these drivers to run these tracks. If they don't like what they see, don't race. Sitting out from an event you find unsafe will be a serious message to the powers that be that something needs to be done. But if you continue to show up and race at these places regardless, they will continue to not make changes. The area of safety is something that needs to constantly be evolving, and drivers need to step up and make moves on their own. I also saw some tweets from guys that this move is financially motivated, with the insinuation being that there are going to be kickbacks or some sort of payoff for the series from the companies that make these systems. That's a wildly cynical view of the situation, and one I hope isn't widely accepted. Not everything in this world is a cash grab. I don't know about you, but if I can add something to my car that will help me not be on fire in a crash, that sounds pretty good. From all angles, safety needs to continue being a focus and being pushed forward. Safer cars, better race tracks, improved safety gear, and better response teams at the tracks are needed. And everyone needs to do their part, from the drivers and teams, to the series and tracks.
When Tyler Courtney and his Clauson Marshall Racing team head south here coming up pretty quickly, they'll do it with a fresh paint scheme on the 7BC sprint car. No more NOS Energy Turbo on the side of that machine, instead going with an updated look from Blackbeard that features just the straight NOS Energy Drink logo. Sunshine is getting ready to defend his All Star Circuit of Champions title and tackle a sizeable sprint car schedule to hopefully make the jump to the World of Outlaws in the future. The All Star schedule kicks off a week from tomorrow at Senoia Raceway in Georgia.
And a quick schedule change for the All Stars. Their April 24th race at Bedford Speedway in Pennsylvania has been pushed back a few days to April 28th. So it was on Sunday, now it's the following Thursday night. It was originally going to cap a four race weekend with Bloomsburg, Williams Grove, and Port Royal. Now it will kick off a four day stretch that will include Lernerville, Sharon, and Waynesfield. For info on the All Star Circuit of Champions, check out allstarsprint.com.
For the modified folks, at East Bay for the WinterNationals last night, 2021 track champion Bryan Bernhardt topped the UMP modified feature over Chris Wilson and Lucas Lee. It was Bernhardt's first WinterNationals win in three years. Drake Troutman finished eighth, Tyler Clem was 14th, and Tyler Nicely finished 22nd. It was a big field of cars with 59 on the property. The modified portion of the event continues through Saturday night. The WinterNationals as a whole continue at East Bay in various forms through February 19th.
There are four shows on the streaming schedule today. FloRacing has the WinterNationals from East Bay and FloRacing 24/7. MAVTV Plus has the opening night of the Lucas late models from Golden Isles, and Speed Sport TV has USAC CRA Sprint Cars from Cocopah Speedway. 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 tomorrow for more DIRTRACKR Daily!