DIRTRACKR Daily Podcast - Episode Transcript
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Which dirt late model series is tougher? The Outlaws or Lucas? | Daily 3-16-2022
Coming up we are going to dive into the numbers and see if Lucas and the Outlaws are similar in terms of competition, or if one series is actually tougher than the others. Let's go!
Today is Wednesday, March 16th, two thousand and twenty two. Welcome into DIRTRACKR Daily. I'm Justin Fiedler.
I feel like today's show topic and some of the conclusions may hurt some feelings, so let's just get right into it. I'm a numbers guy. I don't think that's a secret. I have an entire section of my website dedicated to dirt racing stats and analytics and numbers. As with anything like this, the numbers don't ever tell the whole story, but neither does the eyeball test. You kind of have to use both, but in the instance of dirt racing, we haven't had super great numbers to help explain things in the past, so I built what I wanted. In the past I've done a bit of a statistical analysis of the difference in difficulty between the World of Outlaws Sprint Car Series and the All Star Circuit of Champions. I did a whole show about it, and those numbers are now available all the time in the dashboard if you are a DIRTRACKR Plus member. So the next logical comparison after we did the two top sprint car series, is to do the two top late model series. With the sprint car comparison, we used an index of drivers that were not full time with either series, but with the late models, we can use full timers because guys go back and forth all the time. There aren't the restrictions on the late model side like there is on the sprint car side. So like I did before, I put together an index of drivers so we could compare average finish between the two series. I also went through and compared their win percentages and their individual average finishes so we could also take a look at those. So where exactly is it more difficult to race, with the Lucas Oil Late Model Dirt Series, or with the World of Outlaws Late Model Series? I could be wrong in this assumption, but I'm guessing if you just polled late model fans, they would tell you that Lucas is more difficult. You hear things like all the big guys race with Lucas. The Outlaws is just dominated by Richards, etc. But in the end, it's not that simple. And the numbers show things are way more equal than you might imagine. The index of drivers I chose is comprised of ten names, some Outlaw regulars, some Lucas regulars, and some guys that run pick and choose. The drivers are Brandon Sheppard, Brandon Overton, Jimmy Owens, Tim McCreadie, Devin Moran, Jonathan Davenport, Shane Clanton, Josh Richards, Tyler Bruening, and Mike Marlar. All ten have a significant amount of starts with both series. We are comparing them over the previous 104 Lucas races and 137 Outlaw races. Let's start with total average finish for all drivers. When you compile all their feature starts and finishes, the average finish for the index with the Outlaws is 10.05. With Lucas, the index's average finish is 10.22. That's a difference of only 17 hundredths of a position. It does show a very slight, and I mean slight tip to Lucas for lower average finish, but we are talking less than two tenths of a spot on average. So if you are part of the index and you run with Lucas, you'll probably finish around 10th on average. And if you run with the Outlaws, you'll probably finish around 10th. No massive difference there.
When we hop in and look at the drivers on a more individual basis, we don't get a whole lot more clarity. Let's take Brandon Sheppard. He's the reigning Outlaw champion and has won a ton on that side. As you might expect, his win percentage is better with the Outlaws, as is his average finish. No shock there. On the flip side, let's look at Tim McCreadie, reigning Lucas champion. If the Outlaws is easier, than McCreadie should do better on that side than he does with Lucas, but that's not the case. He's won more often with Lucas, and his average finish is lower with Lucas. In recent seasons he has way more Lucas starts, but McCreadie has been an Outlaw regular in the past, so it's not like he doesn't know the race tracks. On the rest of the list, Overton wins more often with the Outlaws, but has a better Lucas average finish. The numbers are the same for Jimmy Owens, Devin Moran, and Josh Richards. All win more often with the Outlaws, but finish better on average with Lucas. Davenport and Clanton both win more often with the Outlaws and have a better finish on that side. Bruening doesn't have any wins on either side, but has a better Outlaw average finish. And Mike Marlar is flipped from most of the other guys. He wins more often with Lucas, but has a better average finish with the Outlaws. So we have five drivers with a better Outlaw average, and five with a better Lucas average. Seven have a better Outlaw win percentage, two have a better Lucas win percentage, and one has no wins. Absolutely as clear as mud. Unlike the very clear difference between Outlaws and All Stars on the sprint car side, we don't have that with the late models. Things are way more even than some might want or think or hope. But if you really understand the way drivers go back and forth, that would make sense. Without the restrictions on where drivers can race, you would expect these fields to be more even and that appears to be true by these numbers. On a regular basis, you get a very similar group of drivers racing against each other, no matter what side is sanctioning the event. You have certainly seen Sheppard handle the competition on the Outlaw side in recent years, but it's not like we haven't seen similar performances from Lucas drivers. Owens was the clear run away champ in 2020, and nobody could catch McCreadie last season. So after looking at all these numbers, I'm going to say that these two series are pretty dang even. After you've digested this a bit, drop me a comment, let me know your thoughts on this and your own conclusions based on this information. If you're a fan of one side versus the other, try and step back and be as unbiased as you can. Do you view these series as even when it comes to the competition on the track?
A couple of notes about the upcoming dirt racing weekend. The Lucas Oil Late Model Dirt Series has moved the Friday night show at Atomic Speedway to Sunday because of impending weather. So now we'll get the Indiana Icebreaker at Brownstown on Saturday, and the Buckeye Spring 50 at Atomic on Sunday. Brownstown is $15 grand to win and Atomic is $12 grand to win.
Also, if you were hoping to see the Comp Cams Super Dirt Series late models at Talladega, those shows have been cancelled for the weekend, also because of weather. They were supposed to race Friday and Saturday nights, but fans will have to wait until 2023 to see this series at Dega. Next up on the schedule for the Comp Cams late models is April 1st and 2nd at Ark-La-Tex Speedway in Louisiana.
In the dirt racing podcast department, you can hear Calvin Knapp, Lance Dewease and Jacob Allen on Winged Nation this week. LoudPedal has Big Al, Forward Bite has Doug Sanders, and there are new episodes of Open Red, the Dirt Reporters, and the Dirt Nerds. To see the full list of shows and episodes, hit up dirtrackr.com/podcasts.
I've had some requests and caught some hell because I don't spotlight the RacinBoys shows on Wednesdays when I talk about podcasts. I guess I've never really thought of their shows as podcasts because they are livestreamed, and I do have the RacinBoys YouTube channel on the site. If that's something you want me to do, I can certainly add them to the podcasts page as well. Let me know.
The only thing on the streaming schedule today is FloRacing 24/7. To see the full daily streaming schedule with links to watch, visit dirtrackr.com/watchtonight.
That's it for the show today, 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!