DIRTRACKR Daily Podcast - Episode Transcript
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Thoughts on Kyle Larson's Bristol penalty, plus why the dirt racing at Bristol isn't closer | Daily 5-3-2022
Coming up we've got a lot to talk about from the weekend, including Kyle Larson's penalty, some thoughts about the racing at Bristol and my responses to a few of your questions. Let's roll.
Today is Tuesday, May 3rd, two thousand and twenty two. Welcome into DIRTRACKR Daily. I'm Justin Fiedler.
My apologies for there not being a show yesterday, but the Sunday rain at Dover kind of killed any Monday plans I had. But we are back on this Tuesday, and even though we are a few days removed, I have some stuff from the weekend I wanted to talk about. Let's start with the World of Outlaws weekend at Bristol.
On the late model side, as expected, the fields were pretty light. We had 22 cars on Friday and 21 on Saturday, and that 21 included Scott Bloomquist who was loaded up before the feature because of an engine issue they didn't want to make more severe. Even with the Lucas weekend cancelled, they didn't pick up anymore cars, which was probably a long shot anyway, but I thought maybe one or two would make the tow. In the Friday night feature, Jonathan Davenport got by Ricky Weiss late to take the $25,000 win and continue his nice week of big money wins. But after the race, the only thing anyone was really talking about was the Kyle Larson situation. So let's run it back. Larson was originally scheduled to start the night's feature from outside front row, but he was kicked to the rear when he missed the call to lineup for the main event. He was apparently having transmission issues and had to be pushed around the pit area. The six car was also pitted on the sprint car side, which apparently got some blame as well. But according to the DIRTVision broadcast, the team was warned multiple times before they were ultimately penalized. Larson was in the second sprint car heat race, so from the time that race ended to the time the late model feature was lining up was about 35 minutes. He would have obviously done a debrief with Paul Silva and those guys before stepping next door and getting things ready to go with Kevin Rumley for the late model feature. So between that and the issues with the car, Larson ended up late to staging. Once green though, he was on a mission and was 10th after the first two laps. From there, he was top five before ten to go. He was using the top to absolute perfection and just flying by guys. He started to run down the leaders late, and got by for second with three laps remainig. On the final lap, while trying to run down Davenport, he went full send mode into turn one and the car just didn't stick. He caught the wall pretty heavy and limped it home to an eighth place result. Afterwards, DIRTVision's Chase Raudman was there pretty quickly for the interview and Yung Money did not mince words about the penalty. He said quote "I'm the only guy doing double duty so there's a lot of shit I have to get done. It's no wonder teams like Rocket and Mark are leaving this tour" unquote. Pretty harsh words, but I understand his frustration in the moment. He was hot, but them putting him to the rear isn't why the Rocket team swapped to Lucas. Series director Casey Shuman is tough, but I haven't heard of him not being fair. And at the end of the day, Shuman came from the open wheel side, so if there was any bias, you'd think it would be in Larson's favor. But regardless of him running double duty or not, the rules have to be applied the same for everyone. I also thought the comments about Larson wearing a FloRacing suit were pretty funny. Like he was somehow giving the middle finger to DIRTVision and World Racing Group. But Larson IS actually sponsored by Flo, so him wearing that suit would make sense. And how is that different from a certain Valvoline sponsored late model switching to a series owned by a rival oil company. Anyways. On Saturday afternoon back at Dover, Bob Pockrass posted a video of Larson's thoughts, and he had softened quite a bit from his frustration the night before. He told Pockrass there was some miscommunication and that it wouldn't happen again. He also said that he thought they shouldn't bend the rules for him. And then after Saturday's program, he said he loved racing with the series. So cooler heads definitely prevailed, and no, I don't think this is evidence of some sort of bigger systemic issue when it comes to teams racing with the World of Outlaws. I saw a bunch of comments in that direction, and I don't believe that at all. You won't see a slew of teams leaving because of this. If Larson was indeed late, which I haven't seen disputed anywhere, then the penalty was deserved. It's easy to say that they should have just let him slide, but you can't apply the rules differently because it's Kyle Larson. These series officials are in the unenviably position of having to make those calls, and sometimes your favorite driver is going to be on the crap end of it.
On Saturday night with the late model series, except for a brief few laps before half way where Chris Madden led, it was all Ricky Weiss out front. He's been fast it seems a lot at Bristol, and this was a big score for him and that Sniper chassis. It was the first time Weiss had been in victory lane with the Outlaws since May of 2020. With the weekend complete, and Brandon Sheppard now gone, the points battle at the moment is between Dennis Erb Jr. and Max Blair, and Erb didn't have a great weekend with two finishes outside the top ten. Blair wasn't able to capitalize though with finishes of 17th and 7th. So the gap between the two is 38 points with the series headed to Mississippi Thunder Speedway for three nights this week. Tanner English, Tyler Bruening, and Kyle Hammer complete the top five.
With the World of Outlaws Sprint Car Series, we had two drivers grab their first wins of the season. Friday night it was a dominant showing from Logan Schuchart. Aaron Reutzel actually led the opening lap, but from there it was all the 1S. Things haven't gone to plan for that team this season, but the tide appears to be turning in recent weeks and this was a nice score. The win was Schuchart's 31st career victory, which moves him out of a tie with his grandfather Bobby Allen for sole possession of 20th all time on the win list. After an up and down start to the season, Schuchart now has five straight top five finishes and leads all drivers in average finish over that span. Also, shoutout to Kraig Kinser for the Friday night podium result. It was his best finish of the season, and first podium since Ransomville last summer. The Saturday feature was won by Spencer Bayston, also his first win of the year driving the CJB five machine. He led from start to finish, but had to fend off a late challenge from Kyle Larson in a two lap dash to the finish. I mentioned Bayston a few weeks ago as a driver to watch going forward, as his momentum was building, and the win on Saturday was his 10th top ten in his past 11 starts. It was Bayston's third career Outlaw win and I would not be surprised to see this lead to more victories this season. He and Barry Jackson really seem to be making progress as a duo, and when they are good, the CJB five can be really good. We've seen that in the past with drivers like David Gravel. The racing at Bristol, especially for the sprint cars, has taken a bit of a beating because there just doesn't seem to be much action. The Friday hard charger was plus three, and the Saturday hard charger was plus five just to give you an example of the low passing numbers. But I think that final two lap shootout between Bayston and Larson shows why the drivers aren't comfortable there making big moves. Larson was alongside Bayston twice, and I think that second slider actually had the 57 clear of the 5, but Larson pinched off the move. He clearly wasn't sure if he had the room to move up, and with the speeds at Bristol, the consequences of being wrong there are too big. If that is almost any other track, Larson takes the space and goes on to the win. But instead, he doesn't finish the slider, Bayston holds tough on the high side and the five leads into turn one on the white flag lap. Bayston made a little move at Larson into the corner, then blocked the slider line, and that was all she wrote, Bayston wins. There were very few cautions all weekend, and it's because you can't risk your car or someone elses at those speeds. That's a big reason you don't see more action. I also liked Bayston going toe-to-toe with Larson there late. I'm not sure how many guys are hanging in there with the 57 when he starts making those moves.
Leaving the weekend, Sweet maintains the points lead, but his advantage has shrunk thanks to weekend finishes of 10th and 13th. That 13th on Saturday busted Sweet's streak of 15 straight top tens with the Outlaws. So Macedo is just 20 points back in second, with Gravel 30 back in third. Sheldon Haudenschild and Logan Schuchart complete the top five. Donny Schatz continues to slide down the order, and is now seventh. The Outlaws head to Eldora this weekend for Let's Race Two.
With the All Star Circuit of Champions over the weekend, they got two out of three shows completed, with Sunday at Waynesfield being postponed. Friday night at Lernerville it was Hunter Schuerenberg tracking down Justin Peck in lap traffic to earn his second career All Star win. Tyler Courtney just nipped Greg Wilson at the line for second, but shout out to Wilson and Andy Potter with that Seeling 97. Those guys have been fast in recent weeks, including a second place finish at Attica on April 15th, and that good run at Lernerville. Even with all the struggles he's had in recent years, Wilson still has plenty of gas in the tank. On Saturday night at Sharon, George Hobaugh came out of nowhere to dominate a lot of that feature, but a late caution brought the field back to him. With two laps to go, he made a mistake into turn one that let both Brent Marks and Cap Henry by. Marks was on his way to the win from there, but he got trapped in behind lap cars out of turn four coming to the checkered, and Henry pounced, stealing the victory on the frontstretch. Henry and that Lane car are always good for a few wins a season, and it might surprise you to know that only four drivers have more All Star wins over the last three plus seasons than does Cap Henry. They are Aaron Reutzel, Kyle Larson, Tyler Courtney and Cory Eliason. In the All Star standings, Sunshine maintains a 24 point advantage over Parker Price Miller leaving the weekend after finishes of second and seventh. Henry, Peck, and Bill Balog are the rest of the top five. The series is off this weekend, and will return to racing May 13th at I-96 in Michigan.
Most of the USAC weekend was lost to weather between Bloomington and Haubstadt, but we got a really fun Silver Crown race on Sunday at Terre Haute. There was plenty of drama out front between Buddy Kofoid, Justin Grant, and Jerry Coons Jr. Grant snuck by Coons late for the victory, but if you haven't watched that feature yet, go find it on FloRacing. Also, that new Terre Haute wall was tested early, so big kudos to Bernie Stuebgen and Scott Ronk and their team for those improvements at the action track.
The final thing on my agenda for today's show, I wanted to address a few comments and questions from recent days. First, Dylan brought up Alex Bowman recently and how good he's been in the sprint car. I definitely agree, and with all the other guys crossing over, I kind of feel like Bowman has been lost in the mix a bit. Over the weekend while Larson was going back and forth between Dover and Bristol, Bowman slipped up to run the weekly 410 show at Lincoln. He ended up 18th on the night, but has been incredibly respectable for a guy with not a ton of dirt racing experience. Racing 410s is no joke, and he looked solid at Volusia with the Outlaws back in February making all three features, and he picked up a seventh place finish with the All Stars on April 21st at Bloomsburg Fair. That night he outran names like Brent Marks, Cory Eliason, Dominic Scelzi and several others. I'm a big fan of what we're seeing from Bowman right now.
I've seen a few questions about Kasey Kahne and his status with the Outlaws, with the most recent coming from Benny. I would not expect him back any time soon. He's still suffering from effects from that crash at Volusia, and I've heard he wants to be back racing, but that he's been advised not to do so. Kasey's career as of late has really been derailed by injuries and medical issues, which is a shame. The guy is a fantanstic competitor and someone who is so passionate about racing. Spencer Bayston should easily cruise to the Outlaw rookie of the year award.
And BC asked about where Gio Scelzi has been lately. That team originally planned to race at Bristol with the Outlaws, but Gio has been having some shoulder issues, and they decided to skip the weekend to give him time to rest up. They tweeted a few days ago that they still plan on being at Eldora this weekend.
There are four shows on the streaming schedule today. DIRTVision has the Super DIRTcar Series from Bridgeport and outlaw karts from Millbridge. FloRacing has Flo 24/7 and IMCA action from California all week long. Tonight they are at Hanford. 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 Monday. 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!