DIRTRACKR Daily Podcast - Episode Transcript

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Macedo has a hole to dig out of; Larson, Bell headed to Bridgeport; Eldora opens Million entries | Daily 5-17-2022

Coming up we are talking Outlaws at Bridgeport, Short Track Super Series at Outlaw, and we have updates on Reinbold/Underwood Motorsports' future and the Eldora Million. Let's roll!

Today is Tuesday, May 17th, two thousand and twenty two. Welcome into DIRTRACKR Daily. I'm Justin Fiedler.

We get a little Tuesday night sprint car racing today as the World of Outlaws are headed to Bridgeport Motorsports Park in New Jersey following the week in Pennsylvania. From here, they head to Ohio this weekend with stops at Attica and Sharon on tap. Carson Macedo being light at the scales on Saturday night created a big shift in the points standings, and instead of Macedo being the championship leader coming into tonight, he's third, 42 points back. Brad Sweet maintains the lead with David Gravel now second, 24 back. Macedo and the Jason Johnson Racing 41 had been on a hot streak as of late with multiple wins and a lot of top ten finishes, but the 26th place result they got credited for at Williams Grove was their first finish outside the top 20, since they finished 21st at Port Royal back in October of 2021. Those 42 points are about 21 positions now that Macedo has to make up on Sweet to get back to where he could have been without the penalty. I don't know the details on how light the 41 was at the scales, but under 1425 lbs is under regardless of by how much. With all the fuel issues we had because of the conditions, I'm guessing the team just miscalculated where they'd be at the end with fuel burnoff. That car has been really fast, and I wouldn't expect that to change tonight or going forward, but now they have to dig themselves out of that hole. The field tonight will be stacked, and besides the Outlaw regulars we'll get Rico Abreu, Christopher Bell in the SpeedLab 39, and there might even be a Kyle Larson sighting. You'll definitely get some of the Central Pennsylvania guys to tow over as well. The last two shows at Bridgeport have drawn 27 and 30 cars, and there's no reason to think we won't be at a similar number tonight. The last two trips to the track have been won by Danny Dietrich and Logan Schuchart. Other guys to watch who have good average finishes there include Anthony Macri, Donny Schatz, Macedo, and Logan Schuchart. Besides the main front runners, I continue to be impressed by both Spencer Bayston and Jacob Allen. Bayston is tied with Schuchart for best average finish over the past five races, and he leads in average finish over the last ten shows. He also has the longest current top ten streak with the series at 10 straight. He trails Schuchart right now by 30 points for a spot in the top five in the series standings. As for Allen, he's suddenly the best driver in the series early in the night and it's leading to wins and strong finishes. For the season, Jacob is the best average qualifier, he has three quick times which only trails Macedo, he's second in dash wins, and leads all drivers in heat race wins. He and Gravel are tied for the most dash appearancs on the year, with 13 each. He still has work to do come feature time, as his feature plus minus is negative for the year, but even so, he and that 1A team are massively improved. As for a win pick for tonight, the dirtrackr.com analytics prediction formula likes Kyle Larson. I'm gonna go Macedo. I think that team will be motivated to bounce back from Saturday, and Macedo's two recent Bridgeport finishes are 4th and 2nd. This show will be live on DIRTVision tonight.

We talked yesterday on the show about Tanner Thorson's decision to depart from Reinbold/Underwood Motorsports, and the team put out it's own statement yesterday. They wished Thorson the best of luck going forward, and did reveal that their plans for the 2022 season haven't changed. The team will still campaign winged and non-wing sprint cars and midgets, and they will be at Terre Haute this coming weekend for the USAC National Sprint Car event. Their driver for the two day show will be announced later this week. Besides Thorson, the team has run midgets for Hayden Reinbold, and the young driver did pick up a midget win over the weekend at Jacksonville, topping Jake Neuman and Chase McDermand. I'd guess the team will have it's pick of drivers with all the success they've had, including midget wins with Thorson and Reinbold, non-wing wins with Thorson, and they picked up winged sprint car wins with Buddy Kofoid in 2021. So we'll have to wait on the future driver for this squad, and we are waiting to see what the future holds for Thorson. A lot of people are still wondering if Thorson is going Outlaw racing with Sides, and it sounds like that team will have some sort of announcement about their future this week. I can't tell if there is actually some connection between Thorson and Sides, or if this is just wishful thinking on social media putting these two together. Tim Shaffer will pilot the 7S tonight at Bridgeport.

I've been asked a few times about how big I think the Eldora Million field will be coming up in June, and my only response so far has been that I think it will be pretty big. Entries for the event are now open, and we got to see some more details about the purse structure and tire rules. Teams have until June 5th to enter at a discounted rate for both the Million and the Dream. The fee for late entries rises $140 and doesn't include a free driver pit pass. Both the Million and Dream will have twin prelim features the nights before that are 25 laps and pay $12,000 to win. The Million main event is 101 laps, will pay $1,002,022 to the winner, $100 grand for second, and $5022 to start. The Dream will pay $128,000 to win. As for the tire rules, teams must use the same four tires from time trials through the features on the prelim nights. On the main event nights, teams must use the same four tires for the qualifying races, but they can begin the features with up to three new tires. On prelim nights, LM-30s are required on three corners, except the left front, which can use any DIRTcar tire. On the championship nights, teams can use either the LM-30 or LM-40 on the right rear. If you aren't aware, the LM-40 is the harder compound, so the idea is that it won't be as fast early on, but should last longer through the extended main events. I don't know when Eldora will start releasing pre-entries, but with only three weeks until the racing starts, I'd say we'll start hearing fairly soon. You can find the official entry form over at eldoraspeedway.com. In the show comments from yesterday, ThunderMS34 said they thought Madden could be a darkhorse for the Million at Eldora, but can you really say that the guy that is leading the country in total winnings this year is a darkhorse? I know we don't normally think of Chris Madden when we talk who'll be fast at Eldora because he doesn't have big wins there, but he does have plenty of top five and top ten finishes in the big shows at Eldora, including the Dream and World. With the roll he's on right now, I would not be shocked if he was in contention in a few weeks.

If you're looking for other racing tonight, the Short Track Super Series is back with more midweek action, this time from Outlaw Speedway. This will be round three for the north region modifieds, and Mat Williamson enters as the points leader over Danny Creeden and Andy Bachetti. Money Mat and Superman Matt Sheppard have the two north region wins so far in 2022. Besides the names I've already mentioned, you also see Stewart Friesen tonight, along with Alan Johnson, Brett Haas, Billy Decker, and plenty more. Tonight's total purse is $26 grand with $5000 going to the winner. The crate 602 sportsman are also on the card, along with the 360 Patriot Sprint Tour. Grandstands open tonight at 5:30PM ET with hot laps scheduled for 7. As is the case with all Short Track Super Series events in 2022, you can watch live on FloRacing if you aren't near Dundee, New York.

It's a busy Tuesday on the streaming services with four shows going on. DIRTVision has the World of Outlaws from Bridgeport, and micros and more from Millbridge. FloRacing has the Short Track Super Series from Outlaw Speedway and Flo 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!