DIRTRACKR Daily Podcast - Episode Transcript
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Knoxville Nationals entry list swells to 90, includes Kyle Larson, Corey Day, Daryn Pittman, others | Daily 7-28-2022
Coming up we've got an update on the Knoxville Nationals entry list, including some notables. We've also got previews for what to watch tonight and more. Let's go!
It's Thursday, July 28th, I'm Justin Fiedler. This is DIRTRACKR Daily.
With still about two weeks until the Knoxville Nationals get underway, the entry list has swelled to 90 cars split between the Wednesday and Thursday prelim nights. Looking through the list, I don't see any super big surprises right now. You've obviously got all the full time Outlaw teams, a bunch of the All Star full timers, and other names you'd expect from the various regions. Guys like Anthony Macri and Logan Wagner from Pennsylvania, Kerry Madsen in the second Roth car, Aaron Reutzel, Brian Brown, Rico Abreu, weekly Knoxville and midwest names like Justin Henderson, Davey Heskin, Matt Juhl, and a lot of others. Kyle Larson is back in the Paul Silva 57 to defend his title. Larson is also running the 360 Nationals the week before. Daryn Pittman appears to have taken over the Heffner 27 for the time being. We saw him at Williams Grove last weekend in that car, and he's on the list in the 27H. As expected, Corey Day is listed in the Meyers 14, and Colby Copeland and Shane Golobic are coming from California. Buddy Kofoid will be in the Crouch and Bernie 11X, while Bernie will also have Cory Eliason in the Indy Race Parts 71. The Swindell Speedlab 39 originally had Pittman on the list I believe, but is now showing as TBA. They tweeted on Tuesday they will have their driver announcement soon. I would expect the list to grow a little bit more in the coming days, and I'm guessing we'll be around 100 cars for the week. We've also got over 100 right now expected for the 360 Nationals. If you want to see the full rundown on entrants and their tentative prelim nights, head over to knoxvilleraceway.com.
There is a bunch of racing to get into tonight, and we'll start with Indiana Sprint Week at Lincoln Park Speedway. Three nights remain in sprint week and Justin Grant is the current weeklong points leader with Robert Ballou and Chase Stockon in tow. Grant has three straight top two finishes during sprint week, and Ballou and Stockon are the only other two drivers to finish in the top ten all three nights to this point. JG is actually riding a wave of 12 straight top tens right now with the series that goes back to Williams Grove on June 17th. In that stretch he has three wins and it's why he's the current overall championship leader with the series. Guys like Ballou, Bacon, and Leary have all had struggles in recent weeks. I've got the last nine races at Lincoln Park Speedway for the series in the dirtrackr.com analytics database, and we've seen quite a few different winners, with Grant, Leary, Tanner Thorson, KTJ, Stockon, Bacon and Shane Cottle all having victories. The dirtrackr.com analytics prediction formula likes Leary tonight just slightly over Grant, and I think I'll agree. He has the best average finish of any driver over that nine race span, sitting on 3.4, and he's got two victories. He was also a winner earlier in the week at Circle City and was fourth the other night at Kokomo. Other drivers with solid average finishes at Putnamville include Logan Seavey, Cottle, JG, and Emerson Axsom. I feel like Axsom is a driver we haven't talked a whole lot about recently. He's in his rookie season with the series in that Clauson Marshall ride, and he started out 2022 red hot, winning twice in the first three nights. Since then, he's come back down to earth a bit, with four finishes outside the top ten since Bridgeport in June. He's still been strong a lot though with 18 top tens in 22 starts. He's fallen down the points standings after leading out of Florida, but he's still having a very nice year. You can watch Indiana Sprint Week tonight on FloRacing.
Up at Orange County Fair Speedway in New York tonight, the Super DIRTcar Series is inbound for $10,000 to win and a guaranteed starting spot into the 50th Super Dirt Week coming up later this year in October. Matt Sheppard has stretched away just a bit in the championship race, leading Mat Williamson right now by 32 points. Guys like Anthony Perrego, Max McLaughlin, Jimmy Phelps, and Marc Johnson all remain within striking distance. We'll also get a Brett Hearn sighting tonight as he makes his first SDS start of the year and is getting some laps in to be ready for Super Dirt Week. This one will be live over on DIRTVision.
And ASCS Speedweek continues at 81 Speedway tonight. On Wednesday at Caney Valley, it looked like maybe we'd see another win from Tim Crawley. He led twice for 13 laps, but settled for second at the end because Dylan Westbrook was able to run him down. The 47X of Westbrook took over on lap 15 in traffic and led the rest of the way. It was Westbrook's second win in just eight appearances with the series this year. Crawley settled for second, which was his fourth straight top four finish, and he's got eight straight top tens right now. Wayne Johnson was also on the podium in third. Even though he got spun out of the lead, Blake Hahn maintains a 19 point advantage over Johnson in the year long standings, with Crawley now third. Looking at tonight, Ryan Timms was the winner at 81 a year ago, with JJ Hickle second and Blake Hahn third. Timms and Hickle are probably not racing, so things could be wide open tonight. The ASCS is live on season long on FloRacing.
If you want a little late model appetizer tonight before the Prairie Dirt Classic gets underway tomorrow at Fairbury, check out the Southern Nationals at Tri-County Racetrack. Three nights remain on the Southern Nationals schedule, which includes tonight at Tri-County, Friday at Boyd's in Georgia, and Saturday at Tazewell. Tonight is $7500 to win, while the Friday and Saturday races are two more $10k to win races. Brandon Overton enters tonight having won the two previous races, while Cory Hedgecock leads the points standings over Will Roland and Jensen Ford. Tri-County is usually a pretty racey joint, so it should be a good show tonight. You can watch it live on FloRacing.
The All Star Circuit of Champions were supposed to open a two night show at I-70 tonight for the Rayce Rudeen Foundation event, but tonight's racing has been cancelled because of weather. They will race tomorrow night as planned at I-70, and then move to Knoxville on Saturday. Tyler Courtney continues to control the championship battle over Justin Peck, Cap Henry, Parker-Price Miller, and Zeb Wise.
Before we close out, I've had a few questions about the upcoming DIRTRACKR shirts. They have been ordered from Kahne Screen Print and I should have them in hand in a couple of weeks. I've got two designs on order, one for my sprint car people and one for my late model friends. This first round is less than 150 shirts, so they could go quickly. I'll have more details as we get closer, but still thinking $30, which will include shipping. I know there are some Aussie and Kiwi watchers that will want them, so I'll have to figure out pricing to get them to you guys down under. In the meantime, if you want some merch, go grab a DIRTRACKR decal. Big ones for $5, small ones for $3. dirtrackr.com/bigdecal and dirtrackr.com/decal.
13 shows on the streaming schedule today. That includes the Super DIRTcar Series at Orange County Fair on DIRTVision, FloRacing has USAC sprint cars, Southern Nationals and ASCS, and there is a bunch of local and regional racing on Speed Sport. 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 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!