DIRTRACKR Daily Podcast - Episode Transcript
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DJ Netto vs. Tony Gomes, Aaron Reutzel makes more friends | Daily 10-3-2022
Coming up we'll talk Williams Grove and driver safety, Aaron Reutzel making friends, DJ Netto vs. Tony Gomes, and more. Let's go!
It's Monday, October 3rd, I'm Justin Fiedler. This is DIRTRACKR Daily.
We'll start today off with the World of Outlaws at Williams Grove on Friday. The Saturday show was eventually postponed to October 22nd because of the remnants of Hurricane Ian, but they did push things along on Friday to try and get that program in. Earlier in the day it looked like the rain might stay away long enough to get the show in, so they moved the start time up and were in hurry up mode all night. Things were going pretty good until right at feature time. They started to get some drizzle, but it was kind of coming and going, and they eventually went green after mixed reactions from the drivers. They ran seven or eight laps before a caution was called for rain, they idled around a bit, buzzed the track off, more mixed reactions from drivers, and they went racing again. The race was then red flagged on lap 11 when Brent Marks went for a big ride in turns three and four, ended up out of the ballpark, wiping out a billboard in the process. According to Jeremy Elliott, Marks said the rain wasn't why he crashed, but from that point, the race never went green again, and Lance Dewease was declared the winner with just 10 of 25 laps in the books. Afterwards, we saw some reaction from drivers on social media, Jeremy got quotes from several drivers and race director Mike Hess, and as you might expect, things were pretty mixed. Some were okay with the decision making, and others were critical. This was a perfect example of a no-win situation for the series and the track. If they cancel ahead of time, or mid-program, they catch hell. If they try and run the program, they catch hell. Some combination of teams and fans were going to be upset no matter what the call was. I do find it interesting that drivers are given the opportunity to weigh in on what they think of track conditions, and either don't offer an opinion, or continue racing when they don't think it's safe. Give the thumbs down, pull off the race track, stop and talk to an official, let them know it isn't safe. The guys in the tower are trying to make the best decisions they can, but they need the full picture and all the information they can get. Should they have tried to race? I don't know. You've got Lance Dewease saying it was okay, Brad Sweet saying he wasn't sure, and Donny Schatz saying no. So from those three opinions, what do you do? The series and officials aren't blameless in these cases, but neither are the drivers. They have a voice and power and they need to advocate for themselves. If everyone is saying no, and the series pushes things, then okay, we have a real beef with those who are making the calls. But that wasn't the case here. Driver safety needs to be at the top of the list at all times, but it's not just the responsibility of the series, it's on everyone. The series, the drivers, the teams, the crews, everyone needs to be involved.
As for the race itself, the Friday show is tied with a race at Bakersfield from 1990 as the shortest Outlaw feature in history. It's only the third time ever that a race was called official before halfway. Dewease was the winner over Sheldon Haudenschild and Carson Macedo. David Gravel was fifth, and points leader Brad Sweet was sixth. Gravel is still 94 back, with Macedo 134 out. And Jacob Allen's top ten streak continued with a seventh place result. He's now got 16 consecutive top ten finishes. The series remains in Pennsylvania for another week with two nights at Port Royal coming up.
Before we move on a quick merch update. I've got some more decals on the way, including two new designs. I sold out of decals a few weeks ago and have been wanting to do a restock. I'm hoping to have those available in the store later this week. Also, I've dropped the prices on a couple of items. If you want to grab some DIRTRACKR merch and support what I'm doing, head over to shop.dirtrackr.com.
With the USAC National Sprint Cars, they had two shows over the weekend, Friday at Kokomo and Saturday at Lawrenceburg. Both races ended up with the same winner in Kyle Cummins. They were his third and fourth national victories of the year. Friday night he led 15 laps and outdueled Jake Swanson and Chase Stockon for the victory, with those other two drivers also leading laps. Saturday at the Burg Logan Seavey led early from the pole, but Cummins took over on lap 17 and drove on to the victory. Points leader Justin Grant had weekend finishes of eighth and third, while Brady Bacon was fifth and sixth. Not a ton of movement in those standings with Bacon picking up just six points. Five nights remain on the season, with the series off now until October 28th at Cocopah.
In big time super late model racing, the Outlaws had already cancelled, and Lucas only completed one of three shows. Elsewhere around the country, Tanner English grabbed an Iron Man win at Ponderosa as did Mike Marlar, Jeremy Wonderling was a RUSH winner at Pennsylvania Motor Speedway, Brandon Overton won Friday at the Talladega Short Track, and Jason Feger was an MLRA winner at Sycamore.
In other sprint car racing around the country, we had fireworks and tempers at both the Short Track Nationals and out at Silver Dollar Speedway. At I-30, in what was the final ever event at the speedway before it's sold to Copart, things got spicy late between Aaron Reutzel and Sam Hafertepe. Those two won the two prelim features and started at the front for Saturday's main event. Reutzel led the first 17 laps, but got crossed up in turn four and Hafertepe slipped by to lead lap 18. These two were far from done though. Reutzel threw a pretty wild slider with ten to go that didn't stick but stayed with the 15H through traffic. Coming to six to go, Reutzel tried to sneak to Hafertepe's outside on the frontstretch, but Sam didn't realize he was there and Reutzel caught his tail tank sending him into the wall. The 15H was able to continue, but Reutzel also ended up with front wing damage, with that piece eventually ending up folded over. Hafetepe surived the final few laps to score the big Short Track Nationals victory. In his post race interview, Hafertepe said quote "Well, I'm just glad that 8R didn't win the race after driving people like he drives people. That's a piece of shit move that he did and guess what we came out on top and he's sitting over here" unquote. Nice to see those guys making friends.
And Saturday night at Silver Dollar, DJ Netto and Tony Gomes had a run-in that was pretty wild to watch. Gomes tried to make a move to Netto's inside in turn three, but the pass never had a chance, and Netto ended up going for a big ride, tumbling over the banking. He then got out of his car, ran across the infield to Gomes' machine, and proceeded to rip out the left side spark plug wires of the 75. Gomes was then pushed to the work area under the red to try and fix the wires, where Netto continued to show his anger and we even had a little skirmish. The best part though, was the ongoing commentary from Troy Hennig and Gary Thomas. Their play-by-play was classic. I watched this one on replay, and normally I just skip through the cautions and red flags, but not for this one. Well worth it. Gomes did not end up coming out of the work aread. Tanner Carrick was the Friday night winner, while Shane Golobic got the Saturday win.
With the POWRi midgets, Cannon McIntosh was the Friday winner at Sweet Springs, while Andrew Felker won Saturday night.
Only two items on the streaming schedule today, DIRTVision and YouTube have the finale for the iRacing World of Outlaws Late Models, and there is FloRacing 24/7. To see the full daily streaming schedule with links to watch, visit dirtrackr.com/watchtonight.
Before we shut down today, I wanted to talk briefly about Rick Eshelman. I don't normally talk about deaths on the show, as other people do a much better job of eulogizing than I can. But this one feels more important to mention. We found out Saturday that we'd lost Rick, who if you don't know, was the announcer for the World of Outlaws Late Model Series. Because of my own time working for World Racing Group, I'd known Rick for quite a few years. I'm not going to sit here and say I was super close with him, but we always talked when he came through the office and it's hard not to be a fan of a guy with the type of passion he had for the dirt racing community. He was so versed on the late model drivers, but when you heard him on the mic at an event like the World Short Track Championship, nothing was different. He could talk about modified competitors or other weekly racers, just like he did for Brandon Sheppard or Rick Eckert or Chris Madden. And when he wasn't in the booth, he was always helping somewhere with driver registration or wherever else he was needed. I have visions of him sitting at tables with Jonathan Clayton, or Erik Grigsby, or Jimmy Magill getting drivers signed in and handing out passes and paperwork. And the last time I saw Rick, was during one of these times when he was working, but not in a booth on a microphone. I took my little guy to Millbridge earlier in the year for the Xtreme Outlaw Midget show, and there was Rick helping get cars lined up for staging. I walked by and gave him crap for being a late model guy at a midget race, we talked briefly, and I went on my way as he continued with his radio and clipboard. Rick Eshelman and what happened over the weekend is the perfect example of not knowing what people around you are dealing with. Loved by the community, awesome at what he did, and now suddenly gone. Let's use this as reminder to check in on those that we care about, and that dirt racing stuff is not that serious, and ultimately supposed to be fun. If you or someone you know is having trouble, the suicide and crisis lifeline can be reached by dialing 988, texting 988, at 1-800-273-8255, or at 988lifeline.org.