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Max Blair and Viper Motorsports split; more thoughts on Outlaw full timers including money, schedule | Daily 10-5-2022

Yet another championship contending late model driver and team are splitting, plus some things I've been ruminating about lately around the future of full time World of Outlaws teams. Let's go!

It's Wednesday, October 5th, I'm Justin Fiedler. This is DIRTRACKR Daily.

So, I don't know if it's just me, but it seems like the dirt late model silly season just keeps on bringing the hits. We've already had Brandon Sheppard announce he's leaving Rocket Racing. Ashton Winger parted ways with GR Smith. Tanner English and Riggs Motorsports are done following the Outlaw season. Double Down Motorsports is looking to replace Hudson O'Neal. And now the next domino to fall is Max Blair and Viper Motorsports. The team announced yesterday that following the World of Outlaws season and World Finals, the two sides will split. Over the past year and a half they've been together, Blair won more than 20 races, and the 2021 ULMS championship. This season, they went full time Outlaw racing together, and Blair was in the mix for much of the season in the championship fight. Towards the end, Dennis Erb Jr. and Tanner English have stretched away a bit, but Blair is set to finish third in the standings. In 37 Outlaw races, they've picked up two wins, 10 top fives, 22 top tens, and an average finish of 9.0. Blair actually leads all full timers with the most laps led this season with the series at 123. Only Jonathan Davenport and Brandon Sheppard have more. Through the summer though, Blair hasn't had the finishes he'd had earlier on. He hasn't led laps since Sharon on May 28th, and his last win was at Bloomsburg Fair on May 19th. His results have been mixed since June, with seven finishes outside the top ten in 18 races, but he's currently got three straight top six runs. Team owner Shawn Martin said they couldn't quite get on the same page for 2023 plans, but the split is amicable. The release says they will continue to support Blair's career moving forward. Viper does plan on relocating it's shop, which was previously based in Pennsylvania, to make it better for national competition. As for Blair, he posted to his Facebook account that they will announce plans for next season as soon as they have them. So right now we've got two of the top four in Lucas points changing teams for next year, and two of the top three in Outlaw points. With so many teams and drivers on the hunt, it feels like we are no where close to done on what else could change. Drivers will start looking at some of these other teams as potential landing spots, and that will open up other seats. The next few months could be interesting, as we've had all of this already go down, and we are just barely into October.

And speaking of unsettled things, I have some more thoughts on full time World of Outlaws drivers and the issues that the new High Limit Sprint Car Series presents. I don't know that I have any real specific points to make today, or strong opinions one way or the other, but I kind of just want to go stream of consciousness a bit, and just give you some things to think about. And I know that I'll probably have people on both sides not thrilled about me talking about this stuff, but oh well I guess. Back on August 16th I got into this topic of whether or not full time World of Outlaws Sprint Car Series drivers were going to be allowed to run the High Limit races in 2023, and nearly two months later, we don't seem to be any closer to a resolution on the subject, at least publicly. World Racing Group has not acknowledged any of this, not that I would expect them to do so. Things seems to be bubbling though, and you can tell they are if you read between the lines a bit. We've seen folks around some of these race teams talk about money and purses in recent weeks, and we've seen Donny Schatz go full ham against the series. In Jeremy Elliott's story about the rain issues at Williams Grove, Schatz was commenting on driver safety and said quote "It kind of says to me — the guys who race for them — where we rate. That might go to the decision on how long some of these guys stick around with this group. It was never a question in my mind, but after this, it is" unquote. I could be wrong, but a quote like that feels like there is more behind it than a single night's decision making over a rainy track and placement of a fire bottle. Are some of these guys trying to find ways to put pressure on the series? Are they trying to find extra reasons to walk away from full time membership? I'm not sure, but the public discourse here seems to have turned a bit negative in recent months. There are two things I want to get into a bit here, one is purse and points money, and the other is the schedule itself. One point of contention you hear a lot about the series is that standard races still only pay $10,000 to win. And that's true. It's really only been a few years though that $10,000 to win was the base purse. But an important point here is that for the 2021 season, the series did bump feature payouts quite a bit. They did not add anything to the winner's share, but they did add $8000 down through the field. A race used to be $10k to win and $800 to start, and now they are $10k to win and $1000 to start. A total feature payout went from $47,800 to $55,800. So they could have easily added more to the winner's share, but instead, like you hear all the time that these teams want, they paid more down through the field. So yes, still $10,000 to win, but the narrative that the purses haven't changed isn't true. The other money that is available is obviously the points fund for full timers that is $350,000 bigger this year, taking it over a million total, with the winner getting $200,000. That is not insignificant, and also unavailable anywhere else. And there is also the bonus program introduced this year that pays the top 12 full time drivers in each race at least an extra $500, and as much as an extra $1000. The way revenue is shared is always going to be a moving target, and we do need to continue finding ways for all parties to benefit, but there has been progress. The other interesting part of all of this is the schedule and the way races are laid out through the week. The High Limit Series is offering midweek shows so as to not interfere with the other series, but it wasn't all that long ago that the full time World of Outlaws teams sat in meetings and complained about there being so many midweek Outlaw shows. And in the years since, the series has decreased the week day shows, and focused much more on weekends and more multi-day events because that's what the teams asked for. In 2014, there were 88 races. 21 of those happened on days between Monday and Thursday, with 19 being standalone races and not part of a bigger weekend event. So that's 26.25% and 21.6% of race nights. In 2018, 71 races completed, 16 of which were Monday through Thursday, that's 22.5%, but just 12 were standalone races, or 16.9%. So a fairly sizeable shift in just four years. And that progress has continued. Through 61 races this year, 17 have happened between a Monday and a Thursday, but just six were standalones. The other 11 were part of a much bigger weekend, like at Huset's, Knoxville, or Silver Dollar. So that six number represents less than 10% of races happening midweek. So a few years ago, they didn't want midweek shows, the series adjusted, but now they are okay running them apparently. I'm having a hard time deciding where I stand on whether the teams should or shouldn't be allowed to run other races. I get both sides. As a team, you obviously want to race as much as you can and are able to, as that means more money, more chances to do well, and more opportunities to grow your fanbase. On the series side though, allowing these guys to run wherever they want, whenever they want, dilutes your product and harms your business. It's pretty evident this season on the late model side with none of these restrictions in place. Everyone runs everywhere, and there is no real delineation between Lucas, the Outlaws, Flo, XR, or some of the big crown jewels. Outside of the championships, which I am convinced I'm the only one who actually cares about, what series is running doesn't matter anymore. That's not a good thing. I know this isn't the first time we've talked about this subject, and it won't be the last as there is still plenty of behind the scenes dealing that is set to play out in the coming months. But these are just things I've been thinking about lately as all of this continues to evolve.

Up at Oswego today in New York, Super DIRT Week really starts to ramp up with the race car parade through Oswego at noon, and cars on track from 2 to 4:30 for the first rounds of practice. We will see sessions for all four divisions today, and the frontstretch grandstands are open and free for fans to come hang out. The temporary dirt surface at the paved Oswego track seems to be a topic of conversation every year, and today will be our first look at how things could go for the rest of the week. Later on tonight, the 358 and sportsman competitors will head over to Brewerton for the Hurricane 75. Both today's practice sessions and tonight's Brewerton show will be live on DIRTVision if you want to tune in from afar. Last night at Weedsport for the Super DIRT Week kickoff, Max McLaughlin bagged the 358 modified feature win, starting from the 12th position. He topped Anthony Perrego who drove up from 14th, and Jimmy Phelps. Cody McPherson won the night's sportsman feature.

Also last night, Utica-Rome held their Modern Day Outlaw 50, and it was Matt Sheppard who went to victory lane. He started ninth, and bagged his 12th win of the season at the track, which is a new record for most wins in a season at Utica-Rome. Larry Wight and Demetrios Drellos rounded out the podium. It's definitely a good week to be a dirt racing fan in the northeast. If you can't make it to these shows, make sure you're tuned in on the streaming services.

This week in dirt racing podcast land, Winged Nation has Greg Wilson and Sam Hafertepe, SuaveTalk has Gregg Satterlee, the Dirt from Knoxville has new track GM Jason Reed, Dirt Tracks and Rib Racks has Geoff Ensign, and there are new episodes of the Dirt Nerds and the Dirt Reporters. To see the full list of shows and episodes, head over to dirtrackr.com/podcasts.

Five shows on today's streaming schedule between three different services. DIRTVision has day one of Super DIRT Week from Oswego, modifieds at Brewerton, and micros from Millbridge. RacinDirt has the USRA Nationals from Wheatland, and there 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 Wednesday. Please hit that like button, and subscribe to the show if you don't already.

Thanks everybody for tuning in, I'll see you tomorrow for more DIRTRACKR Daily!