DIRTRACKR Daily Podcast - Episode Transcript
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Bad sliders, wall riding, and a surprise Chili Bowl winner on night two | Daily 1-11-2023
Today we'll talk a wild Tuesday night at the Chili Bowl, including a surprise winner and disaster for a favorite. We've also got more High Limit commitments, and the All Stars need a series director. Let's go!
It's Wednesday, January 11th, I'm Justin Fiedler. This is DIRTRACKR Daily.
It was a wild night last night in Tulsa, and before we get into it, today's show is sponsored by MSP Mounts. A lot of the onboard footage you are seeing this week from the Chili Bowl, between FloRacing, and a lot of the racers, is being captured using these GoPro mounts. Spencer Bayston's car last night had an MSP mount on it for the feature if you want to see one of these things in action. They are easy to put on and take off, they fit a bunch of different sizes of bars and cages, and they are incredibly adjustable. You'll be able to capture all sorts of different angles for your footage. These were designed by sprint car racer Dan McCarron and can be used for not only midgets, but any type of race car, dirt or pavement, and even side by sides and ATVs. If you aren't in Tulsa this week, head over to mspmounts.com to order, and make sure to use code "DIRTRACKR" at checkout for 10% off. That's D I R T R A C K R at checkout for 10% off your order at mspmounts.com. If you are in Tulsa, go find Darin Naida or Steve Irwin in the building. They have some for sale, and you can get one and immediately have it mounted and ready to go. Thanks again to MSP and Dan for their support of this show.
So Monday night at the Chili Bowl didn't really produce any major surprises, the feature was about what you would have expected, no wild incidents, etc. But Tuesday may have been the complete opposite. Wild racing, terrible sliders, and a prelim winner from out of nowhere. Hank Davis picked up the win last night, with Spencer Bayston in second. Those two join Cannon McIntosh and Shane Golobic as locked into the Chili Bowl feature on Saturday night. I'm sure a lot of people are asking today who Hank Davis is, so here you go. Davis is from Oklahoma, and during the year runs a lot of sprint car stuff in the area. 305s and some non-wing stuff at places like Creek County and Tulsa Speedway. We've also seen him in NOW600 micros, and he is planning on a bunch of racing with the 360 ASCS Sooner region in 2023. Before last night, the best we've seen from Hank Davis on a Chili Bowl prelim night was an eighth place run in 2021. His best Saturday finish is 17th in a B-Main, also in 2021. We haven't had a real surprise winner like Davis on a prelim night since probably Travis Berryhill did it in 2017. Joining Davis and Bayston on the podium was Jade Avedisian, who will head to a B-Main come Saturday with Kyle Jones, Jonathan Beason, Kaylee Bryson, Chance Crum, and Tim McCreadie.
The night as a whole though was pretty wild, and we saw some really bad moves. The most egregious was definitely from Damion Gardner in the night's second qualifier. He tried to put a slider on Brayton Lynch from Safari Joe's that literally had no hope of clearing. Lynch went for a ride, but did get back out for the B where he finished seventh. Gardner was sent to the tail for the very poor attempt, but did eventually get into the night's main event. Another perfect example of not a young kid making a terrible move, but a very veteran driver, one who's won a Chili Bowl and knows better than to do that. If you're going to get pissed at the 16 year old, then you better have the same fire for this crap as well. If these guys would quit setting this type of example, maybe the kids coming up through micros and outlaw karts would stop doing it.
A few names that ended up in the Bs that surprised me a bit were Chance Crum, Zach Daum, and Tim McCreadie. All eventually got through to the feature though. We did have another nasty crash in the first B when Colton Hardy jumped a right rear and went for a huge tumble. He walked away, but Jordan Swindell later tweeted that Hardy took a ride to the hospital, and that he is bruised and has a concussion following the incident.
Things were going to plan for the main event, with Buddy Kofoid and Daison Pursley on the front row, but it went sideways quick for several drivers. Pursley was officially credited with leading the first lap, but he got sideways in turn three after that and collected Alex Bowman, Darin Naida, and Devon Borden. Naida and Bowman ended up being done for the night. Bowman's guys ran out of time in the work area. The crashing and the drama was far from over though. We had a big flip for Michael Pickens after he was the victim of a short slider from eventual winner Davis. Pickens put a similar move on Davis a few laps before, but Davis was able to get on the binders in time to avoid crashing. I don't know if it was a little payback or not, but Davis did apologize in victory lane for the move. Kofoid was in control though, and ended up leading until lap eight when his entire Chili Bowl went from pretty good to really bad. Several guys got stacked up in turn one ahead of him, and Kofoid tried to wall ride to avoid them, a la Logan Seavey, only it didn't end up well. Kofoid's front suspension folded up like origami, and his night was done. That handed the lead to Davis on the restart, and he officially led the rest of the way for the victory. The racing though through the top five was really wild, there were plenty of sketchy moves, and I'm honestly surprised there weren't more crashes. It was an impressive drive from Davis, Jade had a really strong night, as did Kyle Jones and Kaylee Bryson. Tim McCreadie went 21st to eighth, and AJ Bender drove from the C to finish 17th in the feature.
We'll all collectively catch our breath after Tuesday, and get right back to it today. Same schedule, hot laps at 4 central, with racing at five. Tonight's field will likely be well into the 70's for car count, the the list includes plenty of names again. Sammy Swindell, Justin Peck, Kevin Thomas Jr., Corey Day, Parker Price Miller, TMez, Sam Hafertepe, Rico Abreu, Ricky Thornton Jr., Blake Hahn, Jake Swanson, Mitchel Moles and a lot of others will all get their chance tonight to try and lock into Saturday. Rico has won five straight prelim nights, and seven of his last eight, so I'm not sure how you pick against him tonight. I'm also going out on a limb and saying Corey Day locks in. He's in a Matt Wood entry and was really fast last year. If you want to tune in, don't forget coverage continues all week on FloRacing.
A couple of other notes for you today. First, Brent Marks posted on his social channels last night that he plans on running the full High Limit schedule in 2023. He joins Kyle Larson, Rico Abreu, Buddy Kofoid, and Justin Peck to announce their intentions to follow the full series. As I mentioned before, we'll also probably see Alex Bowman at a lot of these races as well. No surprise to see Marks join the list, as this will be a perfect smaller series for him to fit in between the rest of his pick and choose schedule. He'd said right off the bat that he'd be in for this series. Justin Peck is an interesting one though here. We'd mentioned Peck as most likely a full timer again with the All Stars, but there now seems to be some question about whether or not that will happen. The High Limit and All Star schedule don't gel on the Bridgeport weekend, with the All Stars in Illinois and Missouri, and that's a very difficult back and forth. Not impossible, but it would be a tough trek and require extra help most likely. So we'll see what happens during the summer with Peck and Buch Motorsports.
And speaking of the All Stars, that series is now looking for a series director after Eric Walls shared yesterday that he has left the series to go work in NASCAR with driver Justin Haley. This feels a little unexpected, and is pretty late in the game, especially considering the All Stars will be on track in less than a month to start their season. Walls had been with the series for nearly eight years, and I think had done a very nice job. We'll see where the All Stars and Tony Stewart go from here.
On the dirt racing podcast front, LoudPedal has a Chili Bowl preview, Passing Points has a bunch of extra stuff from Tulsa, Forward Bite has Ray Cook, QuickTime has Ryan Timms and Tadd Holliman, Dirt Tracks and Rib Racks has Daniel Whitley, Hoogie's Garage has three new interviews, and there are new episodes of The Dirt Reporters and the Dirt Nerds. To see the full list of shows and episodes, head over to dirtrackr.com/podcasts.
The streaming schedule today has five items on it. FloRacing has night three of the Chili Bowl, night three of the Wild West Shootout, plus Flo 24/7. Speed Sport has another night of racing from the Winter Nationals at Cocopah, and there is DIRTVision Now. To see the full daily streaming schedule with links to watch, visit dirtrackr.com/watchtonight.
Alright, that's it for the show today. Have a good Wednesday. Thanks everyone for tuning in. We'll be back here tomorrow for more DIRTRACKR Daily.