DIRTRACKR Daily Podcast - Episode Transcript
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"Christopher Bell should leave Joe Gibbs Racing for more dirt racing freedom!" | Daily 2-1-2023
Coming up, no Christopher Bell is not leaving JGR to have more racing freedom. Plus more news from XR and we do a little Q&A time. Let's go!
It's Wednesday, February 1st, I'm Justin Fiedler. This is DIRTRACKR Daily.
On yesterday's show we talked about the current state of the Toyota 410 sprint car engine, as we were given some insight from Christopher Bell on David Gravel's Monday night live stream. I also briefly touched on Bell's current situation with not being allowed to race dirt, and it was something we talked about a few weeks ago around the Chili Bowl. Bell had kind of been lumped into the quote unquote boycott of that event, and the purse comments from Kyle Larson. In reality though, Bell missing the Chili Bowl was much more about his JGR bosses not allowing him to compete. In regards to Bell's status, I've seen a bunch of comments in recent weeks, and some on my video yesterday, from folks saying Bell should just leave JGR. I guess the idea being that he could go somewhere else in NASCAR and have more freedom to do what he wants outside of his day job. But as much as he may want to get in dirt starts in micros, midgets, sprint cars, whatever, know that Christopher Bell is absolutely not going to do that. He's going to continue racing in NASCAR for Joe Gibbs Racing, and doing or not doing what they tell him to do or not do. And here's why. For JGR and for Toyota, Bell is the present and the future. He's a multi-time winner now, he was a championship contender a year ago, and he will continue to be a very important piece for a manufacturer and a race team that just lost a big star in Kyle Busch, and has aging stars currently in Martin Truex Jr. and Denny Hamlin. Truex could literally retire at any moment and Denny is growing his own organization on the side. That leaves Ty Gibbs, who's still incredibly young and will need time to find himself, and Bell. On top of this, Bell signed a multi-year extension with JGR, very quietly, during the 2022 season, and Coach Gibbs said late in the year he'd wished he'd signed Bell to a 20 year agreement. So Bell's future is already on paper with Gibbs. And let's not forget that the entire TRD driver development program was built around bringing Christopher Bell along. After Toyota missed out on Larson, they vowed to not let that happen again, and Bell was their answer. Signed to race with Keith Kunz towards the end of 2012, Bell has been in the TRD pipeline ever since, and is the poster child for their program. The playbook they created for Bell is the same one they use for drivers today. Yes, Bell is one of the most talented drivers to ever sit in a sprint car or midget, and we as race fans want to see that as much as possible. But regardless of that, Bell is not going to turn his back on a multi-million dollar contract, and a decade long relationship with TRD that brought him to the heights of American motorsports just to do some side racing. And you might not want to hear this, but if Rick Hendrick decided today that he didn't want Larson running any more dirt, Yung Money would be on the sidelines as well. The teams have all the power in these instances, and rightly so, when they've got so much invested. So yes, it sucks to not see Bell strapped into an open wheel car throwing sliders, but no chance he walks away from one of the top rides in NASCAR.
We talked yesterday on the show about the finalized schedule for the XR Super Series, and later in the day on Tuesday XR announced an additional slate of super late model races for this year. They are calling this schedule the Workin' Man Series, and it features 13 races from May 22nd to December 2nd. The release says quote "Instead of a traditional yearly points fund, the series will focus on respectable start money, open trailer bonuses, heat winner money, and other unique bonus programs. Every dollar is available on a per-night basis to incentivize all racers to put in their best performance each night and not pull in early" unquote. All races on the schedule are $10k to win, except there are two shows that still list the to-win amount as TBA. The tracks included with this new series are Legit Speedway Park, Cherokee, Belleville High Banks, Red Cedar, Mountain View, Volunteer, and All-Tech. So between the Super Series and the Workin' Man Series, XR has 23 super late model events planned for the season. As I said yesterday, XR continues to evolve and to try and find their footing in the space. This combined schedule has a very different feel than 2022, a lot of different race tracks than we've seen them at before, but I like this mix of races for more high level teams, and this new slate for regional and local drivers. To see more details on this new series, visit xrworkinman.com.
Down in Florida, the UMP Modified season is off and running, and this week at East Bay is modified week for the WinterNationals. Drake Troutman dominated last night's feature, topping Kevin Adams and Allen Weisser. Nice field there at East Bay with 59 cars in attendance. Sunday and Monday winners over at North Florida included Tyler Nicely and Lucas Lee. The modified crowd is at East Bay through Saturday, and then they'll continue this opening stretch of the season at Volusia next Monday.
Today I figured we could do a Q&A segment. I'd kind of like to do these more often. All of these questions are from YouTube. So here we go:
Brian asks: Why does the internet think TRD’s continuing development of a 410 will be the death of sprint cars? I think more competition will do the complete opposite in my opinion.
Donald asks: What kinda changes would you make in the dirt track industry in order to obtain a larger national audience?
5 on 5 off wants to know: What is the best way to get into dirt track racing ?
Mel asks: What took you from Oregon to North Carolina? And do you get back to Oregon?
Dalton wants to know my favorite driver all time in late models and sprint cars?
slats85 asks: What Sprint car driver, past or present, would you want to see race that you haven’t already.
RA says: If you could race any type of car, dirt track car of course, what would you want to race?
Chandler wants to know: Do you think the joiners “HTF racing series” will go big or bust?
Question from Loganofan2022: What nascar teams did you work with and why’d you get into dirt racing?
Similar vein, Eric asks: How did you get your start in the Motorsport industry? And if you could get behind the wheel of any race car, which would you choose?
And finally, Michael asks: who do you predict may be in contention for a win at the USA National’s at Cedar Lake Speedway this year?
We are starting to get a few more new episodes of some of the other dirt racing podcasts out there. Winged Nation is back with Tyler Clem and Kevin Swindell. Passing Points has another Down Under episode, Quicktime has Cole Vanderheiden, Dirt Tracks and Rib Racks has CJ Leary and the BGE Dougherty guys, All Gas, No Brakes has Kollin Hibdon and Tom Berry, Hoogie's Garage has Robert Bell and Santino Ferrucci, and there are new episodes of the Dirt Reporters from Dirt on Dirt, and the Dirt Nerds. Shout out to the Dirt Tracks and Ribs Racks guys for the care package this week, they are now represented on the sticker board. Also, we have two new additions to the podcasts page. I finally tracked down Mandee Pauch's RSS feed, so Dirt Track Confessions is now there, as is newcomer Dunewich on Dirt. And if you haven't heard, Ross is bringing back Open Red. The first episode drops next week, and is with Brian Kemenah. I'll add Open Red back to that page once the first ep is posted. To see all the podcasts along with recent episodes, hit up dirtrackr.com/podcasts.
Today's streaming schedule is the same as yesterday's. Modifieds from East Bay and Flo 24/7 on FloRacing, and DIRTVision Now. To see the streaming schedule, every single day, click over to dirtrackr.com/watchtonight.
Have a good Wednesday out there, so you guys tomorrow!