DIRTRACKR Daily Podcast - Episode Transcript
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*Sprint Cars After Dark* turns fighty | Daily 5-15-2023
Don't expect Dennis Erb Jr. to send Hudson O'Neal a Christmas card this year. We'll talk about that today, plus other top Lucas guys struggle, Chase Johnson threw haymakers at Cole Macedo and nobody noticed, and more from the dirt racing weekend. Let's go!
It's Monday, May 15th, I'm Justin Fiedler. This is DIRTRACKR Daily.
Before we get rolling, today's show is brought to you by DIRTRACKR Plus. When we talk any stats, numbers, trends, or go deep on a driver's performance, that research for me happens with DIRTRACKR Plus. You can access all the same stats and analytics I do with a subscription. Over at dirtrackr.com/analytics, a lot of stuff in there is free, including race results and a bunch of stat categories. But you can go even deeper with exclusive analysis and stat tools you won't find anywhere else, including driver comparisons, race results and average finish by track, and advanced numbers like efficiency and value finishes. If you are creating content, work for a series or track, play the pools or fantasy like Dirt Draft, this will give you an edge over the competition. A subscription is just $4.99 a month or $49.99 a year. You can cancel any time, and the yearly gets you two months free. And the cool thing is, your subscription just gets better as we go. I just recently added the Xtreme Outlaw Midgets, and the High Limit series will be available very soon. If you want to sign up, click the plus link below in the description, or click Plus in the nav bar at dirtrackr.com.
We'll start this Monday show off with the Lucas Oil Late Model Dirt Series. The Friday show at Farmer City was lost to rain, but they are running it tonight. So you will get some big time dirt racing later on today if you are down for that. The Saturday show at Fairbury did go on, but they did have a rain delay mixed in. Once the feature got rolling later on, we ended up with a drama filled show. Shannon Babb led the first few from the outside front row before fifth starting Dennis Erb Jr. took over on lap six. Erb looked good out front, but just past half way following a restart, his night went big sideways. Hudson O'Neal made a bid for the lead into turn one, but it was probably a tad aggressive, and he ended up making contact with Erb and driving over his left front. Erb spun and collected Babb. Both of them tried to continue, but eventually fell out of the race. Erb even tried to maintain the lead for the restart, but was sent to the tail per the Lucas rule book as he was the reason for the caution. After the show, Erb barely commented and he was clearly pissed, while O'Neal did take responsbility for the incident. Once rolling again, Pierce took advantage on the ensuing restart to assume the lead, and he held on to the end for $30,000. O'Neal had a chance to widen his points lead, but screwed up on the cushion with two to go and destroyed the Rocket one. He was credited with 16th, and now falls to second in the standings. The only guy to finish in the top ten who was also in the top five in the standings was Brandon Overton. He went 21st to fourth and now leads the championship by five points headed to Farmer City. O'Neal had issues, as did Ricky Thornton Jr. Tim McCreadie was 14th on the night after a trip to the infield, and Jonathan Davenport was out early and finished DFL. Hat tip to Daulton Wilson for his 11th to second run. Following tonight at Farmer City, the late model crowd will stick around the midwest for Flo Series races at Marshalltown and Davenport on Tuesday and Wednesday.
Just briefly before we move on to some sprint car stuff, I wanted to double back to the stickman conversation from Friday. There were lots of comparisons to NASCAR spotters when it comes to stick guys, and mentions of Larson needing a spotter on Sundays. I do think the stick stuff versus spotters is not quite an apples to apples comparison. Stick guys can't really spot since they are only viewable once a lap, but where I think they play a huge role is in changing track conditions. An asphalt track changes very little from start to finish in a race, but we all know that's not true in dirt racing. O'Neal jumping high late at Lincoln was a big deal because Sheppard had found something on the top. And the leader in that instance has a huge advantage because if the driver doesn't notice that change, the stick guy can point that out for him and he can move to defend. Which is exactly what O'Neal did. It doesn't matter that Sheppard later jumped the cushion trying to make something happen. He ran down the Rocket house car from a long way back and the race fundamentally changed when O'Neal moved up to defend. That's why it was a big deal. It's not different than the Saturday feature at the Chili Bowl. The first guy to really make moves on the top has a big advantage, and guys have used the screen to see when that happens. The shots at Larson for using a spotter on Sundays were off as well. Let's not forget that Yung Money has no problem not having a spotter in a sprint car. So that criticism doesn't really work. I know the signaling isn't going away any time soon, but that doesn't mean we have to like it.
The World of Outlaws Sprint Car Series weekend at Williams Grove was cut short with Saturday cancelled because of rain. The Friday race was nothing to write home about unless you're a Brad Sweet fan. He won the dash from the pole, and led all 25 laps in the feature from the pole. Nobody could even get close enough to the NAPA 49 to make a move. I do think going forward, it's a big problem for guys like David Gravel and Carson Macedo that Sweet has found speed in Central PA. It's always been the one area where the Big Cat has struggled, but it will be difficult to challenge him for the title if they can't beat him in PA. Headed to Sharon and Attica next, Sweet's lead in the standings is now 36 over Gravel, with Macedo 46 back in third.
One driver and team note from Pennsylvania, Troy Wagaman Jr. has parted ways with the John Trone owned 39 team. It was just last week that Jeremy Elliott was writing about Wagaman being pleased with the direction of the team, but then Wagaman tweeted the news on Saturday. That came after back-to-back B-Main exits against the Outlaws at Lincoln and Friday at the Grove. Trone continues to campaign Cameron Smith, and I'm sure this will mean a return to his own car for Wagaman.
With the All Stars over the weekend, we saw wins from Hunter Schuerenberg and Tyler Courtney. Schuerenberg went flag-to-flag on Friday at Jacksonville, but Chris Windom and Parker Price Miller didn't make it easy. PPM was in the Rudeen 26, subbing for Zeb Wise who is recovering from a concussion suffered the weekend before at Eldora. PPM was probably in line for a good finish, but made a mistake out of four and spun out. He drove back through the field to finish tenth. He was also 10th on Saturday at Wilmot and will remain in the 26 tomorrow night with High Limit. That Saturday show at Wilmot was dominated by Sunshine. He got to the lead on lap 10 and drove on to a six second victory. He leaves the weekend with a 42 point advantage in the standings, and the rest of the field could be in trouble for the title, unless someone like Schuerenberg or Windom can really step up. Windom had a fantastic weekend, finishing second both nights and really looking comfortable with the wing on. Hopefully that trend continues. The McCandless 29 car that PPM vacated last week was in attendance with Sye Lynch in the seat. He had weekend finishes of 14th and sixth. One driver who I keep waiting for to turn things around in 2023 is Ryan Timms. He made a nice splash debuting against the Outlaws last season, with finishes of ninth and second in his first two starts, but this season has been a struggle. 12 Outlaw starts with a best finish of 14th at US36, and a lot of B and C main results along the way. And Friday night at Jacksonville, a track he won at just a few weeks before, he ended up 19th against the All Stars. Definitely some work to do for those guys going forward. Later this week, the All Stars take on Outlaw, Fonda, and Weedsport in the northeast.
Out in California, the Dominic Scelzi vs. Corey Day show continued with the NARC sprint cars. They split the two nights of the Peter Murphy Classic at Hanford, with Day winning Friday night over James McFadden, and Scelzi striking on Saturday for the big cash. Day tried to run him down late in the finale, but ran out of laps. In his first weekend away from the Outlaws, McFadden picked up two podium results. He will be in action tomorrow against High Limit. In the second Roth car, Buddy Kofoid was sixth on Friday, but had issues on Saturday night and was out early. He's also on the High Limit entry list, and just a little bit ago tweeted that he'll be in the Indy Race Parts 71 on Tuesday. Day continues to lead the NARC championship by 19 points right now over Scelzi.
The one thing from the NARC weekend I was surprised about, was how little attention the Chase Johnson, Cole Macedo incident got. In that Friday race, Macedo, Johnson, and Scelzi were battling hard for position, and Macedo dove low into turn three and ended up wiping out Johnson. Johnson's car just spun out, but Macedo went for a tumble. As he was gathering himself in the car, he was met with a hail of punches from Johnson. He got in quite a few shots before safety workers pulled him away. The kerfuffle did grow though later when crew guys came out onto the track and got involved. Johnson wasn't allowed to restart the race afterwards, which seemed like a screwup on his part. He could have easily driven back into the top ten, especially since his car didn't appear damaged, but he clearly felt like he needed to send Macedo a message. I don't know what else led up to that incident, because I don't feel like you go after a guy like that over just that one issue. I was also surprised how little pub the whole thing got. I'm guessing because it happened so late at night, you know that whole sprint cars after dark thing. If you want to see all of what went down, I'll link below in the description to Cali Dirt Video who has the whole thing, including drone footage.
One final thing for you today. Apparently the ASCS has been dropped from FloRacing. Series owner Terry Mattox tweeted this morning quote "Unfortunately, the @ASCSRacing will not be broadcast on @FloRacing for the foreseeable future. We are working to rectify the situation as quickly as possible" unquote. No mention anywhere as to why or when another streaming option will be available. This might just be another example of Flo moving on from some of their lower performing deals. We've seen it a bunch in 2023, tracks and series dropped, and Flo focusing on only certain dirt racing series and events as they expand into other verticals like drag racing and pavement stuff. We'll keep you posted on where the ASCS lands.
That's it for the show today, make sure to check out the streaming schedule at dirtrackr.com/watchtonight.
Hope you guys have a good Monday out there, we'll see you back here tomorrow.