DIRTRACKR Daily Podcast - Episode Transcript
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Where do you stand on sprint cars vs. late models? | Daily 5-31-2023
Coming up, does it matter that High Limit is down on entries this week? Plus we look at tonight's Flo Series race at Florence, and ponder late models versus sprint cars. Let's go!
It's Wednesday, May 31st, I'm Justin Fiedler. This is DIRTRACKR Daily.
Two big shows tonight to get into with both the FloRacing Night in America Series at Florence and the High Limit Sprint Car Series headed for Tri-City. We'll start first with High Limit. We last saw them two weeks back at Wayne County. Kyle Larson was the winner that night over Justin Sanders, and he enters the night as the series points leader by 27 over Anthony Macri. Tonight's race is $23,000 to win, and as some have pointed out already, the entry list is a little bit lighter than we've seen for some of these other races. The first three shows at Lakeside, 34, and Wayne County all drew north of 50, but the pre-entered list for tonight shows just 33. If that holds, that would make this the lowest attendance High Limit has had, even going back to the first race in 2022, where they had 35 at Lincoln Park. On top of missing some of the local and regional guys that have hit up some of the other races, tonight's list doesn't include names like Chris Windom, Hunter Schuerenberg, JJ Hickle, Scotty Thiel, or Bill Balog. A lot of those guys are All Star full timers, and they are coming off that Central PA weekend, and headed for Wisconsin on Friday. It's certainly not a huge leap to travel to Illinois, but clearly some are taking the night off. There is also no Justin Peck on tonight's list, and he hasn't raced since that crash last Thursday night at Bridgeport. Word on the street is he suffered a concussion in the incident and has not yet been cleared to return to racing. There is no known timetable yet on his return either. The other group sort of missing from tonight will be World of Outlaws drivers. Through the first three races this season, we'd had at least one in each race, but eventually that was going to end with the Outlaw restrictions, and tonight is the night. Make no mistake though, even with 33 on the list, it's still a very quality field. Buddy Kofoid, Kyle Larson, Danny Dietrich, Anthony Macri, Justin Sanders, Zeb Wise, Rico Abreu, Brian Brown, Brady Bacon, Brent Marks, Cory Eliason, Parker Price-Miller, Tyler Courtney, etc. etc. etc. The last big time sprint car race we had at Tri-City was just about a month ago when the World of Outlaws rolled through. David Gravel was the winner that night, but guys who are racing tonight who ran well in that one include PPM, Kofoid, Eliason, and Bacon. I mentioned on the show yesterday that I had added High Limit to the analytics section at dirtrackr.com and we will continue tracking the series going forward. There are some interesting numbers to ponder today that I haven't see talked about anywhere else. On top of having four different winners in four races, nobody has finished top five in every race. Larson has the most with three. Larson is also the only driver to run top 10 in every race. Looking at who's raced, even with as big as the fields have been, only nine drivers have made all four starts so far, they are Courtney, Peck, Schuerenberg, Marks, Kofoid, Larson, Sanders, Eliason, and Bacon. And that list will shrink tonight. The other interesting stat is where winners have come from. Kofoid and Gio Scelzi each won from ninth, and Macri and Larson won from third. No front row starting winners yet, and only two wins from the dash. You can see all these numbers and more at dirtrackr.com/analytics. High Limit hot laps are scheduled tonight for 6:30, and if you can't get there, watch it live on FloRacing.
A quick DIRTRACKR merch update. I'm already down to the last six sprint car stickers from the most recent re-stock if you are wanting to get one. I do still have a decent number of logo and late model stickers in stock. They are $5 shipped. Also, on the t-shirt front, everything is marked down right now to $15, but the sprint car shirt stock is low. I only have two smalls, four mediums, and a single XL left. Once these are gone, they are gone. I will not be making any more. That $15 includes tax and shipping for anyone in the US. You can shop anytime over at shop.dirtrackr.com, or click the links below this video.
At Florence, the FloRacing Night in America late models get ready to run their final race before going quiet all summer. The next time we'll see the Flo series racing will be on September 12th at Fairbury. I certainly understand why Michael Rigsby and Ben Shelton decide to do this, but it is strange that they voluntarily go completely dark for more than three months. They've done this every year to avoid conflicts with some of the big events, which I respect, but it has to be hard to keep momentum rolling for the series when you disappear for that long. Tonight's stop at Florence will be the first appearance for the Flo series at the Kentucky track. Hudson O'Neal enters as the points leader over Bobby Pierce and Brandon Sheppard. Mike Marlar, Ricky Thornton Jr., Dennis Erb Jr., and O'Neal have all won on the midweek tour so far in 2023. Tonight's field will include all of those guys, plus Tim McCreadie, Jonathan Davenport, Brandon Overton, Devin Moran, Tyler Erb, and plenty more. And it's hard to go to Florence without mentioning Josh Rice, who is always fast there. Both of his Lucas series wins in the past two seasons have come at Florence, so you know he'll be stout tonight. After tonight, the dirt late model world will turn their focus to a midwest run for the World of Outlaws, Lucas at West Virginia for $50,000 to win, and then the Dirt Late Model Dream at Eldora is looming next week. Tonight's card at Florence also includes modifieds and crate late models, with hot laps set for 6pm. As you probably already knew, you can watch it live on Flo if you can't get there.
I did have a question on Twitter today about my thoughts around the Flo show and High Limit being scheduled against each other. It doesn't really bother me, and with so much racing going on, it's impossible to be completely void of conflicts. I don't know this specifically, but I doubt the online viewership will suffer much if at all on either side, and clearly the at-track fans won't be affected. As much as it seems like maybe fan bases have converged a little bit recently, I'd go out on a limb and say that the race fans are still pretty heavily segmented when it comes to sprint cars versus late models. I know there are plenty out there like me who will watch anything, but I don't know that that's true for the greater dirt racing population. Years and years ago when I worked at WRG, we had some decent numbers to prove that out, and I still think there is still plenty of turbulence between the taxi cab and push and flip communities. Drop me a comment and let me know where you stand on the car types right now.
Elsewhere today, Western PA Speedweek gets rolling for 410 sprint cars. They'll race each of the next five nights at Knox Raceway, Pittsburgh's Pennsylvania Motor Speedway, Lernerville, Sharon, and Tri-City Raceway Park. Shows are $3000 to win and $300 to start, and the weeklong points champion will get an additional $3000, with points places paying down to 10th. Last year, Lernerviller regular AJ Flick was the speedweek champion, topping Ryan Smith and Darin Gallagher. 42 drivers took part over the course of the week, and I'd guess we'll see similar car counts this year. The weather forecasts for the next several days look pretty good for the area. Tonight's action at Knox Raceway gets going at 6:45 for hot laps, with RUSH non-wing sprint cars as the undercard. If you can't get there, Lernerville's streaming service, Dirt.TV will have live coverage.
In some racing action from last night, Mike Marlar picked up a $10,000 Ultimate Heart of America Series win at Clarksille Speedway. He started on the pole and led all 50 laps for the win, topping Cory Hedgecock and Ricky Weiss. Marlar will now head to Florence today to join the proceedings with the FloRacing Night in America Series.
That's it for today, make sure to stop by dirtrackr.com to check out the streaming schedule and persue the news and analytics sections.
Hope you guys have a good Wednesday out there, we'll see you back here tomorrow.