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Is sandbagging possible in qualifying? | Daily 7-17-2023
There is a lot to unpack from the Kings Royal weekend, and we'll talk Donny Schatz's big win, formats and inverts, and sandbagging. Plus we've got updates on Tyler Courtney's injury and subs, and plenty more from the dirt racing weekend. Let's go!
It's Monday, July 17th, I'm Justin Fiedler. This is DIRTRACKR Daily.
We'll talk format stuff here shortly in regards to the Kings Royal, including zeroing in on sandbagging, but hat tip to Donny Schatz and his guys on capitalizing on Saturday night. As we've documented here, and as Matt Weaver talked about in his Saturday night piece for The Slider, things have not been great for the Tony Stewart Racing 15 this yar. His average finish is way down, they aren't in the championship fight, and things are not great inside the team. If you missed Weaver's piece, I'll link to it below in the video description. His reporting after the win on Saturday night was really good, and there are details in there you won't find anywhere else. But on a night when the format was in the crosshairs because of a heavy track that didn't allow much passing, Schatz made the moves when he needed to. Being in the sixth heat definitely didn't hurt, and he was the only driver to win a heat that didn't start on the front row. Four of six heats were won from the pole, and Sheldon Haudenschild won from second, although we know now that Hunter Schuerenberg's engine was laying down. That third to first charge in the heat put Schatz on the front row of the Kings Royal feature, and he never relinqueshed that top spot through the 40 laps, multiple restarts, and a fuel stop. It was a confidence boost the team needed in the midst of all their struggles. Things did get better though in terms of track conditions by feature time. We had Sye Lynch go 23rd to 13th, Sam Hafertepe 24th to 11th, Carson Macedo 21st to ninth, Rico was hard charger at 20th to sixth, Kyle Larson 15th to fifth, and Brent Marks 11th to second. There was just nothing anybody could do about Schatz out front in clean air. Everyone has been saying that the Knoxville Nationals win in 2022 propelled the 15 to better performances to the end of the season, but really, they were pretty good going into Knoxville. If that will happen this year or not, I'm skeptical. The win will certainly help, but there are still fundamental issues right now with that team, and I don't know that everything is magically fixed with one victory. We'll see.
Outside of Schatz, because of the rain and weather, the format took a beating on Saturday night from fans and really seemed to be the main topic of discussion. 48 hours before, the invert format was all the rage. The Million prelim action was lauded because of the inverts and the points system. But Saturday, the Kings Royal format was blasted for poor action all night. I'm not going to advocate one way or the other with inverts, but it's clear under certain circumstances they are amazing, and under others they aren't. What I did want to get into though, is the Kings Royal qualifying and sandbagging. It's been talked about for years, and when drivers know ahead of time what the inversion bubble is, the thought is that guys will drag their feet in qualifying to get themselves a better heat race starting position. On Saturday night, that meant that positions 31st to 36th in time trials would be the heat race pole sitters. That ended up being Aaron Reutzel, Parker Price-Miller, Hunter Schuerenberg, David Gravel, Lance Dewease, and Kerry Madsen. I think under normal circumstances, most of those names wouldn't necessarily surprise you down there in qualifying. That is, except for David Gravel. He's one of the most prolific time trialers the Outlaws have probably ever seen. He was quick time in his group back to Wednesday, and was fourth in his group on Friday. Suddenly though, he was down in 33rd and it drew the attention of some on social media, including Brad Doty. For some context, the entire 61 car field was separated by less than a second in qualifying. But only about half a second separated the top 57 cars. It was SUPER tight through the field. Peck was quicktime at 12.827, and Gravel was 33rd at 13.074. That's only two and a half tenths difference, which doesn't seem super suspicious, but Gravel didn't help his own cause. Later, Matt Weaver posted a video with Gravel where he asked about the lap and if it was luck or skill. With a wry smile, Gravel said quote "I'm just running a line, and had a good lap, perfect." If he was indeed sandbagging, he was one of the few who could really make it work, going out late in the session. If you go out early, there really is no way to know what will end up being the time needed. I know some look at sandbagging poorly, like cheating, but I feel like it's hard to fault the teams for trying to work the format to their advantage. This is after all, a competition. In this instance, if Gravel really was able to pull it off successfully, more power to him. It's a massive risk to take on a night when the field is bunched so tightly together. Gravel was at 13.074, and Aaron Reutzel had the final heat pole at 13.103. Noah Gass went 13.111, and instead of being on the pole, started heat one in seventh, and had to race through the C Main. That means if Gravel misses the lap time by just about 4 hundredths, he's buried. I'm not saying here definitively that's what Gravel was doing, but it certainly makes you wonder. On the flip side, it didn't pay to qualify up front. Peck and Rico were guaranteed feature starts by qualifying P1 and P2, but Logan Schuchart, Spencer Bayston, Brad Sweet, and Jacob Allen were all on the outside looking in come the Kings Royal main event, after they quaified third through sixth. From what I could find, it was the first time in his full time Outlaw career that Brad Sweet didn't start a feature. His last DNQ was 2013, before he was a full time member of the series. Regardless of all that though, it is notable to mention that Saturday was the largest crowd ever at Eldora. Not bad for a day affected by rain.
Back to Friday night, Carson Macedo picked up the feature win in the Knight Before, and it's tightened the Outlaw championship battle back up. Gravel heads to BAPS on Wednesday with a two point lead over Sweet, with Macedo 24 back in third.
One news item that came out of Friday. Tyler Courtney was involved in a crash during that Knight Before feature and has injured his back. He sat out Saturday at the Kings Royal, and will continue to miss races going forward. In the mean time, Clauson Marshall Racing has announced that Anthony Macri will fill in for Sunshine during All Star and Outlaw races they have coming up, and Corey Day will drive the car during the High Limit races until Courtney is back. Thereis no word on a timetable.
The national touring late model weekend was affected by weather, with Lucas rained out Friday and the Outlaws rained out Saturday. On Friday night at Ponderosa, Mike Marlar had a hellacious charge from 22nd to win the $15,000 feature. Bobby Pierce led the most laps, but he hit an infield tire late, damaging the nose, and it was the opening Marlar needed to get out front. It was the third time this season the night's hard charger also won the race. Ryan Gustin did it at River Cities going plus six, and Hudson O'Neal went 23rd to the win way back at Volusia. Pierce did hold on for second, and pushed out his championship lead to 56 over Chris Madden. The Saturday show at Brownstown was rained out, with officials looking for a new date. The Outlaws are back July 28th and 29th at Fairbury for the Prairie Dirt Classic.
The Friday Lucas show at Tri-City ended up getting rained out partially through the show, and they are also working on a new date. Saturday night at Wheatland, Brandon Overton led the first five laps from the pole, but Jonathan Davenport took over on lap six and went the distance for his second straight series win, and sixth of the year. It was exactly what he and Devin Moran needed in the championship, with Moran finishing second to JD and Tim McCreadie down in 10th. With the Silver Dollar Nationals at Huset's on tap for this week, Davenport now has that foruth and final championship spot for the season finale. McCreadie has slipped to fifth, 50 points back, and Moran only trails him by five points. I do think Overton remains at risk as well, with Davenport surging and Moran better as of late. This is definitely a situation to watch as the summer continues. Ricky Thornton Jr. and Hudson O'Neal remain solid out front.
In Summer Nationals action, Hartford was rained out, Ashton Winger won Saturday at Oakshade, and Kyle Moore won yesterday at Wayne County. Winger was crowned the final Summer Nationals champion and grabbed the $10,000 for the week five title. So Winger overall, Brian Shirley took week one, Jason Feger weeks two and four, and Winger weeks three and five. Weekend modified winners were Dalton Lane and Nate Young, and Tyler Nicely extended his points lead. The Modified Nationals don't officially end until Prairie Dirt Classic weekend, but Nicely should easily have this thing wrapped up.
With the USAC midgets over the weekend, Logan Seavey stayed fast and extended his lead in the championship. On Friday night at Jefferson County, Ryan Timms led early from the pole, with Seavey grabbing the lead just past half way. He drove on to his second win of the season. He followed that up with a second place finish Saturday, starting sixth, and challenging leader Tanner Thorson late, but ultimately coming up short. Thorson officially led all 40 laps, and won for the first time as a car owner as well. Seavey's lead in the USAC midget championship is now 76 points over Jacob Denney. That Abacus team has been really fast with Seavey in the seat and we'll see if they can keep it up. The midgets don't race again until August 18th.
Other weekend winners included Jake Timm and Jim Chisholm winning the Mod Wars prelims with the USMTS, and Timm also taking the $11,000 weekend finale. Rodney Sanders stayed in front in the championship, leading Jason Hughes after the weekend by 101 points. Weekend Southern Nationals late model wins went to Jimmy Owens and Dale McDowell. The IRA and the NOSA teams went at it over the weekend at River Cities with Mark Dobmeier and Austin Pierce coming out on top. Brenham Crouch is still the IRA points leader, while I believe the Dobmeier is the NOSA points leader. At Weedsport on Sunday for the Hall of Fame 100, Mat Williamson bagged the $10,000 payday and locked himself into the main event at Super Dirt Week. He started fifth and battled with guys like Anthony Perrego and Stewart Friesen to get to the front, and then held off points leader Matt Sheppard at the end. The Super DIRTcar Series is right back to racing on Wednesday at Land of Legends. And finally, Shane Golobic was the NARC winner on Saturday night at Ocean Speedway, topping Justin Sanders and Tim Kaeding. With points leader Corey Day down in 12th, the championship battle tightened back up again with Dominic Scelzi finishing fifth. Don't worry about trying to go find the replay though, as Ocean Speedway wouldn't allow FloRacing to broadcast the event as part of their NARC contract.
Make sure you stop by dirtrackr.com/watchtonight to see what you can watch on streaming that doesn't involve Ocean Speedway. You do have several options today including the Short Track Super Series at Fonda. That's it for today's Daily...
Hope you guys have a good Monday out there, we'll see you right back here tomorrow.