DIRTRACKR Daily Podcast - Episode Transcript
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Ford's sprint car engine wins away from TSR, could we see an engine war? | Daily 8-21-2023
Coming up we'll talk Zeb Wise's win with the Ford 410 and a possible future sprint car engine war. We've also got some late model news, Sunday winners, and wait, why is Stockton cancelling their NARC show? Let's go!
It's Monday, August 21st, I'm Justin Fiedler. This is DIRTRACKR Daily.
Real quick before we get started, make sure to hit that subscribe button on the YouTube channel or where you listen to the podcast. At this moment, we need 3,281 subscribers to reach our 2023 goal of 25k on YouTube. Also, if you like what I'm doing here, you can help spread the word by telling a friend about this show. I know a bunch of you have done that already, which kicks ass, and I think we forget sometimes that not everyone is on social media. So there's a decent chance that your dirt racing friends don't know about this little program we do everyday. Also, if you missed it yesterday, on the Sunday Daily we talked the cost of going midget racing thanks to Thomas Meseraull, plus Bobby Allen's thoughts on the sprint car tire and more crashes. A lot of good info in there from TMez, so check that out. Alright, let's get into it.
The All Stars were at Selinsgrove last night to round out a three race weekend. Back on Friday it was Tyler Courtney winning in his return to the seat, Saturday Danny Varin went flag-to-flag for his first All Star win, and last night it was a dominating performance from Zeb Wise. Zeb's fifth All Star win of the year and three weekend podiums continue to cement his place at the top of the All Star driver's championship, but that owner title remains tight. It's just 10 points between the 26 and 7BC right now. Up next for the All Stars is a trip this week to Michigan for stops at Tri-City and Butler.
Zeb's win last night though was significant for another reason, and that was the horsepower under the hood of that Rudeen 26. Ahead of the Knoxville Nationals, we mentioned that the team was using Ford power for the week, and that they had initially tried it for the first time at Kokomo with High Limit. The engine was acquired from Tony Stewart Racing, and the blue oval didn't appear to be a magic bullet for them, with Zeb finishing 9th in the Nationals B-Main on Saturday night. As we've seen with Donny Schatz and heard from his comments, it seems as though the Ford engine requires a bit of a different setup package, and it was probably going to take the 26 guys some time to figure it out. The Rudeen car isn't the first team outside of TSR to use the Ford power though, as we know the McCandless 29 has used it this season as well. I've heard the engine choice may have played a factor in Parker Price Miller's departure from that car early this year, and the merry-go-round of drivers in the 29 continues. Sye Lynch had been in it, and this weekend it was Brandon Spithaler. Following the Nationals, it looks as though the Rudeen 26 was back to their usual engine package, which I believe is 410s from Speedway. Zeb was second at Outlaw and third at Utica-Rome, but they had a choice for Sunday on the 1/2 mile at Selinsgrove. And they ended up bolting the blue oval back in, and I'd say it went well. I don't know what direction they will head in going forward, especially locked in a tight championship battle. It's possible we could continue to see them switching back and forth. I also don't know why they would experiment at this point in the season, but I do know that Kevin Rudeen has a good relationship with Tony Stewart, and we've seen the Rayce Rudeen Foundation on TSR dragsters, plus the big All Star show they promote each year. If Ford wants to slowly start expanding beyond TSR, it would make sense for them to approach a friendly team. It also makes me wonder and be hopeful for the future of sprint car engines. It might be fun to see some serious engine wars get going here between the traditional builders like Speedway or Rider, and now Ford and Toyota. The Roth cars continue to be fast wherever they go, and TRD's David Wilson talked earlier this season about how they'd like to have their engines available for public sale by year's end. Unlike other forms for motorsports, dirt racing isn't heavy on the branding and manufacturer involvement, but this engine deal could add a layer of interest and intrigue that could be fun.
Elsewhere last night, Bill Balog was an IRA winner at Angell Park Speedway, wrapping up a weekend sweep that also included the win on Saturday at Wilmot. Brenham Crouch continues to control the IRA championship, and he's got a sizeable 244 point lead on Jordan Goldesberry leaving the weekend. California driver Joel Myers Jr. has been running some of these IRA shows as of late as well, and he's been fast, including two weekend top fives.
And at Action Track USA, Tim Buckwalter was a USAC East Coast sprint car winner. It was a tough night for Briggs Danner, finishing down in 18th, but he controls that championship right now over Steven Drevicki.
In some late model news, the World 100 entry process is now open with that event coming up in a just a few weeks. The track has added a little more than $25,000 to the main event purse, with the race being $56 grand to win and $5300 to start. No other super big changes to that three days of racing. Signal sticks still not permitted, but crews can communicate with drivers via hand signals. There is a tire rule, and few other things, but again, not super notable.
Also, entries for the Gateway Dirt Nationals opened yesterday at 5PM eastern time, and by 6:45 they were closed as the entry limit had been reached. Promoter Cody Sommer tweeted they received over 100 entries over that less than two hour period, and they have now added a wait list for other teams to possibly get in. The Gateway Dirt Nationals take place indoors in St. Louis December 14th through 16th this year.
One schedule note for you today, and a bit of a weird one. This coming Saturday's NARC sprint car show at the Stockton Dirt Track has been cancelled, but not because of weather, or a tire shortage, or any number of other reasons why we've seen dirt races cancelled. This one is off because of a construction project to replace a water well in the track's infield. According to a series release, the project has been coming for a while from the state of California, but they started working last Monday on the well with no announcement and no projected completion date. So the track is forced to cancel this week's racing because the project is near turn three and equipment is on the racing surface. That's definitely a new one. The next race on the schedule for the NARC 410 sprint cars is September 30th at Hanford.
That's it for today's Daily. There are a few things on today's streaming schedule, including the Western Sprint Tour at Cottage Grove and iRacing. To see that full schedule, head over to dirtrackr.com/watchtonight.
Hope you guys have a good Monday out there, we'll see you back here tomorrow.