DIRTRACKR Daily Podcast - Episode Transcript

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Wings, chassis an issue at Gold Cup; Hudson O'Neal, Corey Day score huge victories | Daily 9-10-2023

Rocket finally wins the World, Corey Day breaks through with the Outlaws, plus we'll talk tires, tech, wings and more. Let's go!

It's Sunday, September 10th, I'm Justin Fiedler. This is DIRTRACKR Daily.

I had hoped back on Thursday to have some new DIRTRACKR hats to share, but they are a tad delayed, so the new target is tomorrow. In the mean time, anyone who buys a DIRTRACKR logo t-shirt today will get a free can koozie and sticker with your order. You can grab something over at shop.dirtrackr.com.

We'll get this Sunday show rolling with the World 100 at Eldora. Leading into the weekend, track conditions were definitely a storyline, but big kudos to the track prep crew. I thought the surface was good all weekend, which led to good racing and a good finish in the 100 lapper last night. It's exactly what we need from tracks like Eldora during these big shows. For nobody to even notice the track, and for the conversation to be about other things coming out of the race nights. I don't know if Tony Stewart being around more aided in things, but whatever happened, it needs to continue happening. The main complaints to come out of the World were obviously against Hoosier and the tire failures through the weekend. In most cases, when tires start to become a problem, it's right rears. But over the last few days, suddenly drivers were losing right fronts. Jonathan Davenport and Hudson O'Neal had issues in their Friday prelim feature, and there were more last night, including Devin Moran and Bobby Pierce in the main event. Both Moran and Pierce ended up having heavy contact with the outside wall and were out of the event. I don't know the details on all of them, but I saw comments about tire pressure and camber being blamed by some, but after the last few years we've had, no matter what the case is, Hoosier will take a beating. During these situations, you always end up with the inevitable comments from people that the tire rules should be opened back up, but that is no magic bullet either. At this point, there are really only like two companies making dirt racing tires, and as soon as the rules go away, then teams are forced to go with whatever tires work best on a night to night basis. That means tire costs go through the roof as you'll need a bunch of options from each manufacturer to maximize performance based on track conditions. I know tire issues make everyone angry, but it's just not that simple. There were a few other weird moments through the weekend, including Matt Sheppard's Niece Motorsports entry falling off the lift on Thursday. Both the car and Cody Sommer went for a tumble off the lift, and while Cody did suffer some bruises to his arm and leg, he stayed all weekend and the car was fine. Sommer told Kyle McFadden that the car jumped the wheel chocks as he was trying to unload it. We also had Ricky Thornton Jr. hitting a safety truck on Friday night. The truck was stopped on the track under a caution, and I heard RTJ was trying to communicate to someone outside the car and didn't see the truck until it was too late. The 20RT was fine, and the safety truck just suffered a broken tail light. As for last night's main event, great racing down the stretch between Hudson O'Neal and Jonathan Davenport. It felt like once Davenport was out front just past half way, that that might be it. But O'Neal wasn't going to be denied. He drove the wheels off the Rocket 1 late to get back out front and score his first career World 100 win. It was the first for an Indiana driver, and probably more importantly, the first ever for Mark Richards and Rocket Racing. There was a ton of emotion from everyone in victory lane, and you can see how much the win meant to all involved. Behind O'Neal, JD settled for second, with Dale McDowell coming from the B-Main to go 27th to third. Tanner English also had a big 25th to fifth charge. The big surprise drivers to miss the World feature were definitely Tim McCreadie, but also Dennis Erb Jr. Neither even got close to B-Main transfers. Looking ahead, a lot of these teams will be back to racing on Tuesday, with the Flo series returning from their summer break. They take on Fairbury for $23,000 to win.

Out in California this weekend, it was Gold Cup 69 for the World of Outlaws Sprint Cars. Last night's main event was dominated by young Corey Day. He led all 40 laps from the pole to score his first career Outlaw victory, and he did so in a big event on the calendar. He'd been close a few times before, including last year at Bakersfield and Perris, and more recently at Skagit last week. Behind him, the real fun was the battle for second, with Justin Sanders, Buddy Kofoid, and Dominic Scelzi waging absolute war. Sanders came out on top, with Buddy third, and Scelzi fourth. Brad Sweet was the highest finishing Outlaw driver in fifth, and it was a bit of a tough weekend for the full timers. Not a single feature lap led, or podium result any of the three nights. There shouldn't have been any changes in the Outlaw standings, as I believe the weekend was show-up points only.

Along with the racing at Chico, there was some tech drama through the event. Back on Thursday a few teams were not allowed to run cars because of chassis tubing thickness. Outlaw officials found a few cars that didn't meet the standards, and I was told it was a manufacturer issue, and not necessarily a team or repair problem. This happens a handful of times through the season, where some local guys are found with chassis that don't meet spec. The tracks and series they race in normally don't go heavy on the tech process and things like this fall through the cracks until the Outlaws come to town. It sucks for those guys, but there are rules for a reason. And then yesterday, there were a number of teams that were found to be running top wings that didn't conform to the Outlaw rule book. They were local teams that were using the same wing builder. Walkapedia tweeted about it, with the rumor being that the teams were dimed out by someone to series officials. It was a bit difficult to understand what exactly the issue was from social media, but I was later told that the problem stemmed from the rear wing brace that connects to the sideboard being incorrect. The wing sideboards must be at a 90 degree angle to the center foil or wing belly, and any kickouts on those sideboards are not allowed. Kickouts could give an aero advantage, and have been a problem in the past, hence the regulation. The rules are pretty clear on all of this, and you can find the info yourself on pages 56 and 57 of the Outlaw rulebook. Talking to some people last night, it's actually not that difficult of a fix. Those braces are just riveted on, so it wouldn't have taken long to alter them to get the wings back to spec. Whether there was intent or not, I'm sure the teams and the builder will get things rectified. No need to slander anyone over it. But as you could imagine, there was plenty of vitriol spouted on social media towards the series and it's officials, and heaven forbid we actually enforce the rulebook. My favorites are always that the series has it out for the locals, which isn't true, and that just because these violations weren't found on Thursday or Friday, they should have been let through on Saturday. Right, because nobody would try and cheat anything later in the weekend after initial tech on Thursday. The rules state very clearly that quote "Officials may at their discretion, inspect any car entered for competition in any racing event at any time" unquote. The reason it seems as though locals get the brunt of these situations is because of their less intense local tech processes that I mentioned just a little bit ago. The Outlaw officials see the top teams all the time, but the locals only sporadically. So things the locals can get away with or don't get noticed weekly, they get busted for by the more stringent national tech guys. It's not that hard to understand. And as for teams ratting each other out, it's actually a really effective strategy. It sort of deputizes everyone in the pit area to make sure teams are playing fair. It happens all the time at all levels of not just motorsports, but sports as a whole. Alright, let's move on. I'm sure the comments will be super rational on all of this.

With USAC this weekend, we got two of three shows completed. Back to Thursday night it was Brady Bacon picking up the win at Devil's Bowl Speedway. He led all 30 laps, and held off a late charge from Robert Ballou. Friday at Texarkana 67 was rained out, and Saturday night it was Matt Westfall picking up the win. Westfall hadn't won a USAC sprint car show since Eldora in 2006. He rolled the bottom to the win and $10 grand. Bacon though had issues and ended up 15th. With Justin Grant running top five, Bacon lost the points lead and now trails JG by nine headed to Circle City and Haubstadt next weekend.

At the Tuscarora 50, it was a bummer of a weekend. Thursday rained out, Saturday rained out, and they were going to try again today, but as of this morning that's off as well. They are working on finding a reschedule date and we should know what that is in the coming days. Tyler Courtney won the Friday night prelim feature where we had three different leaders and four lead changes in 30 laps. Lance Dewease went seventh to second, and Zeb Wise finished third after leading early. He had the Ford power back under the hood of the Rudeen 26. The Clauson Marshall team has a 14 point advantage on the 26 team with just three race nights left, plus whatever Tusky 50 reschedule we get.

And looking at today's schedule, we were supposed to get the Super DIRTcar Series at Weedsport, but as of just a little bit ago, that racing program has been cancelled because of weather.

Alright, that's it for today.

Hope you guys have a good rest of your Sunday, we'll see you back here tomorrow.