DIRTRACKR Daily Podcast - Episode Transcript
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Kyle Larson confirms High Limit schedule detail, sprint car silly season moves continue | Daily 10-29-2023
Coming up, Kyle Larson talks High Limit and gives us some schedule clues. PLus we've got a number of driver and team moves to talk about, and weekend results. Let's go!
It's Sunday, October 29th, I'm Justin Fiedler. This is DIRTRACKR Daily.
As we edge closer to the end of the dirt racing season, the rumors are coming in hot about potential dates for the expanded 2024 High Limit season. We've talked on this show about what it could look like, and some expectations I have based on what I've heard from friends in the industry. One of those elements is the return of the midweek races, and I've said before I could envision a championship within a championship. And on Saturday at Martinsville, Kyle Larson confirmed that the midweek shows will continue. After he qualified for Sunday's Cup race, he spoke to a number of reporters, and both Matt Weaver and Speed Sport had stories with his comments. Larson said quote "Whatever our full schedule ends up being, the priority of ours' is we want to maintain the mid-week races. The more mid-week races we have, the more I opportunity I have to race. And the viewership of the midweek stuff has been really good. That is a priority of ours. But it's difficult to put a schedule together and have it logically make sense for everybody" unquote. Yung Money also talked about wanting to raise purses, have teams competing for millions each season, and that the overall schedule continues to be a work in progress. I'll link both stories below if you want to see everything Larson had to say. With the All Star Circuit of Champions now under their control, a safe assumption to make is that the big All Star shows will now fall under High Limit. That could include things like the Rayce Rudeen Foundation Race, the winged portion of 4-Crown at Eldora, and the two big races at Port Royal in the Tusky and the Weikert. We already know that the Dean Knittel Memorial that has closed out Ohio Sprint Speedweek will be on the High Limit schedule somewhere. Rumors I've heard from a few sources include the usual trip south to start the year, in Georgia and Florida, and potentially the return of dirt racing to the Texas Motor Speedway dirt track. The ASCS ran their until 2018, we saw XR go there in 2021, and it was part of the World of Outlaws schedule from 2000 to 2004. As we look ahead to the coming weeks, I think the schedules will be the next big domino to fall, and then once they are in place for both the Outlaws and High Limit, teams can start making their own decisions on what to do.
We've got a number of driver and team moves to talk about, as it's been a busy last few days on that front. Later in the day on Thursday, sprint car driver JJ Hickle posted to social media that he is out of a ride and now on the hunt. He had started 2023 driving the Seeling 97 out with the All Stars, but part way through the season transitioned to the Home Pro Racing 50YR machine. But according to his post, that 50YR team is scaling back dramatically for next year, and now he's out. Hickle ended the season sixth in the final All Star driver points standings, and in all of his 410 starts, had two wins, seven top fives, and 16 top tens in 64 races. He also had a pair of 360 wins to go along with his 410 exploits. His two 410 wins were in AFCS action at Fremont, and a weekly show at Butler. His best All Star run was a second at Atomic in June. I think Hickle is a guy that could be very solid in the right situation, as we've seen him contend out with ASCS as well.
In Central Pennsylvania, we've seen a pair of recent changes. First, Dylan Norris is looking for a new ride, as he found out recently that Scott Gobrecht is shutting down his sprint car program completely. In nine years in operation, Gobrecht's cars had drivers like Norris, Trey Starks, and Chase Dietz. The team will run the season finale at BAPS Motor Speedway on November 11th, and then that's it. No word yet on what Norris will do. Also, driver Tyler Ross is looking for a new situation after recently parting with car owner Rick Lefever. Ross is working on some combination of running his own deal, and/oro partnering with another team for the future. He had 23 top tens this season in 45 starts, and won the Non-Winners race back on Friday at Bridgeport.
In some good news, Hunter Schuerenberg has a winged ride for a few race nights coming up. He'll join Alex Bowman Racing and the Ally 55 team for the Tuesday night 410 show at Cherokee Speedway, before then continuing with the deal at Charlotte for World Finals. The ABR team was pretty quiet during the second half of the season, and I don't believe they've been out since the Jackson Nationals in August. Schuerenberg has a pair of 410 wins this season, including an IRA show at 34 Raceway, and an All Star win at Jacksonville. He started the year with the Vermeer 55, but after losing that deal, has run with Kevin Newton, Swindell SpeedLab where he made the Knoxville Nationals main event, and most recently with Zemco in Central PA. He did run a High Limit show with ABR, picking up a ninth at Grandview.
And elsewhere in open wheel racing, not sprint cars, but midgets, Chase McDermand announced he's parted with Mounce Stout Motorsports after two years together. He says he'll announce his Chili Bowl deal soon, but doesn't have any full plans yet for 2024. McDermand ended up fifth in the final Xtreme Outlaw rundown, leading the series with six wins.
Looking at some weekend results, Corey Day dominated the NARC feature at Kern County, taking over the lead from polesitter Cole Macedo on lap 3 and never looking back. He topped Buddy Kofoid and Chase Johnson at the end. With championship rivals Justin Sanders and Dominic Scelzi finishing down the order, Day will take a sizeable lead in the standings to the final race at Stockton this coming weekend.
At Georgetown Speedway, Anthony Perrego bagged the small block win on Friday at the Mid-Atlantic Championship. Last night, it was Danny Bouc topping Ryan Godown and south region champion Matt Sheppard for the victory. The Short Track Super Series north region will close out November 10th at Orange County Fair Speedway.
Bridgeport Speedway had their Sprintoberfest weekend for sprint cars, and last night it was Kyle Reinhardt leading flag to flag in the winged 410 main event. Danny Dietrich and Justin Peck joined him on the podium. Anthony Macri was there in the 39M, but finished out of the race after getting involved in an early incident with Paulie Colagiovanni, while running inside the top five. Alex Bright won the USAC East Coast feature, and Briggs Danner was crowned the 2023 USAC East Coast champion.
Kaylee Bryson made her super late model debut over the weekend in unsanctioned action at Thunderbird Speedway in Oklahoma. That Friday feature was won by Billy Moyer Sr. over Logan Martin and Jeff Roth. Bryson started eighth and finished eighth, driving a car owned by Brady and Liz Ross, who's son Hayden died last year. The race was run in his memory.
In a terribly fitting end to the season, the final ASCS weekend of 2023 was, yep, you guessed it, rained out. The Short Track Nationals at Texarkana 67 Speedway were lost for the second time after originally being postponed from a few weeks ago. So Jason Martin we already knew was the season champion, and I think series owner Terry Mattox needs to go make an offering to the gods or something. His series might be the most snake bitten the past two seasons when it comes to cancellations out of his control.
If you want to check out some racing today, don't forget there are a lot of late model stars down at East Alabama for the National 100. $49,000 to win and local driver Richie Stephens will lead Chris Madden, Brandon Overton, and Jimmy Owens to green from the pole. Local divisions are already on track as I write this, and the supers have hot laps, the B and the feature slated for later this afternoon or early evening.
That's it for the Daily today. Hope you have a great Sunday out there, we'll see you back here tomorrow.