DIRTRACKR Daily Podcast - Episode Transcript
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Hunt the Front lands another, Gravel vs. Kofoid gets spicy | Daily 4-14-2024
On this Sunday we'll talk Brandon Overton hunting the front, Ethan Dotson's next ride, David Gravel vs. Buddy Kofoid, High Limit losing a full timer, and much more. Let's go!
It's Sunday, April 14th, I'm Justin Fiedler. This is DIRTRACKR Daily presented by Kubota Genuine Parts.
New stickers hit the DIRTRACKR merch store back on Friday. The new Daily show logo featuring Kubota has been made into sticker form and you can grab one now with your DIRTRACKR t-shirt order. Browse the merch any time over at shop.dirtrackr.com.
Also, we dropped some new content on Saturday afternoon, with a fresh episode of the Rico Rundown. We dive into Rico's last two weeks racing against the World of Outlaws and his record breaking win. The episode features highlights, behind the scenes photos and video clips, and plenty of commentary from Rico himself. You can find the full episode here on the DIRTRACKR YouTube channel or on Rico's Facebook page.
We'll kick this Sunday show off with updates to a few stories we've been following here lately. First, I mentioned last week that I was curious if Brandon Overton would eventually sign on to chase any dirt late model championships in 2024, and we got our answer back on Friday. In the lead up to the Hunt the Front Super Dirt Series race at All-Tech, the series announced that Overton had indeed signed on to chase the $50,000 championship. We already knew that Overton wouldn't be back with Lucas, as the team had decided to go back to chasing money this year, but the Hunt the Front schedule provides the chance to still do plenty of picking and choosing while also racing for a title on a more relaxed schedule. Overton had won the season opener at Talladega, and grabbed a third and a fourth this weekend at All-Tech. With three races complete Overton leads the championship over Chris Ferguson and Cory Hedgecock. This Hunt the Front group of full timers was already incredibly stacked, and Overton just adds to it. For just a bunch of YouTubers, these guys have done an incredible job building what is easily the deepest field in regional late model racing, and it definitely rivals the two national tours.
Since we're on the subject, weekend Hunt the Front wins went to Carson Ferguson back on Friday, and Joseph Joiner led flag-to-flag last night for the $15,000 score. The series is back in a few weeks at Smoky Mountain Speedway for another $15 grand to win race.
The other update is about the future for Ethan Dotson. It was announced last week that Dotson and Coltman Farms Racing had parted ways, but Dotson was in action over the weekend with the World of Outlaws at the Illini 100. He was back in a car owned by Chris Bragg, who he'd driven for before getting the ride with Coltman Farms. The team told Dirt on Dirt that they are unsure of their schedule going forward, but that this would not affect their deal to run Logan Seavey in the races already planned for him. Dotson had finishes of 25th and 24th at Farmer City.
At Farmer City, those weekend Illini 100 wins went to Nick Hoffman and Bobby Pierce. Hoffman and Pierce had a wild last lap moment on Friday after Hoffman got tight on the cushion in turn three and allowed Pierce to get alongside. Hoffman ended up throttling it up and leaving the track surface Dukes of Hazzard style to beat Pierce back to the finish by just .072. Pierce dominated the feature last night after taking the lead from Chris Madden on lap 12. Headed to Thunderhill and Talladega this week, Brandon Sheppard is still the championship lead by 24 over Madden. Pierce is back into the top 10 in the standings thanks to his win and a second. He's 122 back.
Also at Farmer City, two nights of Xtreme Outlaw midgets. Ryan Timms your winner on Friday, with Ashton Torgerson leading all but one lap on Saturday night for his first series score. Cannon McIntosh still the championship leader with the series going quite until May 10th at Humboldt.
Weekend World of Outlaws Sprint Car wins at Pevely went to David Gravel and Donny Schatz. Gravel led flag-to-flag on Friday, but was challenged here and there by Buddy Kofoid. Last night, Schatz bounced back from a poor qualifying effort to bag the victory. He was 20th in time trials nearly half a second down, and he mentioned post race that he was animated at his crew in the aftermath back at the truck. The motivational speech worked though, as Schatz went fifth to second in his heat to make the dash, and even though he backed up in the dash, was able to go fourth to the lead by lap 11 in the main event. Schatz continues to look like the guy we saw back in 2019 and before with an average finish in the fives and sitting second in the standings. Two other notes, did you happen to notice the little dustup between Gravel and Kofoid last night? Kofoid threw a slider at Gravel late that did not clear, and I have no idea how Gravel didn't end up crashed. He somehow didn't smoke the turn two wall, and was able to recover to still finish fourth. We didn't get to see the whole thing on DIRTVision afterwards, but Johnny Gibson pointed out that Gravel and Kofoid exchanged pleasantries post-checkered flag. There is definitely plenty of intensity in sprint car racing this season, and I'm sure this isn't the last time this will happen. Gravel is going to be on the wheel all season trying to win this championship, and Kofoid is trying to dig out of the hole they are in following that opening stretch at Volusia. Eight straight top tens though for Kofoid, and Gravel hasn't finished worse than fifth in seven straight. The Outlaws head for Paducah and Haubstadt next weekend.
I talked back on Thursday about this being the first weekend of High Limit and the Outlaws head-to-head, and neither seemed to be worse for the wear in car count. The Outlaws actually had more cars at Pevely than they did last season, with 41 and 37. And after there were rumblings of guys saying they weren't coming back to Texas after the POWRi racing the weekend before, High Limit ended up with 37 last night at Texas Motor Speedway. The track ended up with some character, especially in the feature, but it didn't stop us from seeing four lead changes among three drivers. Anthony Macri came out on top, getting by Tyler Courtney inside ten to go. It was career High Limit win number two for Macri, with Sunshine settling for second, and Brad Sweet third. We did see a couple of really big crashes, including DIRTRACKR friend Zach hampton who had something break on the Shophouse 17 late in his heat race. Big bummer for him. And Wayne Johnson was injured in a crash during the B-Main, and it was initially feared he had broken his arm. But the team shared early this morning that there is no fracture and that he had been discharged from the hospital. Tyler Courtney maintains the series points lead headed to RPM Speedway tonight.
One other High Limit note, it appears as though they have lost their first full timer. Conner Morrell was at Attica last night in the Marc Dailey owned 28M, and not in Texas. He ended up third in B-Main number two. Morrell was an All Star full timer in 2023, and had signed on with High Limit for this season. He started with finishes of 24th and 20th at East Bay, and a 24th at Golden Isles. He sat out the feature on night one at Golden Isles after a tough hit in his heat race. With such a stacked field, Morrell was going to be up against it with High Limit all season. We'll see if the other Marc Dailey car with Cap Henry remains on track to challenge for the midweek championship.
At Lucas Oil Speedway for the opening MLRA weekend, Jonathan Davenport couldn't be stopped. He led all 100 feature laps over Friday and Saturday night's events to take home $27,000. Ricky Thornton Jr. was second in both features. That's now three wins in his past five appearances, which includes that Lucas win at Atomic a few weeks ago. The MLRA season continues this week with races at Cedar County and 34 Raceway.
Other weekend late model winners included Christian Hanger and Dale McDowell with the Southern All Stars, Dillon Brown in crate action at Cochran, and Ross Robinson in weekly action at Port Royal.
Kevin Thomas Jr. was the USAC sprint car winner at the Justin Owen Memorial at Lawrenceburg last night, with KTJ one of four drivers to lead laps. Brady Bacon and Logan Seavey joined him on the podium. Seavey remains the championship leader. Other weekend sprint car winners included Paul Nienhiser with the Sprint Invaders, Devon Borden at Port Royal, Cap Henry at Attica, and Tanner Carrick in 360 action at Ocean.
That's it for the Daily today. You do have some dirt racing options today, so make sure to check out the streaming schedule at dirtrackr.com/watchtonight.
Hope you guys have a great Sunday out there, we'll see you back here tomorrow!