DIRTRACKR Daily Podcast - Episode Transcript
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Will PA Speedweek draw High Limit cars? Plus you won't believe how many races late model guys run | Daily 12-20-2023
The Pennsylvania Speedweek schedule is out. Could we see a bunch of High Limit invaders during that week? We'll talk about the possiblities, plus an update on Junction Motor Speedway, and while sprint car guys talk about running less, the late model guys LITERALLY never stop. Let's go!
It's Wednesday, December 20th, I'm Justin Fiedler. This is DIRTRACKR Daily.
We are down to just the last few days before Christmas, and the sale over in the DIRTRACKR merch shop continues. Everything is marked down at the moment, including the last few hats, shirts, and stickers left in stock. If you want to grab a last minute gift, I will get things shipped out same day so maybe it can get to you in time. Today and tomorrow are probably you last days to order. You can browse the merch any time over at shop.dirtrackr.com.
On Tuesday we got to see the 2024 Pennsylvania Speedweek schedule, with 10 races on the slate from June 28th through July 7th. Eight of which are $10,000 to win, one is $20,000 to win, and one is $25,000 to win. Williams Grove, Lincoln, BAPS, Grandview, Port Royal, Hagerstown, and Selinsgrove all get dates, with the Grove, Lincoln, and Port all getting two dates. This will be the first time ever that the entire week pays at least $10,000 to win every night. It's no small thing that these tracks have stepped up for bigger money, given these are effectively just connected local shows. The only real criticism I saw of the schedule is that certain tracks get multiple dates during speedweek, but that's been the case for a long time, and I don't think it's that big of a deal. I'm sure streaming will be a mess as usual also, with different tracks on different services all week, but again that won't be new either. What I'll be curious to see next summer is how many High Limit teams super truck back to PA to hit up some of those races. The opening weekend is a wash, because High Limit is at Lucas Oil Speedway that Friday and Saturday, but the rest of the week is a definite possibility. It's about a 16 hour drive from Wheatland, Missouri to York Haven, PA, so the Sunday show at BAPS isn't necessarily out of the question, although it would be a serious pull. You'd have to think though, some of the teams with PA connections would be interested in heading back, including Brent Marks, Justin Peck, and maybe Jacob Allen. We know that Rico Abreu has run speedweek events in the past, but he doesn't have any of them listed on his schedule at ricoabreuracing.com. Kyle Larson could be a possibility as well. The Outlaws are off for basically the same stretch of days, so you won't see High Limit guys racing with them during that time. So others could make the trip as well. If you'd like to see the full slate of races for PA Speedweek, head over to paspeedweeks.com. That's speedweeks, plural.
And since we are in the area, I wanted to double back quickly to another speedweek schedule. Western PA Speedweek returns in 2024, running May 29th through June 2nd. Mercer, Pennsylvania Motor Speedway, Lernerville, Sharon, and Tri-City. Each race will be at least $3500 to win and $300 to start. AJ Flick was the Western PA Speedweek champion in 2023.
At Golden Isles Speedway in Georgia yesterday, they had a number of super late model teams on the grounds getting in some testing time. That included Tim McCreadie and Gateway dome winner Brandon Sheppard. The dirt late model season literally never ends. These guys just got done racing indoors in St. Louis, now they're at Golden Isles, and many will head out to New Mexico in just about two and a half weeks to start 2024 at Vado Speedway Park for the Wild West Shootout. We are at this point in time on the sprint car side where teams are talking about off weeks, and shorter schedules, more freedom, more money etc. If you listen to Brad Sweet, this is a big factor behind starting High Limit. They don't want to run that Outlaw schedule with so many events through the year. But it's interesting that you don't hear any of that on the late model side. Both Lucas and the Outlaws will usually be in the mid 40s to low 50s for completed races in a season, but very few just do those schedules. These guys are running way more often than their sprint car counterparts. For comparison, most of the Outlaw teams were right near 80 shows for 2023. From what I could find, the two main 410 winged drivers with the most starts were Buddy Kofoid and Danny Dietrich, both at 87. This doesn't even come close to the top late model guys. Bobby Pierce, 93 races. Brandon Overton, 101 races. Brandon Sheppard, obviously still going, 106 races. Now it gets even bigger. Tyler Erb, 112 races. And the king of them all in 2023, Ricky Thornton Jr. Made a significant number of late model starts, but also a bunch of micro sprint races. He is currently at 127 races competed at in 2023. And he's not done. He's going to compete in all four divisions at the Tulsa Shootout at the end of the month as well. So he will be easily over 130 races. It will be something to watch on the sprint car side in 2024, especially for those committed High Limit teams. They are on the hook for less races, with more freedom. So do they stay home on those off weeks, or will they be out racing and traveling? Will we see a guy like Sweet run even more than the 79 shows he did in 2023? I'll be curious to see. As for the late model teams and them testing at Golden Isles, the Lucas season starts January 25th at Golden Isles. The series will then be back later in February for a second trip, which is that weekend that will also include the High Limit sprint cars. So obviously these teams getting in some work to prepare for those two early season weekends.
Back in November, we did a daily show where I talked about Junction Motor Speedway in Nebraska being for sale. The track is priced at $2 million, and the real estate listing says you could potentially generate nearly half a million dollars a year from track operations and the cropland on the property. The clip I posted to Facebook and TikTok of that story did a ton of a views, and there seems to be a healthy amount of folks hoping for a good resolution here. About a month later, the real estate listing is still active, but there might be some hope for racing at the track in 2024. A Kansas-based hobby stock builder called Prowler Chassis by Wulf posted to their Facebook page late yesterday that they will be operating the track next season. The post says they are planning on Saturday night racing through the summer, and that a schedule and classes will be announced soon. Replies to comments also point to them continuing to be IMCA sanctioned, and that this deal is not a purchase of the race track, but instead a lease agreement. Junction's weekly schedule in 2023 included IMCA sanctioned late models, stock cars, sport mods, hobby stocks, and sport compacts, and I would guess this new group would have a similar lineup. Hopefully this works out for everyone involved, because it seems like this race track has a lot of fans.
If you want some more dirt racing audio this week, Dirt Tracks and Rib Racks has Van Gurley Jr., Dirt Track Confessions has Brett Deyo, Hoogie's Garage has Sammy Swindell, Jay Masur, and Mike Schmitz, TJSlideways has Mike and Steven Linder, Plum Wild has Hayden Cardwell, and there are new episodes of The Dirt Reporters, the Dirt Nerds, Quicktime, Across the Groove, and Getting up to Speed. To see the full list of podcasts and recent episodes, visit dirtrackr.com/podcasts.
That's it for the show today. The streaming schedule is going to continue to be pretty quiet for the next few weeks, but if you want to see it anyway, it's always up to date over at dirtrackr.com/watchtonight.
Hope you guys have a great Wednesday out there, we'll see you back here tomorrow.