Episode 122: Ohio Sprint Speedweek is Coming!

Jacob and Clint talk about The Dream at Eldora and the upcoming Ohio Sprint Speedweek.

Episode Transcript

(00:21):
Hello, brace fans, and welcomeback to the Ohio Dirt Track Podcast.
My name is Clint Knight and I'mJacob Pard, and we are back.
Last weekend was not quite as intenseweekend for you, and I know you
were at Attico on Friday night andthen you took took the rest of the
weekend off to check out some livemusic in Kentucky, I believe. Yes.

(00:46):
How was How was the Royal BirdFestival? It was good. It
rains pretty much the entire time,but that's why you have ponchos, you
know, you get to I gotto watch a lot of artists that I
wanted to see, you know,people like Noah Kahan and Chris Tapleton,
Hosier, Red Klay Strays, StephenWilson Junior was really good, and I

(01:08):
mean there were so many others too. Drinkover price beer and ate over priced
food and had a whale of aweekend down in Kentucky after had a co
one Friday. The Red Clay Straysare on my list. I haven't been
able to see him yet, butI they got really big, really fast.

(01:32):
Yes, oh man, that wasprobably They were either my second or
third favorite set of the weekend,probably one of the bigger crowds I've seen
in the covered stage. They're atrail Bird. I mean, my wife
and I had pretty good spots andwe kind of hung out there all day
on Sunday, just you know,I wanted to see the Red Clay Strays.

(01:55):
But what a performance those guys puton. It was almost you know,
that was top tier, like youknow, Kyle Moore and Rusty Schlank
Attic on Friday night. Yeah,since we're talking music, I've been meaning
to mention this for a little while, but I have. I'm doing a
songwriter series at the Spirit Room abovethe Phoenix Bury and Mansfield. That's kind

(02:16):
of quarterly. I'm bringing in nationalsongwriters on Sunday on a Sunday afternoon.
We have one this Sunday. SonyaLee is coming in from Nashville. She's
got a lot of tracks that shewrote on, some of the early Zach
Brown band stuff. She's been ata while Sunday June ninth at the Phoenix
Brewing Company upstairs in the Spirit Room, and you could get tickets online by

(02:38):
going following Valley Media and Productions atFacebook. So I've been meaning to talk
about that for a while and keepforgetting. Actually, one of the artists
we had last year's name is AbePartridge and he's in a side project with
some of the guys from reg Klaistres. He's from Alabama, Alabama as well,
and they've got a little pump band. They get together like two or

(03:00):
three times a year. I thinkI could talk about music, but that's
a whole that's a whole another that'sa wholly, completely different podcast. Let's
let's talk about results Attic a Fridaynight this past Friday night. I know
you were there, Well, you'rethere every week now that you're employed.
There. Cale Thomas got the win. That was a second week in a

(03:23):
row that Cale Thomas got to goto Victory Lane. I don't know why
I'm drawing a blank on the raceright now. I know Cale, Yeah,
So it was Cale Thomas and CapHenry and Trey Jacobs. That pretty
much the entire race. You couldthrow a blanket over top of them,

(03:44):
you know, those three. Youknow, Call would be running up high,
Cap would be running the low,and Trey Jacobs would be even lower.
You know, shades of like GregWilson and Dale Blaney, you know,
putting that left front tire on thetractor tires there and turns one and
two and three and four. SoI mean they were battling hard, slicing
and dicent through traffic. It wasa very entertaining race to watch, you

(04:08):
know, made my life as asocial media guy pretty fun, you know.
But eventually, I don't know howmany laps left, maybe like eight
or ten laps left, cal Thomasmoved down to the bottom and that was
really all she wrote. You know, that's pulled away and won by a
couple of seconds. But those firstyou know, first two thirds, first

(04:30):
three cores of that race was that'swhat you want, you know, you
want three cars battling anywhere on theracetrack. And then we got into the
late Model feature, and that wasa race of the year contender between Kyle
Moore and Rusty Schlank. If theyweren't sliding each other for the lead,
they were side by side for thelead. I think I think I put

(04:54):
in my weekend recap that there wereonly like five official lead changes between those
two. If you were like goback and watch replay, they probably swapped
a lead about forty times in atwenty five lap race. It was pretty
incredible watching those two, and Kyleended up getting his first Attica Late Model
win has been a long time coming. And yeah, Jamie Miller did Jamie

(05:17):
Miller things in three of five race. That's pretty much been the story of
his season. I don't know howmany times he's won now at Attica this
year, but it's probably been atleast half the races and three oh fivees.
So how are you feeling about thesurface at Attica this year so far?
I like it. I was.I mean, you're a little skeptical

(05:41):
going in because it's like the thirdtime in four years that they've put a
new surface on it. But Imean this surface has been really well or
has done really well. And yeah, I was still a little skeptical there
early on in the season because it'sjust been such a wet spring and those
first, you know, first fewraces, I mean we were still battling

(06:03):
rain, so we didn't know reallyhow the track was going to hold up
on those you know, sunny andwindy days, and these last couple of
weeks we've kind of had those sunnyand windy days and yeah, Friday night,
I still it was a little dusty, but the track still held up
very well. And like I said, I mean Cale Thomas and Cap and

(06:28):
Trey Jacobs were running three different linesfor that four ten feature and they were,
you know, pretty equal, whichis what you want as as a
track prep guy. I know,I think I think there were a couple
of holes maybe, and you know, pork Chop wasn't too happy about that.
But you know, as much,honestly, as much rain as we've
gotten here this spring in Ohio,you know, a couple of holes is

(06:53):
very minor. I guess, yeah, I'm imagining I wasn't able to be
there. I think we were probablyplaying baseball. I'm not sure, but
it sounds right. Yeah, ButI mean imagining those three in one and
two when it's right, you know, on those corners that close, it
makes for some incredible racing, especiallyon that end of the track. I

(07:16):
know you prefer the middle of thetrack. I prefer that end of the
track. But it's you know,last year it sounds like one and two
or it just sounds like the serviceis better, is in better shape.
Then we had some struggles especially latelast year. It's it's actual clay.
This year, I was able toI was there before the season started and

(07:39):
kind of did the ribbon tests likeI learned in f FA in high school.
And those those test strips that Iwere doing, you know, they
were more than two inches long,so it definitely had a high clay content.
And yeah, just kudos to Johnand pork Chop, you know,
the guys that get the track readyevery week. I mean, it's it's

(08:00):
not easy going, you know,switching surfaces like that. They've had great
services pretty much all year. Iknow they won't stop working until they think
it's perfect. But it's I mean, dare I say Attica is back?
I mean, this is this isthe Attica that you know, everyone kind
of fell in love with her andthe late twenty ten's in early twenty twenties.

(08:20):
So it's it's glad to see ATKAgetting the recognition, that getting the
recognition back. They'll be back inaction this coming week. But let's talk
about some other racing stuff that's comingup in between now and then as we
record. It's Wednesday night and FlowRacing Night in America was supposed to happen

(08:41):
at Eldorra, but weather has gottenthe best of that, I believe.
Yeah, they pulled the plug thereabout eight o'clock. I got home from
work and I saw there in therain delay and it's like, I'm going
to eat supper, and it kindof crossed my mind, maybe I'll go
to El Dora. I was lookingat the radar, They're going to be
delayed for a while, but ultimatelyit was this kind of too much rain

(09:05):
and I don't think he could haveput I think they had like seventy three
or seventy five late models signed infor that, so it was going to
be one of those like four AmlDora nights, I think, and I
don't think they've wanted that going intothe Dream week. No, They've got
coming up on Thursday is the kickoffthe Dream, So I think that probably

(09:26):
had a lot to do with makingthat call, Like, yeah, the
amount of work that goes into thesethree nights of racing, they didn't want
to create a create a mess inad on a wet track the night before
the Dream starts. So Thursday nightthere's four heats, two Constellation races,

(09:48):
and a fifty lap feature I believe, and then Friday night is same thing.
The rest of the whoever did raceon Thursday races on Friday another fifty
lap feature Saturday. There are sixheat or six fifteen lap heat races,
two twenty lap constellation races, andthen the Dream happens Saturday night, one

(10:09):
hundred laps, one hundred dollars towin. So that's one of the crown
jewels of late model racing at Eldor. Some may say it is the crown
jewel of late model racing, butI don't know the world though. I
think that is the crown jewel latemodel race. Yeah, I would agree

(10:31):
with the other it doesn't pay asmuch, but man, that globe,
Yeah, the Dream doesn't have aglobe. Dream is a lot of fun.
I wish, yes, I wishI wasn't traveling for work this week,
otherwise I would be over there.It's one of my favorite events of
the year. So I know thecampground is probably cranking right now that nasty

(10:52):
weather has already I think it's alreadymoved through there tonight, but they're probably
getting crank back up and getting setto throw down for the next three days.
I imagine if they kept the baropen tonight, they're gonna make a
lot of money. Probably probably carssigned up. That's a lot of race
cars. Yeah, I'm telling you, if Fremont raigns out on Saturday,

(11:16):
I'm probably gonna go to El Dorago do some late model things. Bluequist
is back. How far? Howdeep do you think he's gonna make it
in the weekend. I'm not surebecause he was coming back from did he
get hurt in that one hunt thefront race? I know his car got
pretty tore up, but he's okay. He might also be with a different

(11:41):
car owner too. I think Iheard that on Dirt Tracker maybe that Bloomer
is going to be with a differentcar owner this weekend. So I mean
it's a different car, or itmight be a different car, and it's
going to be stack competition every night. Yes, you know, I kind

(12:03):
of think if he made the featurelast year, not I can remember off
the top of my head, butyou know, I don't think he did.
Yeah, I mean essentially everybody indirt late model racing is there this
weekend. So yes, the starshave to a ligne just for you to
make the feature. Yes, yeah, and you know crazy things happened at

(12:26):
the Dream in the heat races.I think it was. I don't know
if it was last year. Ithink it was last year, Bloomer didn't
even make it across the track forhis heat race. I don't know if
I remember that correctly or not.He got caught outside the track because his
holler was out. Maybe that wastwo years ago. Yeah, I mean,
definitely some folks to watch, youknow, Chris Ferguson, who we've

(12:48):
had on the show in the past. Ferky Time is always good at El
Dora, and I know you've gotyour favorites. I do. I'm it
would be really cool to see theMoran curse be broken, you know.
I mean, Devin ran good atthe Dirt Track World Championship there at Al

(13:09):
Dora last year, and he's hada heck of a start to the season
this year. I even got tosee him when at falls Over in Illinois.
I know, that's like the completeopposite of El Dora. I just
I feel like the Moran curse isgoing to get broken this year. I

(13:30):
would always love to see Devin whinor get close to the front. I
feel like he had some bad luckthere, you know, towards the end
of the year last year. Buthopefully we can see another Ohio driver get
the victory there. That'd be supercool. I mean, if if Moran
won Saturday night, I don't thinkthat Holler would be leaving until Tuesday morning.

(13:54):
Yeah. I was just looking atthe list here to see see on
who might be a sleeper on thelist. I want to see how Kyle
Blit does the Aussie. He wasat Attica there this past Friday and it
was kind of in a conversation withhim there at the Pitt Tower, and

(14:15):
he just seems like a really cooldude. I also got to see him
at Falls when I went a fewweeks ago, and uh, I'm just
I don't know, he seems likea really nice guy, a really genuine
guy, and I'd just be reallycool to see the Aussie do really well.
We know, you know, guyslike Davenport and Overton are going to
do well. You know what wasit a couple of years ago Overton one

(14:41):
like three out of the four bigraces there at El Dora, so you
know, you can never never counthim out. And Davenport's a million dollar
man. I think Ricky Thornton Junioris RTJ is picking up some momentum right
now, and uh, I wouldexpect a solid showing for him this weekend
as well, okay, so thatis happening Thursday, Friday, Saturday at

(15:03):
Eldorra and then Friday night overlapping.We kick off Ohio speed Week at Attica.
About five minutes before we started recording, I got my Ohio Speed Week
preview posted on the Ohio Dirt websitekind of going over all the tracks and
some drivers to watch. I don'twant to say it's going to be different

(15:26):
this year just because the All Starsaren't there. I know the Fast Series
and Aaron Fry are going to dogood things with it, and I know
there's gonna be a lot of stiffcompetition just because it's not All Star sanctioned,
So some of the local guys aregoing to make more of those shows.
It's gonna be there's gonna be moreparody. Yeah, I think I

(15:46):
think there. I mean there's aseveral nights where they're up against some maybe
high limit races are headed west.I think, yeah, they're going to
be in like Missouri, Nebraska.I think yeah. So you know there's
gonna be some of the heavy hittersthat show up at speed Week, you
know traditionally or probably not gonna bethere, but we'll get to see the

(16:10):
best of the best from Ohio Pennsylvaniareally go at it for ten nights,
nine nights, nine nights, sorry, nine nights. I don't know if
we could handle ten. We're gonnaWe're gonna take baby steps and make it
up to ten one of these years. Yeah, that would that take a
lot. That'd be a very expensivespeed week. That would be I don't

(16:33):
know what would we go back toEldra or lyman Land or Portsmouth. Are
we to hit like a new track? I don't know. I mean,
we're certainly not like Pennsylvania where theycall it a speed week and it's like
at four different tracks and one ofthe tracks is in Maryland. So that's
probably gonna get me kicked out ofPennsylvania for at least another two years.
But it's okay as far as watchingit if you are not at the track.

(17:00):
It bounces back and forth between DirtVision and Flow all week long.
Friday's Friday, Saturday's Dirt Vision,Sunday, Monday, Tuesdays on Flow,
Wednesday's back on Dirt Vision, Thursdayson Flow, Friday's back on Dirt Vision.
So yeah, I mean, it'sit's a you know, whichever streaming.

(17:21):
I would say probably most of ourlisteners probably have both if I had
to kids. We get to seesome of those tracks that you wouldn't normally
see on flow, like Miskieem Musquegem. Yeah. I've only been to Muskegem
once. It was for the SpeedWeek show I think in twenty nineighteen.

(17:41):
I think Dale Plainy one, andthe only thing I remember is I could
barely write a story because I couldn'tsee anything that and the cheeseburgers were expensive
and not that great. Well,maybe i'll get I'll get down there next
week and give you give you areview on on the twenty twenty four version.
I hope, I hope it's betterthan it was in twenty nineteen.

(18:07):
Yeah, so that's a big weekcoming up. I mean, we could
start making picks or talking about who'sgoing to show out, but I mean
it's really a crapshoot almost any night. If you get done listening to this
and you go to Ohio dirt dotcom and click on my Ohio SpeedWeek preview,
you'll be able to see the fivedrivers that I have listed as drivers

(18:30):
to watch. It's going to belike Kle Thomas and Cale, Henry,
Cole, Duncan Zaying, the Vault, and Danity Trick. I think those
are five drivers that can make alot of noise. The Vault's kind of
my dark horse pick. I thinkI said something along the lines of if
he can like keep the car onall four wheels and keep the momentum up,

(18:51):
like you just want two features atFremont one night, and they've been
fast, you know, at somany different tracks all year. If he
can, I guess I keep iton off all four wheels and keep that
momentum up. I think Davault cando a lot. There's probably about two
or three tracks in Ohio that ColdDuncan hasn't won at. So I mean,

(19:11):
Dietrich has almost won speed Week before, Kilo Henry has been so adaptable
to start off his first season inOhio and he finally got that first Fremont
win. And I mean Kile Thomashas just kind of been head and shoulders
above the rest to start the seasonhere in Ohio. So those are kind
of my five drivers to watch hereas we get set up for the grueling

(19:34):
week that is speed Week. Yeah, and you could read that whole story
at Ohio dirt dot Com there onthe website, as well as whatever coverage
we get posted over the next week, we'll be sharing it out on Facebook.
I'm sure we'll have multiple articles comingout over the course of the week
and get you as much as thatspeed weeek coverage as we can. I'm

(19:57):
not sure on how many nights I'mgonna yet, hopefully the first four for
sure. I want to go toHilltop just because I've never been to Hilltop,
but that's a Tuesday night and that'sget it into the meat of my
work schedule for the week. Yeah, I want to go to Sharon just

(20:18):
because I haven't been to Sharon ina long time, and I mean obviously,
like I want to go to millStream because that's the first time they've
raised since twenty sixteen. I wasat that last race in twenty sixteen watching
Craig Kinsery go to the wind andthe four tens. I remember I think
Sheldon Hodden Shield almost won the nonwing feature until we hit the turns three
and four wall and for lack ofbetter term, flipped his dick off.

(20:45):
That was either Sheldon or Jack Ican't remember. I was in twenty sixteen,
So yeah, I was eight yearsago, and then I'm excited to
get back down to Atomic as well. I haven't been there since. That's
spent a year since I've been toAtomic and at ten thousand the win show
just like Freemont. So yeah,hopefully get to hit most of speed Week

(21:07):
this year. Yeah, hopefully wewill have great weather in Ohio for it,
whether you are coming to the trackor are you watching on one of
the streaming sources, And we canget all nine of those shows in,
that would be amazing. If wecan get them all, it would be
I don't know. I think it'sbeen like maybe since twenty eighteen that you've
gotten all of them in. Ican't remember. Right on, Well,

(21:30):
that starts Friday night at Attica andthen Saturday night at Fremont and then on
from there. What else you gotbefore we get out of here? Anything?
Does it look like Eldor is beingsold or maybe? I don't know.
I mean, we had Race andJason and Michael riggsby tweet eyeballs.
I mean that I'm Race and Jasonhasn't missed anything this year on Big News

(21:55):
wise, the Chazz was stirring thepot, so who knows why would it
come out though the day before theDream Oh, I don't know. I
mean, let's get more rise inal Dora. I guess. I don't
know. I've for rumors that,you know, the flow groups by in
it, but I've also seen avery good counterpoint that why would Tony sell

(22:17):
it when he's pouring like two milliondollars into the Eldor ballroom. He's in
the middle of that project. SoI don't know. I assume we will
be finding maybe be finding some stuffout during Dream week, but I don't
know. I'm not here to speculate, but I'm speculating that I don't know.

(22:41):
The rumor mill is going to berunning wild for a long time on
that one. Yeah, we'll justsee where it goes. In the meantime,
it doesn't help that Tony has beenselling everything like racing related minus is,
you know, drag racing team.I think in the meantime, everybody's
just relax and enjoy the show,right, Yeah, I mean, regardless,

(23:03):
there's going to be probably about twentyfive or thirty thousand people drinking beer
that old or Saturday night. Ithink that's about everything you got any anything
else before we sign off? Idon't think so. Well, we will
have plenty next week. Whether itcomes in the form of articles, coverage,
or we're able to get on andrecord a couple more podcasts, we'll

(23:25):
see what angle it comes from.But we'll get some coverage to you during
Ohio's Sprint speed Week and keep youup to date with what's going on and
what we think about it and whatour opinions are, all right, because
everyone needs to hear our opinions,right right, all right, Well,
thanks for tuning in to the Ohiodirt Check podcast. Make sure you are

(23:47):
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