Danny Smith was the most notable winner from the past weekend of racing with the Ohio Valley Sprint Car Association at Brushcreek Motorsports Complex. The victory kept a winning streak alive for Smith where he picked up at least one feature victory the past 41 years. The Bruschcreek event was rescheduled from earlier in the year, proving that rain can sometimes play into a racers favor.
The United States Speed Association has opted to shut down the sprint car portion of their series for the 2016 season. In a post on their Facebook page USSA officials cite the termination of the sprint car series a business decision. (https://www.facebook.com/UnitedStatesSpeedAssociation/posts/1202051379809320).
Weather was not as kind to everyone at I-30 Speedway over the weekend for the Short Track Nationals. Weather obliterated what was supposed to be a four day program into a single night of racing. Some found refuge with a pair of United Sprint Car Series events over the weekend that did dodge the rain. Tracy Clay, promoter at I-30 Speedway, has indicated the event will be rescheduled for spring of 2016.
Kyle Busch Motorsports announced Thursday afternoon that Christopher Bell is signed to run the entire NASCAR Camping World Truck Series in 2016. Bell will carry sponsorship from JBL his first full season in the truck series. Bell won the Truck Race driving for KBM at Eldora Speedway this summer in only his third start in the series. In addition to his open wheel exploits Bell has six wins in 19 starts in late model competition driving for KBM. Bell followed up that announcement by winning the CARS tour feature event on Saturday night at Hickory Motor Speedway.
Another open wheel driving who appears to be headed in the same direction is Kevin Thomas, Jr. Speed51.com ran a story today about Thomas plans for Florida Speedweeks driving for Tim Russell at the World Series of Asphalt Stock Car Racing at New Smyrna Speedway. Russell’s team is the same operation that Kyle Larson turned laps for during Florida Speedweeks at the start of his stock car career. It is interesting to note that Thomas gave credit to Lorin Ranier, who has lots of open wheel racing and stock car ties, cited as being influential with Thomas going in this direction. http://speed51.com/dirt-car-ace-to-make-transition-to-asphalt-racing-with-russell/
One question I had about the new Sprints on Dirt rules / tire package was the time frame for the new tires being available to race teams. After speaking with Hoosier Racing Tire Naida indicated as of now tires will be available at the beginning of 2016 in plenty of time for test and tune dates around the state of Michigan.
Another announcement that will impact sprint car racing in Michigan came from Kalamazoo Speedway at their annual awards banquet. Kalamazoo promoter Gary Howe let his teams know the track will switch to Friday night racing in 2016. While Kalamazoo was a Friday night track while I was growing up, it has been a Saturday night venue for well over 15 years now. It will be interesting to see how teams react to having two top flight facilities to race at locally on Friday and Saturday and how this will impact the various pavement sprint car schedules around the state.