By Steven Blakesley
May 29, 2024 – Open Wheel Showdown promoter Davey Hamilton Jr. announced today an addition to the Davey Hamilton Jr’s Open Wheel Showdown November 22-24 at Irwindale Speedway in Irwindale, California. The announcement revealed there will be a second weekend of racing action the weekend before at the “Bullring” at Las Vegas Motor Speedway November 14-16, 2024.
Both weekends will include National Midgets and Supermodifieds highlighted by 50k to win Winged Sprint Car races from a total purse of over $250,000 in prize money. Both weekends will pay the same purse.
Within one day of the entry process opening for the Irwindale weekend, all 65 sprint car entries were filled. There is currently a waiting list of potential entrants hoping for a chance to compete at Irwindale. With the addition of a second weekend of racing, there won’t be a shortage of winged sprint cars to fill both weekends. Th success of last year’s inaugural event fueled the addition of a second weekend. A sweep of both sprint car events will garner a driver over $100,000 in prize money.
“I knew the Open Wheel Showdown was going to grow from how last year went,” Hamilton Jr. explained. “I genuinely didn’t think going back to Las Vegas was going to be possible for us this year. There’s a lot of moving parts and things with dates. It would have to be a perfect scenario. I didn’t think it was possible. So, I made a deal with Irwindale for us to go there.”
“Then after talking with my title sponsor, which we will announce at a later date, we were all able to figure out how to do it. Now we have two events in the same week, which is pretty cool.”
“It’s going to be an interesting situation. A lot of people were planning on Irwindale only. But I think there’s enough time for teams to plan throughout the year to be able to attempt doing both. We will try and work with everyone to help make it as easy as possible to be able to do both events.”
“Instead of $50k to win now you’re talking $100k to win both events in the Winged Sprintcar Portion. The purse basically doubled. There are two events at two awesome racetracks. One event is great, but my overall plan is to have three events a year. Two events in the same week are a little tight, but I couldn’t pass up the opportunity to go back to Las Vegas this year. We all enjoyed last year, and I think it’s gonna be good for years to come,” concluded Hamilton Jr.
Entry for the second Open Wheel Showdown in Las Vegas will open on June 5th at noon Eastern Time at www.OpenWheelShowdown.com Ticket sales for both Las Vegas and Irwindale events will begin at that time as well, and are expected to move swiftly. Race fans can reserve RV spaces for Irwindale on the series website, while Vegas RV visitors can contact Las Vegas Motor Speedway directly for reservations.
For more information, please visit www.openwheelshowdown.com and follow all Open Wheel Showdown Media outlets for live updates.