By T.J. Buffenbarger
(February 2, 2026) — David Gravel with the Big Game Motorsports team have emerged sitting atop the sprint car world as the team to beat over the past several seasons. Winning the past two World of Outlaws point titles, 18 feature victories in 2025, winning the Kings Royal in 2024 are just a few of the highlights of the best two seasons of Gravel’s career.
Even with those accomplishments Gravel feels there is plenty yet to accomplish during his tenure with car owner Tod Quiring, with the top priority this year of getting Quiring the one major event title that has eluded him over the past two decades of being involved as a sponsor and car owner.
“I think number one on the list is a Knoxville Nationals championship for Tod and Cody (Jacobs). I was lucky enough to win one in 2019, but that’s the one that’s kind of held everybody back. We’ve been so damn strong at Knoxville, so either coming from the back or losing the lead late to Donny that one year.
“I think Knoxville Nationals is #1, but I would say priority number two would be defend the throne and try to go for a three peat. For me a successful season is 10 plus wins. I would love to be in double digits wins. I think those are three strong goals, obviously and if we could achieve all three that would be great.”
To accomplish these goals and more the Big Game team has brought on a fourth full-time crew member in Luke Vaughn, who was the car chief last year for Stenhouse Jr/Marshall Racing. Gravel hopes having an additional crew member can help take some of the load off the existing team while pounding up and down the road on the brutal World of Outlaws schedule.
“Cody is still going to do his job, and tire guy, Zach (Patterson) is still going to do his job, and Pete (Stephens) and Luke will be kind of the car maintenance guys. I think Luke will kind of fill the gaps whatever we need throughout the course of the year. If it’s 100 degrees it’s always good to have a have another set of hands, and I think (Vaughn) will be a big improvement for our work area and open red stuff. Being a young guy and able to hustle to kind of take the load off Cody and make his life easier. Just keeping us happy, keep the morale up, and want to keep these guys hungry for the future.”
The Big Game team has had great chemistry between crew members and the driver during their recent run and expect that to continue based on their interactions with Vaughn while traveling in proximity on the road the past couple of seasons.
“Last year we parked together every single race, and Luke was the car chief on Sheldon (Haudenschild’s) car. We had great chemistry, spent time at the shop and partied with our boys, and we were always staying at the same hotels. Chemistry wise he’s probably worked on our car in a work area, and vice versa. Personality wise we knew who he is, what he is, what he does, so there’s no real guessing going into it. We’ve worked side by side with him for the whole last probably three seasons, so thought it was a perfect fit for us.”
“He finished the year with us last year and did the last handful of races with us, so got his feet wet there. Then he was with Cody in the offseason at the shop pretty much the whole time, so he’s pretty plugged in on what we’re doing. I think it only makes us stronger. I’m excited to add some young blood in there. Cody’s getting older, Pete’s the old man on the team, so I feel adding some young blood is good.”
Before Gravel and the Big Game team start to think about success at some of sprint car racing’s biggest events, one of which is the High Bank Nationals that takes place at Huset’s Speedway that is owned by Quiring, starting off with a strong performance during DIRTcar Nationals at Volusia is at the forefront of Gravel’s focus.
“I mean, you got to have a good week. If you’re off one night, you’re probably not winning that big Gator,” said Gravel. “I think the competition is super, super stout there. Starting off the season, all the US sprint car drivers are broke this time of year, paying taxes, not getting paid for three months, and guys are hungry to make some money. I feel like it’s just a perfect storm. Brian Carter’s built a good thing down there to kick off the season the right way with all the best guys competing there.
Other Notes…
• The week at Volusia Speedway Park became busier with the ASCS National Tour’s final night at DIRTcar Nationals being pushed back to Monday. ASCS will segway directly into modifieds before having Tuesday to rest up for opening night of the World of Outlaws NOS Energy Drink Sprint Car Series season opener on Wednesday.
• Plenty of teams have dropped new “paint schemes” for the 2026 season, but it would be difficult to find one more anticipated than Donny Schatz’s new ride with CJB Motorsports that was released on Sunday night. Schatz will make his debut this weekend with CJB Motorsports at Volusia.
• Ross Wece, who is the Director of Video Content for World Racing Group, re-launched his side project of “Wece’s Pieces” that features over 400 programs from various motorsports events and series with more being added.
• The World of Outlaws will not be the only sprint car racing that takes place in Florida this week as the United Sprint Car Series begins their 2026 campaign Friday at Hendry County Motorsports Park in Clewiston, Florida.
Dale Howard is the defending USCS champion after scoring 13 victories with the series in 2025. Howard will likely have some visiting drivers for the season opener this week in Florida.
• Two other sprint car race taking place outside of Florida this week is the Wild West Sprint Car Series at Central Arizona Speedway and the “Eiffel Tower Classic” for winged 305 sprint cars at Rocket Raceway Park.
• With the Grand Annual Sprintcar Classic and Australian Championship in the history books the sprint car action down under disperses across the country with Perth Motorplex hosting the “Mr. Sprintcar Nationals” on Friday and Saturday night. The program at Perth on Saturday February 7th is free for American viewers on ClayPerVIew.com
The Victoria Speedcar Championship at Simpson Speedway on Saturday will serve as a tune-up for the upcoming 84th Australian Speedcar Championship that will take place at Simpson on February 13th-14th.
In New Zealand the War of the Wings series returning to action at Ruapuna Speedway in Christchurch, New Zealand along with midgets and non-wing v6 sprint cars.