By T.J. Buffenbarger
(July 17, 2026) — The post race party at Eldora Speedway is likely still raging as I finish this edition of the takeaways from my hotel room that is the adequate temperature for a meat locker. As I enjoy my frigid accommodations about 25 minutes from Eldora Speedway, here are my takeaways from the 2026 edition of the Jokers Jackpot.
• In recent weeks there has been some conversation on social media surrounding Kyle Larson’s mistakes behind the wheel. Most of it seemed like trolling because anyone who has seen Larson perform behind the wheel in almost anything can see how talented he is.
That narrative was utterly ridiculous.
Thursday night at Eldora Larson balanced that talent with his maturity in route to a $100,000 victory during the Jokers Jackpot.
When Larson lost the lead to Rico Abreu at the start and dropped back to fourth, it could have been easy for someone with his ability to try to carry the car forward a possible make a mistake on a cushion on top of the racetrack where the martin of error of a clean exit and burying it into the fence was slim.
Larson just went about his business and watched Corey Day cross over that line and get into the wall in turn four while racing with Larson for the second position and trusted his film study of how Rico Abreu races Eldora Speedway to find an opening to take the lead and drive away for the victory.
This race was chaotic because even Larson mentioned in the post-race press conference there were too many slide jobs back and forth to recall, which is remarkable because Larson’s ability to process what he did in the race car and explain it back to us in interviews is remarkable.
Through the chaos Larson showed again while he’s one of the best to ever wheel a sprint car and does so without competing full time in either National series. History has shown us when Larson starts to click in the winged sprint car like we saw on Thursday it also shows up in his other disciplines, and we could be on the verge of another great Larson run at his day job and moonlighting in the sprint car.
• Eldora Speedway is a race trac that Rico Abreu excels at. With several Eldora victories on his resume landing a victory in one of the big paying sprint car races has eluded him.
Thursday looked like it could be his night blasting from third to first at the start of a main event that many of us thought was going to be a battle between Day and Larson for the $100,000 check.
As the race went on though it showed that Abreu was on the defensive, and did a tremendous job holding the lead for as long as he did in the 35-lap main event.
Abreu did land a second-place finish, moving ever closer to a major-event win at Eldora with the Kings Royal looming on Saturday.
There is surely no shame in running second to Kyle Larson and think Abreu has what could be his best chance ever to win a crown on Saturday at Eldora.
• Kyle Larson wasn’t the only winner on Thursday at Eldora Speedway, the sport of sprint car racing won with a highly entertaining program that was seen by a national audience on FS1.
After the flip fest that was the Jokers Jackpot last year and ran over their allotted television window, this year featured a highly efficient program with a very entertaining feature event.
After the C and B-Mains I questioned if we were going to give the home audience as good of a show as the previous night, which had a slew of highly entertaining heat races and two very good main events.
The feature event delivered with Eldora Speedway’s high wire action up on a razor thin cushion being the canvas for drivers like Larson, Day, Abreu, Logan Schuchart, and Tyler Courtney to show their talents off and how entertaining sprint car racing can be.
I had people from other forms of racing and some that have been involved in sprint car racing and have stepped away that were tuned in and all of them remarked how great that feature was, and how well the broadcast was done. It was the most feedback I’ve had unsolicited from one of High Limit’s FS1 broadcasts so far.
I’ve been very critical about sprint car racing on television in the past. I lived through the TNN era and saw some of the downsides having live television can have on the fan that attends the event in person.
The advent of the online pay per view system that sprint car racing has been ahead of the game with compared to other sport has put the infrastructure in place to make broadcasts like this happen while giving fans that attend in person added value with things like video screens with instant replays and being able to interact with friends that were not there about how great an event was.
When television enhances and does not take away from the in-person experience I am all for it. Online pay per view and live television will never be better than attending a sprint car race in person (even in sweltering hot and humid weather), but it does keep people engaged and on the hook as a fan.
I still don’t feel if someone stumbles across a sprint car race on television they are going to be enticed to go see one in person, but if you get someone to a race and they can follow it when the series is on the other side of the country, they are more likely to remain a fan.