Colorado Springs, CO — January 18, 2005 — By DIRT MotorSports PR
Looking to take the edge off of winter? Need some sun? Need some heat? Maybe a little dirt?
Or a lot of dirt?
The answer is simple. Race to Volusia Speedway Park for its 34th Annual Winter Nationals and see some of the greatest dirt racers in history.
The World of Outlaws Sprint Series, coming off of its crowd-thrilling show in Australia, will compete at the half-mile clay oval near Barberville, Fla., for the first time. The two-night event — Feb. 11 and 13 — will feature legends like 19-time series champion Steve Kinser and 2001 champion Danny Lasoski, a former winner at Volusia who drives a Tony Stewart-owned machine.
The following weekend — Feb. 17 and 19 — the World of Outlaws Late Model Series will return to Volusia with the most impressive collection of dirt late model racers in history. The series launched its highly successful inaugural season last year at Volusia, with Steve Francis winning the opening night feature and Scott Bloomquist capturing the event title.
This tough track will test the skills and machines against some of the most competitive fields each series will face all season. And any opening day jitters might just leave a team in the dust.
“You have to be on your game,” said Joey Saldana, a World of Outlaws Sprint Series veteran who has earned a couple of trips to Victory Lane at Volusia. “It’s a big half-mile so you have to have a good running motor.”
Plus, a win in February can do as much for a team’s points as it can for its spirits.
“It definitely gives you momentum going into season,” said Saldana, of Brownsburg, Ind. “When you go to Florida you usually either run really well or really bad. It can definitely set the tone for the rest of your year. If you go down there and run absolutely horrible it kind of makes your year long.”
Saldana is just one of several Outlaws sprint racers to post victories at Volusia in recent years. Perennial Outlaws title contender Craig Dollansky has won there, and so has Lasoski.
“For us, we’ve started down there each year for the past four or five years,” said Dollansky, a Minnesota native. “But for the World of Outlaws Sprint Series to kick off their season down there, I think it will be exciting.”
As for the Outlaws late models, a year ago at Volusia Speedway Park nobody was sure what to expect. There was much anticipation, eagerness and certainly nervousness after the series had come together so quickly. Plus, this group of 12 hard-nosed racers had made a career out of being brutal competitors. They all were winners. They all were champions. They all were rivals.
A year later, the series has turned dirt late model racing on its ear.
After watching Francis win the opener and Shannon Babb steal the second show, Bloomquist grabbed the $10,000 feature on the final night of the 2004 event. It was quickly apparent this group of Outlaws was special.
“I think everybody was looking at the potential for the series a year ago,” said Bloomquist, one of the most decorated drivers in late model history. “I think everyone was just excited at the possibilities.”
It’s that anticipation for another season that carries drivers, teams and fans through the winter. For many teams, racing at Volusia will be the first time to discover if off-season adjustments actually work. New cars, new paint schemes and new sponsors will be unveiled. Fans taking in NASCAR’s speed weeks will find Volusia Speedway Park five miles east of Barberville and easily accessible from Daytona Beach by heading west on State Road 40 from I-95. And they will find heart-pounding, wheel-to-wheel action with the most fearless drivers on dirt.
“I think everybody just has a different feeling about racing because they’ve been off for a while,” said Bloomquist, of Mooresburg, Tenn. “A lot of us live where it’s cool in the wintertime and to get away and go down and hopefully have some nice weather, it just kind of energizes you. So much new equipment and all the possibilities that everyone has in their mind for their new equipment, you never know what’s going to happen. Sometimes you’ll see guys come out of the box running a lot better than you thought. Some guys that were running really well come out with some new stuff and run worse. It’s really an unknown time and it’s really interesting just to go down there and see what unfolds.”
Francis, of Ashland, Ky., couldn’t have started last season any sweeter. After two years as the main driver for Rocket Chassis, he was on his own in 2004. No matter, he captured the series debut.
“To me it was a big sense of satisfaction because, for one thing, I’ll always be in the record books as the first winner of a World of Outlaws Late Model race,” said Francis, who wound up the season second in points behind Bloomquist. “I had never won at Volusia, either, so that was another big thing. And to win with a group of guys that we had just started putting together, to win the first night out was good for them. It was good for myself, but it was good for them, too.”
For some racers, 2005 will be a chance to improve after what they might have considered a sub-par season. There isn’t another racer looking forward to dropping the door on his hauler in Florida more than late model star Chub Frank. After a season in which he dealt with the passing of his mother and a major fire at his shop, Frank somehow managed a sixth-place points-finish and won the World 100 for the first time in his career. Then, in November, he had surgery on his left knee.
“We’re going to go gung-ho to get ready for Florida,” said Frank, of Bear Lake, Pa. “I’m looking forward to going there this year and running with the World of Outlaws. I think our program is going to be a lot better than it was last year because of all the stuff that was going on.
“I figured [the Outlaws] are probably the best guys in the country and if you want to be the best you’ve got to beat the best. Everybody was at Volusia last year. We had about 70 cars every night. Just to make the races down there is an accomplishment. And I would say it’s probably going to be bigger this year than it was last year.”
While the late model racers plan to build on their success at Volusia last year, it no doubt will be a huge debut for the Sprint Series. The drivers with experience at the track will try to get a jump on Kinser, who has more than 500 feature victories in his career but none at Volusia.
“Even though the Outlaws haven’t been down there, guys like Lasoski and Dollansky go down there every year,” Saldana said. “It always seems like an Outlaws race, just Steve Kinser isn’t there.”
The gap between Kinser and the rest of the drivers in the series also is closing as the 2005 season unfolds. Kinser has won four of the past five titles, but drivers like Lasoski and Donny Schatz, who is coming off a victory in Outlaws Down Under II, are on his tail.
“We try to treat all the tracks the same and give them equal respect,” said Schatz, a Fargo, N.D., native who hasn’t raced at Volusia since 1996. “We don’t normally like to say we really like a place because it seems to bite us. We try to keep them on an even keel.
“The last time I raced in Florida, it was a place where you have to be more lucky than good. That’s the way a lot of racing has been. We’ll just be hoping we can carry the momentum we did have at the end of 2004 and continue our performance.”
No longer is the Outlaws Sprint Series about only the top three or four racers. Dollansky is starting the season at full strength after he sustained a serious back injury in a 2003 race at Indianapolis Motor Speedway. Racers like Jason Meyers, Saldana, Daryn Pittman, Tim Shaffer and Kevin Gobrecht Rookie of the Year winner Kraig Kinser have another year of seat time to make this season the most hotly contested Outlaws championship battle in history.
More than anything, though, the races at Volusia signal the return of another season of the best dirt track racing in the country.
For more information, visit the Sprint Series at www.theworldofoutlaws.com, the Late Model Series at www.WoOLMS.com, or Volusia Speedway Park at www.volusiaspeedwaypark.com.
Looking to take the edge off of winter? Need some sun? Need some heat? Maybe a little dirt?
Or a lot of dirt?
The answer is simple. Race to Volusia Speedway Park for its 34th Annual Winter Nationals and see some of the greatest dirt racers in history.
The World of Outlaws Sprint Series, coming off of its crowd-thrilling show in Australia, will compete at the half-mile clay oval near Barberville, Fla., for the first time. The two-night event — Feb. 11 and 13 — will feature legends like 19-time series champion Steve Kinser and 2001 champion Danny Lasoski, a former winner at Volusia who drives a Tony Stewart-owned machine.
The following weekend — Feb. 17 and 19 — the World of Outlaws Late Model Series will return to Volusia with the most impressive collection of dirt late model racers in history. The series launched its highly successful inaugural season last year at Volusia, with Steve Francis winning the opening night feature and Scott Bloomquist capturing the event title.
This tough track will test the skills and machines against some of the most competitive fields each series will face all season. And any opening day jitters might just leave a team in the dust.
“You have to be on your game,” said Joey Saldana, a World of Outlaws Sprint Series veteran who has earned a couple of trips to Victory Lane at Volusia. “It’s a big half-mile so you have to have a good running motor.”
Plus, a win in February can do as much for a team’s points as it can for its spirits.
“It definitely gives you momentum going into season,” said Saldana, of Brownsburg, Ind. “When you go to Florida you usually either run really well or really bad. It can definitely set the tone for the rest of your year. If you go down there and run absolutely horrible it kind of makes your year long.”
Saldana is just one of several Outlaws sprint racers to post victories at Volusia in recent years. Perennial Outlaws title contender Craig Dollansky has won there, and so has Lasoski.
“For us, we’ve started down there each year for the past four or five years,” said Dollansky, a Minnesota native. “But for the World of Outlaws Sprint Series to kick off their season down there, I think it will be exciting.”
As for the Outlaws late models, a year ago at Volusia Speedway Park nobody was sure what to expect. There was much anticipation, eagerness and certainly nervousness after the series had come together so quickly. Plus, this group of 12 hard-nosed racers had made a career out of being brutal competitors. They all were winners. They all were champions. They all were rivals.
A year later, the series has turned dirt late model racing on its ear.
After watching Francis win the opener and Shannon Babb steal the second show, Bloomquist grabbed the $10,000 feature on the final night of the 2004 event. It was quickly apparent this group of Outlaws was special.
“I think everybody was looking at the potential for the series a year ago,” said Bloomquist, one of the most decorated drivers in late model history. “I think everyone was just excited at the possibilities.”
It’s that anticipation for another season that carries drivers, teams and fans through the winter. For many teams, racing at Volusia will be the first time to discover if off-season adjustments actually work. New cars, new paint schemes and new sponsors will be unveiled. Fans taking in NASCAR’s speed weeks will find Volusia Speedway Park five miles east of Barberville and easily accessible from Daytona Beach by heading west on State Road 40 from I-95. And they will find heart-pounding, wheel-to-wheel action with the most fearless drivers on dirt.
“I think everybody just has a different feeling about racing because they’ve been off for a while,” said Bloomquist, of Mooresburg, Tenn. “A lot of us live where it’s cool in the wintertime and to get away and go down and hopefully have some nice weather, it just kind of energizes you. So much new equipment and all the possibilities that everyone has in their mind for their new equipment, you never know what’s going to happen. Sometimes you’ll see guys come out of the box running a lot better than you thought. Some guys that were running really well come out with some new stuff and run worse. It’s really an unknown time and it’s really interesting just to go down there and see what unfolds.”
Francis, of Ashland, Ky., couldn’t have started last season any sweeter. After two years as the main driver for Rocket Chassis, he was on his own in 2004. No matter, he captured the series debut.
“To me it was a big sense of satisfaction because, for one thing, I’ll always be in the record books as the first winner of a World of Outlaws Late Model race,” said Francis, who wound up the season second in points behind Bloomquist. “I had never won at Volusia, either, so that was another big thing. And to win with a group of guys that we had just started putting together, to win the first night out was good for them. It was good for myself, but it was good for them, too.”
For some racers, 2005 will be a chance to improve after what they might have considered a sub-par season. There isn’t another racer looking forward to dropping the door on his hauler in Florida more than late model star Chub Frank. After a season in which he dealt with the passing of his mother and a major fire at his shop, Frank somehow managed a sixth-place points-finish and won the World 100 for the first time in his career. Then, in November, he had surgery on his left knee.
“We’re going to go gung-ho to get ready for Florida,” said Frank, of Bear Lake, Pa. “I’m looking forward to going there this year and running with the World of Outlaws. I think our program is going to be a lot better than it was last year because of all the stuff that was going on.
“I figured [the Outlaws] are probably the best guys in the country and if you want to be the best you’ve got to beat the best. Everybody was at Volusia last year. We had about 70 cars every night. Just to make the races down there is an accomplishment. And I would say it’s probably going to be bigger this year than it was last year.”
While the late model racers plan to build on their success at Volusia last year, it no doubt will be a huge debut for the Sprint Series. The drivers with experience at the track will try to get a jump on Kinser, who has more than 500 feature victories in his career but none at Volusia.
“Even though the Outlaws haven’t been down there, guys like Lasoski and Dollansky go down there every year,” Saldana said. “It always seems like an Outlaws race, just Steve Kinser isn’t there.”
The gap between Kinser and the rest of the drivers in the series also is closing as the 2005 season unfolds. Kinser has won four of the past five titles, but drivers like Lasoski and Donny Schatz, who is coming off a victory in Outlaws Down Under II, are on his tail.
“We try to treat all the tracks the same and give them equal respect,” said Schatz, a Fargo, N.D., native who hasn’t raced at Volusia since 1996. “We don’t normally like to say we really like a place because it seems to bite us. We try to keep them on an even keel.
“The last time I raced in Florida, it was a place where you have to be more lucky than good. That’s the way a lot of racing has been. We’ll just be hoping we can carry the momentum we did have at the end of 2004 and continue our performance.”
No longer is the Outlaws Sprint Series about only the top three or four racers. Dollansky is starting the season at full strength after he sustained a serious back injury in a 2003 race at Indianapolis Motor Speedway. Racers like Jason Meyers, Saldana, Daryn Pittman, Tim Shaffer and Kevin Gobrecht Rookie of the Year winner Kraig Kinser have another year of seat time to make this season the most hotly contested Outlaws championship battle in history.
More than anything, though, the races at Volusia signal the return of another season of the best dirt track racing in the country.
For more information, visit the Sprint Series at www.theworldofoutlaws.com, the Late Model Series at www.WoOLMS.com, or Volusia Speedway Park at www.volusiaspeedwaypark.com.
