My Thoughts on the Current State of Sprint Car Racing

Sprint Car racing is healthy if you ask most of the drivers and teams that are at the top of the sport. We have two national series going head to head and pumping more money into the sport than we have ever seen. Fans from all over the country have access to watch hundreds of sprint car races a year with the convenience of FloRacing and DIRTVision. Driver announcements for the 2024 season are starting to come out and they are getting more attention and coverage than they ever have in the past. These are all good things for the sport. Right?

The short answer is yes, all of this is good for the the top teams and drivers trying to make a living racing sprint cars. Those teams need the extra money and big paying races to consistently increase in order for them to keep up with the rising costs surrounding the sport (and in the world in general). Hotels, fuel, food and everything else that goes into a team out on the road for most of the year is costing teams more than ever. Thankfully, the World of Outlaws and High Limit groups are doing what they can to increase purses and lighten the load for the teams that make the existence of these series possible.

The long answer is that it gets very complicated when you start to look at the trickle down effect from the control and power that the two national touring series have. As Justin from DIRTRAKR points out, the two series are trying to run a successful business and some of the decisions that are coming out are simply because of the business. We can do all of the assuming we want and feed into the rumor mill, but the reality is that the WoO and High Limit groups are going to do what they think is best for their companies and not what’s best for the tracks or local racers.

Currently, we see High Limit Racing trying to grow their brand and separate themselves from the WoO. As with any business starting out, the smart thing to do is highlight how you are different and what you are bringing to the customer (fans). World Racing Group and the WoO have been slowly increasing points funds and adding “exclusivity” bonuses over the years, but to come out and double their tow package for returning full-time teams was something we have never seen before. You cannot gloss over the fact that this was in direct response to the High Limit announcement. As one local racer argues, if they had the funds to do this in the first place, then why didn’t they? The reality is that they probably did this because they knew they wouldn’t be paying out as many full-time drivers in their points championships with the addition of the High Limit series.

The situation is fluid and brand new and I think it is safe to assume that both sides are going to make mistakes this year. As David Gravel pointed out on his Youtube show, 2024 is going to be a huge learning year for both sides. It’s early, but I have already noticed some of the impact that this could have on a local/regional scale in the sport.

During the High Limit press conference, T.J. Buffenbarger from TJSlideways.com said that he spoke to a local track promoter that had held All Star races in previous years who was not contacted by High Limit officials about a 2024 date. Then, we got news that High Limit would be contracting Ohio Speedweek out to the FAST Series. It remains to be seen what happens with Ohio Speedweek, but the allure of the historic event has already taken a hit for no reason at all. High Limit could have sanctioned it and made it a non-points show for their drivers. Sure, their name might still be attached somewhere and they might be helping out with purses and sponsors, but putting it all in the hands of the FAST Series has already started some controversy. The potential for other Ohio based promoters and prominent people in the dirt racing industry to come in and try to create their own Ohio Speedweek is now on the table. If this means that there will be more races and some better payouts for the local guys, than that is great, but it sounds like things could get messy and it didn’t need to be this way.

Sticking to the regional theme, these teams are the backbone of the sport. Not every team and driver is lucky enough to have enough money to start up a full-scale sprint car operation. These guys are racing locally as a hobby and trying to recoup as much money as they can so they can go out and do it again next week. It’s what I grew up on and what I absolutely love to see in the pit area. It creates the story of Shark Racing, and their journey out on the road that started from buying used tires from teams and sleeping in their trailer to follow their dreams. Those are the stories that fans want to root for, and if we stop paying attention to it, then those stories go away forever.

Teams in Pennsylvania and Ohio relied on a series like the All Stars to come through and add some extra money on top of the local purses they are used to racing for. A series that did not have a ton of full-time drivers that saturated the field of cars, making it more appealing for teams to show up with confidence that they will make the show. Now, the All Stars are on hiatus and we are already seeing the consequences on a local level.

Brian Carter from WRG and the WoO made an appearance on Winged Nation a few weeks ago and he claimed that Port Royal was going to be on the WoO schedule for 2024. Then, we got news that the WoO pulled their Port Royal date and is moving it to another PA track. Is this because High Limit came in and acquired the Tuscarora 50 and Weikert shows? Is this because FloRacing would be streaming those events and DIRTVision wanted “exclusive” access somewhere else? We don’t know, but it’s definitely not out of the question. The point is that this is not fair to the local teams and drivers. Some local teams who excel at Port Royal now have one less opportunity to make a name for themselves and win some more money.

Sure, the WoO will still come through Pennsylvania and probably hold a similar amount of shows to what they had in 2023, but to already go back on your word about something does not give me hope for what will happen down the road. Carter had also mentioned that he pays a great deal of attention to the regional race scene and that he might be interested in starting something up to help the regional teams out. The question is when that could happen and how he and his team could make it work from a business standpoint. If WRG doesn’t see a window to make a profit, it likely won’t happen.

I wasn’t a fan of when High Limit announced that they have not spoken to other sprint car series about possibly co-sanctioning events. The All Stars have worked with the IRA Sprints and other series in the past and I do not see why this would be a bad thing for High Limit. I get that they want to separate themselves, but they could separate themselves by being the preferred series for local racers and being the national touring series that is willing to work with everyone.

In the big picture, the two series competing against each other could add more tracks to each schedule that do not usually get national touring series shows. I won’t sit here and argue that streaming is hurting the track attendance for national races because fans are going to show up when the WoO or High Limit are in town. But what streaming is doing is hurting the track attendance during local competition. With more nationally sanctioned shows potentially popping up all over the country, that could be one less event that a family goes to their local track on Friday or Saturday night.

Danny Dietrich suggested a “steaming blackout” area that FloRacing and DIRTVision should use for the tracks that they offer local viewership. I think this is a great idea but one that would probably never happen due to the potential lost revenue for the streaming services. Fans who were out of town or couldn’t afford a trip to the track would absolutely be upset about it, but I know that it would force me to attend at least one or two extra events if that was the case.

I don’t know what the business plan for the next five or ten years looks like for either the WoO or High Limit series. I do know that they need to consider who their target audience is and the general racing fan demographic. A lot of fans are hard-working, blue-collar people who might not have loads of money laying around to attend multiple sprint car races per year and pay for two streaming services on top of it. The last few years have been absolutely brutal for a lot of us and it doesn’t look like things are getting any cheaper anytime soon. That goes for the fans, race teams and drivers.

If the WoO and High Limit come in and saturate the local market, tracks will start to suffer and payouts for weekly racing will not increase to the levels that it needs to be. Fans will target the big events while putting the local races at the bottom of their queue. Why go out to the local dirt track when you already paid money for a streaming service? Streaming is great for watching California races from your home in Pennsylvania, but not so great for the tracks when you are watching Attica on TV from 10 miles away.

The moral of the story is that the WoO and High Limit Racing groups do not have to work together and they do not have to like each other. What they do have to do is consider the big picture and work with the tracks and local series and teams to make everything make sense. Brian Carter mentioned the possibility of adding more money to the non-qualifier races at Outlaw shows and I think that is a step in the right direction. High Limit spreading their schedule out to Texas and the West Coast could benefit the local scene in Ohio and Pennsylvania from a track attendance standpoint, but decreasing the presence that the All Stars had in those areas only hurts the drivers. If another series doesn’t step up, then no one is filling that void. At the end of the day, letting the business of streaming and the politics at the top of the sport get in the way is NOT growing the sport and I hope that the two sides learn a bunch in 2024 in order to guarantee the health of the sport at more than just the top levels.