Our AMSOIL sponsorship Tour...
Our AMSOIL sponsorship Tour partners provided their representatives at Paducah with a display of many of the company products that got the attention of hundreds of racers and fans. Here, Monte Osbourne discusses the benefits of AMSOIL products with one of the fans.
Shannon was "dressed" appropriately having borrowed Kenny Schrader's trailer while his new one is being built. Kenny is one of the owners of this track having purchased it in 2005 along with Dale Earnhardt Jr. and promoter Bob Sargent. In 2006, Tony Stewart came on as a partner and you couldn't ask for a better run show and facility than this.
As for Billy, I saw this as a sort of pickin' style where a top driver chooses to pick and choose races that might not be well attended by the best drivers in Dirt Late Model (no offense to the local teams, but you know what I mean) and where they might be able to pick up some "easy" money, not that this stuff is ever easy.
He did manage to win his heat race and the feature, but that doesn't tell the story for Moyer this year. As of this writing, he has put up some amazing numbers. According to his website that tracks his results in every event he runs, he now has 24 wins this season, out of 58 starts. That is a whopping 41 percent win to not-win ratio. His First Place earnings are at $324,000 and that doesn't include money he took in from winning poles and other-than-First Place finishes, or T-shirt sales.
Paducah was a track that was...
Paducah was a track that was to our liking. We have talked in the past about dirt tracks that had a shape that promoted single-lane racing. We said then that if tracks had a straight wall along the straightaways, then that might promote better racing by slowing the exit off the corners. This track was built just like that. Note in this shot how the front straight wall is very straight and the back straight wall is just like this. And the racing was very good with the possibility for running multiple grooves.
This race was a MARS double header with the second race run at I-55 Raceway on the following Saturday night and Moyer won that one too. What caught my eye was the way Billy drove this race. Remember that we have advocated a more straight ahead style of driving on dirt and keeping all four wheels on the ground.
I won't go into the lecture on front end geometry and moment center design that will help make that happen, but if you've been paying attention to what we preach, you know what I mean. Billy drove his heat running the middle groove and never, ever got the rear end out running the turns just like an asphalt car.
As the track dried out during the other class races, he observed carefully how the track was transitioning. When it came time for the A-main, he had decided to move up to the top, something I never suspected he'd do. But it worked very well.
Still, he would make his run down the straights entering the turns going very fast. Instead of throwing the car sideways like 99 percent of the other cars, he seemed to brake the car hard to slow it down, entered the middle of the turn still straight ahead, and then rotated slightly to drive off the corner. He was able to maintain a lot of momentum doing that, and he won the race.
The track at Paducah has some...
The track at Paducah has some banking up to about 12 degrees. It held moisture fairly well and cars were able to run three grooves through the heat races and B-main. When it came time for the A-main, the bottom had dried and the place to run was at the top to keep momentum up. The track was well prepared throughout the race event. Moyer ran the race up near the wall for the win.
The most important message I can give about all of this is, as we have stated before, consistency wins. This style is very consistent and it has its share of wins this season. Most drivers would give their right lug nut to have 24 wins in a season, not to mention the $350,000 plus in winnings. No, Billy Moyer does not win every race and some he doesn't even get into the feature, but a 41 percent win record is unheard of at this level of competition.
Next Up I'll get off my BM soap box now. We have lots of great races to go on this Tour. We observed other trends and practices and met some great track owners and promoters in little places like Crossville, Tennessee. We're all set to be a part of really big shows like the World 100 at Eldora and Texas Motor Speedway Dirt Track where hundreds of Modifieds come to put on a great show.
As always, stay tuned. And be sure to check out my many blogs on www.circletrack.com that offer a glimpse into the touring life and tidbits about each weekend's races.
As we were walking the pits...
As we were walking the pits and talking to various teams, we came across one car owner who was pouring AMSOIL oil into his modified. I swear this was not staged. He told me he always runs this oil and that it keeps the engine temperatures lower in his transmission and rear end. Running AMSOIL reduces heat and wear and prolongs the life of the gears and bearings. I'm just passing along what I was told. Sounds good to me.
Kenny Schrader is one of the...
Kenny Schrader is one of the owners of this track along with Dale Jr., Bob Sargent, and Tony Stewart. It just happens that Shannon Babb had borrowed Kenny's transport rig for a while and made a showing at this race. Shannon has had a good amount of success in the past and just this year switched to the four-link type of car from the Rayburn he has always run. It takes getting used to the wider range of adjustments on those cars.