ADAIRSVILLE, Ga. — Three down. Five to go. The Crate Racin’ USA Winter Shootout Series continues to roll down the highway with no regard for speed limits, and a three-day stop in the Sunshine State at East Bay Raceway Park looms just around the bend.
The always-racy, often-tricky, third-mile oval in Gibsonton, Fla., will host the Adairsville, Ga-based traveling circuit for three nights, with three separate races scheduled for the sanctioning body’s highly-popular Crate Racin’ USA Newsome Raceway Parts Dirt Late Model Series. Those dates are scheduled Feb. 4-6 at the often-frustrating, hard-to-figure oval.
The busy Winter Shootout Series, which is held during the first three months every season and was expanded to nine events this year, is now down to eight on the slate after a Jan. 15 rainout at Volusia Speedway Park in Barberville, Fla., during the second annual Sunshine Nationals.
Winners Amid Tough Competition
Three different drivers have claimed victories, including current points leader Jason Welshan’s trip to the winner’s circle in the 30th edition of the Ice Bowl held Jan. 10 at Talladega Short Track in Eastaboga, Ala., which opened the 2021 season.
Michael Page of Douglasville, Ga., claimed the checkered flag on the opening night of the Sunshine Nationals Feb. 14 at Volusia Speedway Park in Barberville, Fla., and was disqualified from an apparent win on the third and final night of the weekend Feb. 16 for an outside-the-seals engine infraction, which handed the $10,000 winner’s share on that night to Kyle Bronson.
That weekend collaboration between DIRTcar Racing’s Pro Late Model division and Crate Racin’ USA’s competitors swelled car counts to the mid-50s on the opening night, (way up from last year’s mid-40s), and then included an eye-popping 64 drivers who entered the $10,000-to-win finale.
That latter event kicked off the all-new E-Z-GO $100,000+ Challenge, an assorted collection of high-paying events (each worth at least $10,000 to win or more) that fall under the Crate Racin’ USA banner, and is already drawing much attention from drivers across the sanctioning body’s home region and beyond. The brand new “series within a series,” which was announced at the CARS Racing Show at the Hickory Convention Center in early December, will award $5,000 to its overall points champion.
The Winter Shootout Series offers $2,500 to its overall champion, and the events at East Bay will set the stage for the final two races on the schedule. The next-to-last race on the miniseries slate will be Feb. 27 as the Crate Racin’ USA Dirt Late Model Series portion of the Tuckassee Toilet Bowl Classic receives a green flag at Clarksville (Tenn.) Speedway. The finale will be March 19-20 at Modoc (S.C.), which will pay $10,000 to win and also serve as the second event of the season for the E-Z-GO $100,000+ Challenge.
2021 Winter Shootout Series Schedule
Jan. 10: Talladega Short Track (Winner: Jason Welshan)
Jan. 14: Volusia Speedway Park (Winner: Michael Page)
Jan. 15: Volusia Speedway Park (Canceled: Rain)
Jan. 16: Volusia Speedway Park (Winner: Kyle Bronson)
Feb. 4: East Bay Raceway Park, Gibsonton, Fla.
Feb. 5: East Bay Raceway Park, Gibsonton, Fla.
Feb. 6: East Bay Raceway Park, Gibsonton, Fla.
Feb. 25-27: Clarksville (Tenn.) Speedway
March 19-20: Modoc (S.C.) Speedway
Mack McCarter Draws a Bead
Pierce McCarter is the reigning champion of the Winter Shootout Series, but he’s not defending the title. His younger brother Mack McCarter is already filling his driving shoes nicely, and has drawn attention with two standout performances at Volusia Speedway Park in Barberville, Fla., both of which resulted in second-place finishes during the Sunshine Nationals at the D-shaped oval.
He raced impressively from 19th to second on the opening night of the weekend, and closed the series (after the second night was rained out) with a 20th-to-third journey that resulted in another runnerup placing when apparent winner Michael Page was disqualified, moving McCarter up to a second-place finish.
While he missed the season-opening Ice Bowl at Talladega Short Track and now sits far behind the top four drivers who are battling for the points championship, McCarter will head for East Bay with a level of anticipation that has him excited to arrive, especially based on those two Volusia performances.
2021 Winter Shootout Series (points through Jan. 17)
- Jason Welshan, 264 points; 2. Cody Overton, 252; 3. Dylan Knowles, 244; 4. Jake Knowles, 236; 5. (tie) Kyle Bronson and Mack McCarter, 192; 7. Drew Kennedy, 186; 8. (tie) Cory Hedgecock and Jody Knowles, 184; 10. Mark Whitener, 182.
“I haven’t raced there in five or six years, and when I did we had older equipment than we do now, so I’m really looking forward to those three races,” McCarter said. “You never want to sound too confident or too cocky, but I feel like we’ve hit a really good groove with this car, and considering we passed so many cars at Volusia both nights against the large number of cars that were racing all weekend, we have to believe we’ve got a car capable of getting the job done.”
McCarter set out to purchase a spring smasher, discovered the car for sale, and decided to purchase it. It’s a Chip Vineyard Racing (CVR) machine, and McCarter has had some good runs in the past with the Tennessee-based chassis builder’s equipment.
“I haven’t been racing much, because we bought a liquor store in Newport, Tenn., during the summer of 2019, and that has kept us busy and away from our racing,” McCarter said. “We just ain’t had the time. So when that settled down a bit, we had this car but we’ve only run it six times. We’ve finished five of those six races, and it’s never been outside the top two.”
That will have McCarter admittedly licking his chops as the bright lights of Tampa, Fla., appear through the front windshield of his car hauler on the way to the famed “Clay by the Bay,” and the Sevierville, Tenn., driver is prepared for the stiff competition that will likely show up for the three-race weekend.
“There’s definitely been some heavy competition this year, and especially during the Sunshine Nationals,” McCarter said. “We had 55-56 cars there the first night, and then 60-plus for the last race. We’ve all got pretty much the same motors in the crate division, and it’s tough to make the shows, let alone to pass the amount of cars we did during the weekend. Honestly, I think it’s actually tougher to run these races than it is to win in the Super Late Model division. We’re gonna go down there and give it a rip, and see what we can do.”
Additional information about the weekend can be accessed on the track’s website at ebrp.co, or on the series website at www.crateracinusa.com. Facebook, Twitter and Instagram are also utilized by the series, and all five of its Weekly Racing Series divisions receive coverage on a regular basis.