The highest levels of 410 dirt Sprint Car racing is increasingly lucrative these days but there is a lot happening behind the scenes that could change the entire dynamic of the discipline.
For the past four decades, the World of Outlaws/World Racing Group has set the standard and emerged as the major sanctioning body for Sprint Cars, Super Late Models and Midgets. The series has embraced the changing times in terms of digital media plus streaming while growing closer to the mainstream as a result.
The same can be said of dirt racing in general in how each of the major sanctioning bodies, including the Lucas Oil Dirt Late Model Series, USAC and the All-Star Circuit of Champions have all worked to get their events in front of the most streaming eyeballs possible.
Each of these series eventually landed on FloSports, a major player in the streaming space across all sports, while World Racing Group events air on their own in-house platform in DirtVision.
The All-Star Circuit of Champions is owned by Tony Stewart, the NASCAR Hall of Famer who also owns Eldora Speedway in Rossburg, Ohio, whom purchased the struggling series back in 2015. Where World of Outlaws is a true national touring series, the All-Stars is mostly a regional series that runs a large percentage of its races in Ohio and Pennsylvania.
What’s changed in the past year is the emergence of a new 13-race, big money, weekday series founded by four-time World of Outlaws champion Brad Sweet of Kasey Kahne Racing and his brother-in-law, 2021 NASCAR Cup Series champion, Kyle Larson in partnership with FloRacing.
Note that full-time World of Outlaws teams, under what is called the ‘Platinum Agreement,’ agree to run the series near-exclusively in exchange for access to championship purse money and bonus funds. In other words, if you choose to chase the World of Outlaws championship, you’re not able to run the entire High Limit schedule.
Specifically, the current Platinum Agreement permits teams to run four non-WoO race nights and still have access to the World of Outlaws championship and bonus packages are long as they are outside of 48 hours or a 100-mile radius on either side of a World of Outlaws event.
Drivers and teams could also choose to run five to eight races under the same conditions described above, losing access to the exclusivity bonus program, but remaining eligible to contend for the championship and its allocated fund by the end of the year.
World Racing Group expanded the number of events both exclusive or semi-exclusive teams could enter this season as a result of dialogue based on the emergence of High Limit and a million dollar to win race at Eldora in June, the Eldora Million.
World of Outlaws full-time team owners have increasingly pushed for larger purses or an increased championship fund, citing a conviction over World Racing Group’s DirtVision revenue. The argument is effectively, ‘we believe you are making more on subscriptions so more of that revenue should go to the teams who make it possible.’
The response, beyond WRG increasing the championship and bonus fund this season, has been that teams don’t entirely understand DirtVision’s financial overhead and also overstate the subscription revenue.
To a certain degree, teams believe their cars and star drivers are what make the World of Outlaws the premier series in 410 Sprint Car competition while the sanctioning body believes it has established a premier series that invites commensurate competition.
Like all negotiable things, there is truth in both, and it’s just a matter of finding some middle ground.
The High Limit Sprint Car Series has changed the dynamics of these negotiations because there have been persistent rumors all year that Larson and Sweet would eventually either merge with the All-Star Circuit of Champions or purchase it outright.
For now, all parties have denied such conversations when asked on the record.
Another layer to the conviction that such an outcome is inevitable is that longtime World of Outlaws race director, Mike Hess, was working in race control for the High Limit race this week at Lernerville Speedway.
Hess is one of the best to call a race, if not the best, with an industry reputation to support it. Jeremy Elliott of Sprint Car Unlimited received a statement from World Racing Group CEO Brian Carter, confirming Hess’ departure.
“Mike Hess is no longer employed at World Racing Group,” Carter told the subscription-based website. “With our infrastructure, we have five race directors … two or three former race directors and three or four guys who aspire to be race directors on staff.
“So, it’s not a difficult environment. Mike is a good race director, but we have a deep bench of people who care about the company and what we are trying to do. Our infrastructure allows us to evolve with change.”
Elliott also reported that Hess is not a full-time employee of High Limit. Hess has also released a statement:
“I’d like to thank everyone that has reached out or posted on social media,” Hess wrote. “I am truly humbled and blown away by the support shown to me today. It means more than I could ever tell each and every one of you. I respect the hell out of all the drivers that have ever been on a track that I’m on the radio at. All you drivers are the show and I’m honored to call the races that I have been a part of to this point. When asked what I like about my job, the answer is always the people I have met across the country. I truly have met some of the best and most genuine people from all over. Those people keep us travelers happy to see them at the next stop.
“Passion for racing is to my core and life is too short to give all the time of your life away. I miss time with my kids. I miss family events and not be valued for the time and work that is done. The race teams become family as we see each other more than our own families. I’m not sure what the future holds at this point but hope to land somewhere in the race car world. Many thanks and gratitude to everyone, even the haters and hope to see everyone down the road somewhere.”
Justin Fiedler of DIRTRACKR detailed an email the All-Star Circuit of Champions sent to current track owners in which it said a sale had not been completed.
“We are aware of the rumors circulating that the All Stars have been purchased by the High Limit Series. At this time, the All Stars have NOT been purchased and while we haven’t begun our tedious process of scheduling for 2024, we plan to begin scheduling around the second week of October and will be in touch soon after. In the interim, if anything changes on the ownership side, we will be sure to make you all aware.”
‘At this time’ and ‘if anything changes’ certainly and objectively leaves a lot of room for the weeks and months to come.
A combined All Star Circuit of Champions and High Limit Series would change the dynamics of the industry and it would certainly challenge World of Outlaws hegemony in Sprint Car racing while also giving FloRacing another major national intellectual property.
The reason behind the platinum agreement is that World Racing Group gets exclusivity of its teams and drivers. World of Outlaws and DirtVision is where you see the likes of Sweet, Donny Schatz, David Gravel, Carson Macedo, Logan Schuchart, Sheldon Haudenschild, Spencer Bayston and Gio Scelzi. If those drivers could race anywhere, non-exclusively, it weakens the prestige of World of Outlaws.
The purse and bonuses have to be enough to exclusively keep them there, however.
It’s not an apples-to-apples comparison, of course, but there are two national Dirt Late Model tours in World of Outlaws and Lucas Oil Dirt Late Models and no such exclusivity agreements for either but the schedules are such that teams have to choose one championship over the other while moonlighting in other events.
In a perfect world, two strong national Sprint Car tours that both pay well and have strong bonus programs is something that’s proven viable for Late Models, but it’s just a different world with a much healthier economy.
All told, the structure of national dirt Sprint Car racing appears to be changing in some way or fashion over the next several months.
Matt Weaver is a Motorsports Insider for Sportsnaut. Follow him on Twitter.