National series Mesquite preview

Lucas Oil ASCS Set for 37th Annual Devil's Bowl Winter Nationals!

TULSA, Okla. (October 11, 2010) -- Opperman, Wolfgang, Swindell and Kinser are just a sampling of the legendary names on the list of past Devil's Bowl Winter Nationals champions.

This Friday and Saturday, Sprint Car racing fans in the state of Texas have one final opportunity to catch all the stars of the Lucas Oil ASCS presented by K&N Filters National series as teams from throughout the nation converge upon Mesquite, TX, for the 37th Annual Devil's Bowl Winter Nationals.

And, vying for a second Devil's Bowl Winter Nationals title in a row will be Fort Worth's Kevin Ramey, who bested a field of 61 competitors last October atop the storied 0x00bd-mile Devil's Bowl Speedway clay oval for his ninth career ASCS National triumph.

While the two-time ASCS Sooner champ and 2009 ASCS Lone Star champion leads the local charge for the weekend's $6,000 winner's share, point implications in the series $60,000 championship chase and $250,000 overall points fund that will be distributed among the final top 15 in series points at year's end loom large.

Entering this weekend's action, a mere 77 points separate the top three in the Lucas Oil Sprint Car title chase with Eunice, LA, native Jason Johnson holding a slight edge in his bid for a second series championship after taking the top spot.

Johnson, the 2007 Devil's Bowl Winter Nationals champion, holds a slim 45-point advantage over 20-year-old Brady Bacon of Broken Arrow, OK, with defending series champion Shane Stewart of Bixby, OK, another 32 points back in third.

With the possibility of gaining or losing as much as 64 points in a single feature event, "The Ragin' Cajun" is just one minor miscue away from possibly knotting up the title chase in three-way style.

While Johnson, Bacon and Stewart have matched one another with four Lucas Oil ASCS National wins apiece, a total of eleven different drivers have divvied up the 23 series feature wins thus far, with fourth-ranked Tim Crawley of Benton, AR, with the hot hand as of late with three wins in the last four feature events including a second consecutive Rock 'N Roll 50 win at Riverside on October 2.

Liberal, KS, racing promoter Tony Bruce, Jr., has climbed back up to fifth in points, with 20-year-old Jack Dover of Springfield, NE, just a handful of points ahead of 2001 series champion Zach Chappell of Talala, OK, in the battle for sixth.

Veteran Norman, OK, shoe Danny Wood enters the weekend ranked eighth in points, with Little Rock native Ricky Logan in ninth.

Kyle Hirst of Loomis, CA, enters the weekend ranked tenth and holds the advantage in the Brodix Rookie of the Year chase over Matt Covington (Glenpool, OK), Dustin Morgan (Tulsa, OK) and Channin Tankersley (Highlands, TX).

Twelfth-ranked Darren Long of Elida, OH, is another of the 14 drivers that have competed in every night of Lucas Oil ASCS National action thus far in 2010, with five-time Devil's Bowl Winter Nationals champion Gary Wright slipping back into the top 15 in driver points.

The Lucas Oil ASCS presented by K&N Filters National series kicked off the 2010 campaign with Sammy Swindell whipping a field of 62 entries in the weather-shortened 37th Annual Devil's Bowl Spring Nationals.

Since that time, the Lucas Oil Sprint Cars have averaged 52.69 cars per event over 23 nights of competition at 14 different tracks throughout the nation.

Following this weekend's 37th Annual Devil's Bowl Winter Nationals, the Lucas Oil ASCS National series finishes out the 2010 season with the I-30 Speedway's $15,000-to-win 23rd Annual Short Track Nationals (October 28-30), a long-awaited return to Las Cruces' Southern New Mexico Speedway (November 12-13), the $15,000-to-win 43rd Annual Western World Championships at Tucson's USA Raceway (November 18-20) and the season-ending Las Vegas Sprint Car Nationals (November 26-27).

The Series:JJLucas Oil ASCS presented by K&N Filters

When & Where:
Friday night, October 15 at 8:00 p.m. -- 37th Annual Devil's Bowl Winter Nationals prelim
Saturday night, October 16 at 8:00 p.m. -- 37th Annual Devil's Bowl Winter Nationals finale

Track Information:

Devil's Bowl Speedway (Mesquite, TX) -- 0x00bd-mile, high-banked clay oval located six miles east of Dallas' I-635 on I-20, then three miles north on Lawson Road. Lawson Road north of the track (and south off of US 80) has been closed for repair, so fans and racers are urged to use I-20 and then go north on Lawson. Track phone: 972-222-2421.

-source: ascs