TUESDAY NIGHT THUNDER! USAC MIDGETS SLING THE RED DIRT ON JULY 12
By: Richie Murray – USAC Media
Meeker, Oklahoma (July 7, 2022)………Motorin’ from the north to the south, the USAC NOS Energy Drink Midget National Championship is in a busy state of mind in July – four states in fact.
We’ll have been everywhere, man.
After the festivities at South Dakota are all buttoned up, the traveling show gathers up and makes the nearly 10 hour trek to Meeker, Oklahoma’s Red Dirt Raceway for Tuesday Night Thunder on July 12, the fifth series visit to the 1/4-mile dirt oval.
Logan Seavey (Sutter, Calif.) enters as the lone Red Dirt USAC Midget winner in Tuesday’s field. He finished inside the top-two in each of his first two Red Dirt starts. He led the final seven circuits to capture the 2019 race, which came one year after he led a race-high 13 laps and finished as the runner-up during his 2018 championship season. Most recently, he ran 9th in 2021.
Current championship point leader and defending series champ Buddy Kofoid (Penngrove, Calif.) took 4th in his debut Red Dirt appearance in 2020 and grabbed a 6th in 2021. He scored a feature win in the most recent USAC National Midget event in the Sooner State, scoring in April at Port City Raceway in Tulsa.
Justin Grant (Ione, Calif.) has raced to top-six finishes in each of his two Red Dirt starts, tallying a runner-up result in 2021 to go along with a 6th on his resume in 2018. His 2nd place finish last year came after starting 13th which made him the hard charger of the night. Grant was an Oklahoma winner with the USAC Midgets in April at Port City. His two career victories in Oklahoma have him in a four-way tie atop the list as the winningest USAC National Midget driver in the state alongside Kofoid, Tanner Thorson and Bob Wente.
Jerry Coons Jr. (Tucson, Ariz.) is the only driver to finish within the top-seven in all four of USAC’s Red Dirt USAC Midget races run since 2018. The USAC Triple Crown champion took 4th in 2018 and 4th again in 2019 after leading four laps late in the going. His best result there came in 2020, finishing 3rd, then followed up with a 7th in 2021.
Cannon McIntosh (Bixby, Okla.) made his very first career USAC National Midget feature start at his home state Red Dirt Raceway in 2018, finishing 18th. McIntosh upped his performance in the following years with a best thus far of 7th in 2020 while leading briefly for one lap. His eight-lap time of 1:49.120 in a 2021 heat race is the track’s all-time USAC Midget track record for the distance.
Three-time USAC National Midget winner Zach Daum will be in one of two Bundy Built Motorsports cars alongside teammate Ethan Mitchell. Daum (Pocahontas, Ill.) corralled a 3rd place result in 2021 while Mitchell (Mooresville, N.C.) knocked out a 13th in 2020.
Jonathan Beason (Broken Arrow, Okla.) has been the hard charger at Red Dirt twice in 2019 and 2020, starting 17th and finishing 5th in 2019, then proceeded from 18th to 8th in 2020. He once again put it inside the top-10 in 2021 with an 8th place result while leading a single lap early.
Kaylee Bryson (Muskogee, Okla.) was the frontrunner for much of the early going in 2021, leading nine of the first ten laps in a duel with Beason. Bryson found herself entangled with a lapped car late in the race, ending her bid for victory after the incident dropped her all the way back to the 18th position in the final rundown.
Bryant Wiedeman (Colby, Kan.) set fast qualifying time in the 2021 event but experienced a short-lived night in the end after a flip on lap one of the feature. He’s among the returnees to the Red Dirt lineup as are San Jose, California’s Thomas Meseraull (12th in 2021), Lubbock, Texas’ Brenham Crouch (15th in 2021), Bixby, Oklahoma’s Tanner Berryhill (20th in 2021) and Kennedale, Texas’ Kyle Jones (22nd in 2021) and Macdoel, California’s Maria Cofer (23rd in 2018) while Hayden Reinbold (Gilbert, Ariz.) aims for his first feature start at the track.
Red Dirt debuts come courtesy of USAC National Midget leading Rookie Mitchel Moles (Raisin City, Calif.), Taylor Reimer (Bixby, Okla.), Lincoln Park Speedway Indiana Midget Week winner Jacob Denney (Galloway, Ohio), Jace Park (Overland Park, Kan.), Badger Midget champ Chase McDermand (Springfield, Ill.), Jade Avedisian (Clovis, Calif.), Chance Crum (Snohomish, Wash.), Trey Marcham (Newcastle, Okla.), Anton Hernandez (Arlington, Texas), Corey Joyner (Concordia, Kan.) and more.
At Red Dirt, the gates open at 5pm Central, drivers meeting at 5:45pm and hot laps at 6:30pm with qualifying and racing to follow. The NOW600 Non-Wing Micros are also on the event card.
General admission is just $25 with high school students and younger just $5 and children under five are admitted for free. Tickets are available online at www.reddirtraceway.com under the “Buy Tickets” tab and will be sold the day of the show as well. All access passes are available as well for $35 and available at the pit gate on the day of the show only.
“Tuesday Night Thunder” featuring the USAC NOS Energy Drink Midget National Championship & the NOW600 Restricted & Non-Wing Micro Sprints will be streamed live on FloRacing at https://bit.ly/3dgONXz.
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USAC NATIONAL MIDGET WINS AT RED DIRT RACEWAY:
1-Christopher Bell, Daison Pursley, Logan Seavey & Tanner Thorson
USAC NATIONAL MIDGET WINNERS AT RED DIRT RACEWAY:
2018: Christopher Bell (7/10)
2019: Logan Seavey (7/9)
2020: Tanner Thorson (7/21)
2021: Daison Pursley (7/13)
USAC NATIONAL MIDGET WINS IN OKLAHOMA:
2-Justin Grant, Buddy Kofoid, Tanner Thorson & Bob Wente
1-John Batts, Christopher Bell, Steve Cannon, Jimmy Caruthers, Tyler Courtney, Jimmy Davies, Daison Pursley, Lloyd Ruby, Logan Seavey, Sleepy Tripp & Roger West
TRACK RECORDS FOR USAC NATIONAL MIDGETS AT RED DIRT RACEWAY:
1 Lap - 7/21/2020 - Tyler Courtney - 13.108
8 Laps 7/13/2021 - Cannon McIntosh - 1:49.120
10 Laps - 7/10/2018 - Tyler Thomas - 2:24.03
PAST RED DIRT RACEWAY USAC NATIONAL MIDGET RESULTS:
2018 FEATURE: (30 laps, starting position in parentheses) 1. Christopher Bell (6), 2. Logan Seavey (5), 3. Tanner Carrick (7), 4. Jerry Coons, Jr. (10), 5. Brady Bacon (3), 6. Justin Grant (4), 7. Jason McDougal (11), 8. Kevin Thomas, Jr. (14), 9. Spencer Bayston (18), 10. Tyler Courtney (2), 11. Chad Boat (19), 12. Holly Shelton (15), 13. Ryan Robinson (1), 14. Tucker Klaasmeyer (21), 15. Tyler Thomas (17), 16. Brayton Lynch (24), 17. Jonathan Beason (9), 18. Cannon McIntosh (20), 19. Zane Hendricks (8), 20. Kyle Craker (16), 21. Cole Bodine (23), 22. Ace McCarthy (12), 23. Maria Cofer (22), 24. Dave Darland (13). NT
2019 FEATURE: (30 laps, starting position in parentheses) 1. Logan Seavey (9), 2. Zeb Wise (7), 3. Chris Windom (11), 4. Jerry Coons, Jr. (15), 5. Jonathan Beason (17), 6. Matt Sherrell (16), 7. Chad Boat (13), 8. Tanner Thorson (3), 9. Tucker Klaasmeyer (10), 10. Tyler Thomas (19), 11. Jesse Colwell (14), 12. Tanner Carrick (6), 13. Shannon McQueen (18), 14. Hank Davis (22), 15. Robert Dalby (21), 16. Tyler Courtney (1), 17. Jason McDougal (2), 18. Kevin Thomas, Jr. (5), 19. Andrew Deal (20), 20. Holley Hollan (12), 21. Cannon McIntosh (4), 22. Zane Hendricks (8). NT
2020 FEATURE: (30 laps, starting positions in parentheses) 1. Tanner Thorson (1), 2. Tyler Courtney (6), 3. Jerry Coons Jr. (8), 4. Buddy Kofoid (5), 5. Chris Windom (3), 6. Emerson Axsom (11), 7. Cannon McIntosh (4), 8. Jonathan Beason (18), 9. Tyler Thomas (9), 10. Andrew Layser (10), 11. Robert Dalby (20), 12. Daison Pursley (13), 13. Ethan Mitchell (2), 14. Sam Johnson (7), 15. Cole Bodine (17), 16. Tanner Carrick (15), 17. Trey Gropp (14), 18. Steven Shebester (12), 19. Shannon McQueen (22), 20. Chance Morton (21), 21. Kaylee Bryson (16), 22. Ace McCarthy (19). NT
2021 FEATURE: (30 laps, starting positions in parentheses) 1. Daison Pursley (5), 2. Justin Grant (13), 3. Zach Daum (7), 4. Kevin Thomas Jr. (3), 5. Chris Windom (12), 6. Buddy Kofoid (15), 7. Jerry Coons Jr. (18), 8. Jonathan Beason (1), 9. Logan Seavey (11), 10. Chase Randall (10), 11. Tanner Thorson (17), 12. Thomas Meseraull (16), 13. Emerson Axsom (4), 14. Cannon McIntosh (14), 15. Brenham Crouch (9), 16. Ethan Mitchell (8), 17. Hayden Williams (19), 18. Kaylee Bryson (2), 19. Tyler Thomas (22), 20. Tanner Berryhill (20), 21. Trey Gropp (23-P), 22. Kyle Jones (21), 23. Bryant Wiedeman (6). NT