Curt Spalding came to Volusia Speedway Park with goals of winning the Big Gator Championship and having fun with his team at the 54th Federated Auto Parts DIRTcar Nationals.
He completed both tasks on Saturday night by winning his first career Gator Championship and the overall points title for 2025.
“It’s just crazy,” Spalding said. “For everything that transpired this week, it was like nothing could go wrong, and only had a couple of problems here and there. We just made up for it, kept our heads down, and focused on our own program. I didn’t care what anyone else was doing. I knew I had a hot rod. I just needed to stay in my element and it worked out.”
The Watervliet, MI driver knew the competition he had to face was much harder than he ever had to face, with David Stremme and four-time Gator Championship Feature winner Kyle Strickler leading the field of 34 DIRTcar UMP Modifieds to the opening green flag.
Stremme took the lead for the first third of the Feature while position changes between Strickler and Spalding went back and forth. Spalding cleared Strickler by sticking his No.5CS to the bottom of the Turns 1 and 2.
Spalding used that same move on Stremme for the lead, which worked out to his benefit by claiming the top spot before the second caution of the Feature waved.
While Spalding never relinquished the lead for the remaining laps, he continued to feel the pressure of competitors racing to take away his lead.
Stremme faltered on the restart, allowing Will Krup, Kenny Wallace, and hard-charging Cole Falloway to compete with Strickler and Spalding for their positions.
Wallace passed Strickler for second after starting the Feature in 13th, giving his Nick Hoffman-built Elite Chassis a chance at the Gator.
Krup had an uphill climb to endure after losing three spots on the initial start from his fifth-place beginning. The Mt. Carmel, IL driver picked off both Strickler and Wallace through Turns 3 and 4 to take second with six laps left.
Falloway emulated Krup’s move by pulling past the two drivers through the same corners to take the final spot on the podium.
At the front, Spalding created distance from the pack by using the bottom lane of the track to build his lead to one and a half seconds by the time the twin checkered flags waved on his career achievement.
“I had a good hot rod,” Spalding said. “The door was open, and I just took it. I wasn’t gonna sit back and wait, I’d rather control the race, especially with everybody around us. So I just said ‘Let’s go, let them chase me, and see where it all ends up,’ and here we are. This is for the old guys. A couple of people had some nice comments like ‘You look like an 18-year-old out there,’ and I feel like it when you keep winning races like this. It’s pretty cool.”
Curt Spalding goes for the pass on David Stremme for the lead (Paul Arch Photo)
Krup finished the night in second. While he came up short of his goal of winning the Big Gator on Saturday, he said he is happy with the efforts made by his No.K9 team throughout the three weeks of UMP Modified Speedweeks.
“I wanted to win, for sure,” Krup said. “Obviously, with this field of cars, it’s tough and those restarts just wasn’t going my way early on in that race. Then, finally there at the last half, I was getting used up pretty good.
“I just went ahead and got pretty aggressive on the restart and luckily it worked out. I got a clean racetrack and got to second, so that really worked in my favor. I felt like the car was good, just circumstantial stuff. I think if one of these cars would have started in front of the other, it probably would have finished that way. But I’m pretty excited and pretty happy with our Speedweeks.”
Falloway finished the night in third to complete his comeback from starting 19th in the Gator Championship. With the podium, the Owensboro, KY driver finishes his first DIRTcar Nationals with five Golden Gators, top fives in every Feature, and an average finish of 2.11.
“It was still a solid week for sure,” Falloway said. “I wish we could have started closer towards the front there and see what we had for those two, but we’ll take it after last night.”
Strickler finished the night in fourth, and Wallace cemented a fifth-place finish to end the DIRTcar UMP Modifieds racing at DIRTcar Nationals in 2025.
RESULTS:
Gator Championship Feature (30 Laps): 1. 5CS-Curt Spalding[4]; 2. K9-Will Krup[5]; 3. 66-Cole Falloway[19]; 4. 8S-Kyle Strickler[2]; 5. 36-Kenny Wallace[13]; 6. 56-Colton Profitt[15]; 7. 777-Trevor Neville[6]; 8. 35-David Stremme[1]; 9. 21CZ-Cole Czarneski[14]; 10. 77D-George Dixon[3]; 11. 9T-Ryan Thomas[8]; 12. 19-Dustin Sorensen[21]; 13. 8A-Austin Holcombe[9]; 14. 45-Chase Holland[31]; 15. 15X-Justin Stone[20]; 16. 10Y-Trent Young[32]; 17. 49-Brian Ruhlman[27]; 18. 96M-Mike McKinney[7]; 19. 27G-Jason Garver[34]; 20. 32-Chad Roush[33]; 21. 8W-Gregory Moore[10]; 22. 114-Jordan Koehler[17]; 23. 05-David Wietholder[24]; 24. 97-Mitch Thomas[22]; 25. 24-Zeke McKenzie[23]; 26. 88-Matt Crafton[25]; 27. 90K-Ray Kable[28]; 28. 7D-Brad Deyoung[30]; 29. 13-Charlie Mefford[11]; 30. 72-Todd Neiheiser[12]; 31. 77-Ray Bollinger[16]; 32. 18L-Michael Long[18]; 33. 5-Jonathan Taylor[26]; 34. 11Z-Zane Oedewaldt[29]
Up Next: DIRTcar racing continues at Volusia Speedway Park with the DIRTcar Late Models invading the 54th Federated Auto Parts DIRTcar Nationals from February 10-12. Tickets are available here:
If you can’t make it to the track, you can watch all the action live on DIRTVIsion – either online or by downloading the DIRTVision App.
