Grayville, IL — There’s no bigger stretch of UMP DIRTcar Racing Super Late Model action than the one that begins this weekend at the famed Eldora Speedway in Rossburg, Ohio.
The national spotlight will focus on UMP DIRTcar Racing with the running of Eldora’s $100,000 Dirt Late Model Dream XV this Friday and Saturday (June 5-6) and won’t fade until mid-July when the organization’s grueling Summer Nationals tour finally comes to an end.
“This is the signature time of the year for UMP DIRTcar Racing,” said Sam Driggers, the director of the sanctioning body that is part of the World Racing Group family. “We’re proud to once again sanction the richest dirt Late Model event of the season at a marquee track like Eldora Speedway, and of course the Dream leads into the Summer Nationals ‘Hell Tour’ that has become UMP DIRTcar’s most anticipated annual series.”
The UMP DIRTcar Racing-sanctioned Dirt Late Model Dream at NASCAR star Tony Stewart’s high-banked, half-mile oval offers a $100,000 top prize – the largest single first-place paycheck for a dirt Late Model race this season. Hot laps, time trials and non-qualifiers’ events are scheduled to begin at 6 p.m. on Friday (June 5), with the Saturday-night program of heat races, B-Mains and the 100-lap Dream set to kick off at 7 o’clock.
That huge purse will lure all of the top dirt Late Model drivers in the country, including dozens with deep ties to UMP DIRTcar Racing.
Two-time defending UMP DIRTcar national and Summer Nationals champion Dennis Erb Jr. of Carpentersville, Ill., will lead the UMP DIRTcar contingent to Eldora. He will be looking to make his first start in the Dream A-Main since 2002, when he finished 11th.
Other UMP DIRTcar stars expected to challenge the fast Eldora track include former national champion Randy Korte of Highland, Ill.; Jason Feger of Bloomington, Ill., Rusty Schlenk of Jackson, Mich., and Jon Henry of Ada, Ohio, who are among the drivers near the top of the 2009 UMP DIRTcar national points standings; and Brian Shirley of Chatham, Ill., who battled Erb down to the wire in last year’s Summer Nationals points race.
Joining Erb as former UMP DIRTcar Summer Nationals titlists in the Dream field are Billy Moyer of Batesville, Ark., five-time and defending Dream winner Scott Bloomquist of Mooresburg, Tenn., Shannon Babb of Moweaqua, Ill., and Don O’Neal of Martinsville, Ind.
For full information on the Dream, including detailed time schedules and ticket prices, visit www.eldoraspeedway.com.
Following the checkered flag in the Dream, Erb, Feger and Shirley will be among the drivers who immediately shift their attention to the UMP DIRTcar Summer Nationals. Now in its 22nd year tearing up Midwestern dirt tracks, the Summer Nationals is the biggest test of men and machine in dirt Late Model racing.
The 2009 UMP DIRTcar Summer Nationals opens on Thurs., June 11, at Brownstown (Ind.) Speedway. The series is scheduled to visit 26 different tracks over a 31-day period, with the finale once again set for Oakshade Raceway in Wauseon, Ohio, on Fri., July 11.
Additional info on all of the series, sanctioning and member tracks of DIRTcar Racing and the complete UMP DIRTcar Summer Nationals schedule is available at www.DIRTcar.com.
