Forum: HoseHeads Sprint Car General Forum (go)
Moderators: dirtonly  /  dmantx  /  hosehead

So just saw the Theil team won the IRA at Beaver Dam... now granted Balog is in Knoxville... but Bill Rose and everone were there, so how does a 360 land up winning this race?? Now i know that 150 less horsepower on a dry/slick can work, but at this level, the 410's should be able to get that HP to the ground. Even more odd is he won his heat race as well! Not to take anything away from Scotty, he is a good driver, but how the he11 does this even happen? Like i said early in the year, clearly the best of the rookies by far though.... not counting Bill Rose, but how can you consider him a rookie anywyas lol

Scotty Theil Is running a 410 has been all year. (may have had 360 in for a weekend when he smoked his 410 again)

Correct, 410 is out of commision again from what i saw on Facebook. Looks like the 360 has been in the car about as many nights as the 410 had been. Either way, great job by that group.... it just baffles me.

Jeff swindell won an all-star race with an ASCS 360 in west Memphis a few years back

There is no replacement for cubic displacement 

Jake Peters did it twice at Husets in back to back weeks if I remember right.

Scotty ran a great race. The track was a completly slicked off dust bowl all night. Absolutly nothing to get a hold of. He was straight and smooth.

Unreal the amount rocks in the new clay though. 

In both his heat race and the A main Thiel started on the front row which was a major benefit and sometimes getting the breaks is what it takes to put yourself in the position for a win. Beaver Dam was slick top to bottom with the majority of everyone running the top all around the joint, a few guys got rolling around the bottom the last 10 laps of the race as Jason Johnson (the one from WI) started deep in the field and ran the bottom up to 3rd. It was just totally a momentum track and Thiel just kept the 360 wound up around the top and drove a good race. Plus it helped picking up a few cautions to keep him in clean air and out of traffic but no one could make a move on the restarts either.

People can complain about Balog not being there but you can only race the cars that are in attendance. Heck look at Reinke, Whitney and Meyer they didn't even crack the top 5 as it was just a super slick track. Congrats to Scotty Thiel as he has been getting better and better each week and it was just a matter of time till he parked it in IRA victory lane. If Thiel gets his 410 motor back running I would bet he will get into victory lane again in 2014 against the IRA.

Nice to see some fresh blood running up front with the IRA.

I think WIsprinter summed it up pretty well. This is purely conjecture on my part, but it would seem that having a well built, properly tuned motor that is slightly less HP than the rest of the field could actually be a good thing on a smaller, very dry slick track. bigger isn't always better. but, I'm probably wrong. and I'm sure people will let me know.

as others have noted, it certainly helps that Scotty is a very good driver. he has been passing a lot of cars from the back of the A main often this season.

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Horsepower never wins races. You can have all the power in the world but if the chassis isnt hooked up, you wont go anywhere. Scotty Thiel has had many good finished with his 360 against the IRA and finished 15th against the WoO when they were in town. It was only a matter of time before he won and IRA feature. The kid is smart when it comes to setup and does it himself. Kid is GOOD

Mark Dobmeier & Wade Nygaard have won with 360 CI engines @ River Cities Speedway this season
Lee Grosz won in a 360 @ Ada, MN against the NOSA 410's a couple months ago.

Thomas Kennedy won in a 360 against the All-Star circuit of Champions @ Glyndon, MN last year.

these days of gopros & youtube, I've realized how important throttle control is. it seems like the best drivers know how feather the gas, keep the tires from spinning like mad. watching sprint cars race. they are so fast, it lended me to believe guys were just mashing on the pedal all the time, manhandling the car around the turns.

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larryitis   Facebook - Michael Collins 

He won in a $30,000 ASCS 360. Probably has just as much horsepower as most of the IRA 410's. Also being in clean air the whole time helped. Yes he is a good driver so place the emphasis on that rather than a 360 motor.

I tell it like I see it.

On dry slick a 360 is like a 410 with traction control

Last year at Pdtr during the fair race with IRA KurtDavis finished 4 with IRA the 80 car chased him all most the hole race and could not get pass him. track was dry. and that was with a MSA 360 a100 or more less hp and 200 lbs heavier .Sometimes the cards all fall in lineand car is just right . It makes for great racing look what happind at Angle Park on last lap 4 place car won .

I agree, its great for the IRA as a whole. While its an obvious disadvantage on the half miles and horsepower tracks, one has to wonder with the amount of smaller tracks on the schedule, mixed with dry/slick most nights.... if running an ASCS motor is the way to go in IRA, if you are a budget team that would also like to mix in a few ASCS shows a year. Obviously having both a 360 and 410 would be ideal, but not possible for everyone. Maybe this is a good middle of the road approach in this area?