Dirt Late Model Drivers

[racincowboy02]

What is the number of dirt guys that have jumped to any of the top 3 nascar series and had success? I know Tyler Red(not a nice word)(not a nice word)(not a nice word)(not a nice word) is there and Jeremy Clements is there as well but what other dirt guys have made the jump and wonder if they would ever return to dirt

[Stefan2k4]

Many moon ago, Jack Pennington raced in Nascar. Ne never won, but finished second for the rookie of the year standing when Nascar decided to posthumously give the award to a rich guys kid who got drunk and killed himself and a 27 year old nursing assistant, wife and mother who was driving in the opposite lane in a highway accident instead. I think he lead 6 laps in the Daytona 500 and when he and Moroso raced together in the same events always finished ahead of him. However, he didn't have the funding to race the full series.

[kidrock]

Most of the guys that make it to nascar make it through the dirt world is open wheel guys, Jeff Puvis by the way one of the best to ever strap in a late model made it to Nascar but, guys Like Jeff Gordon, Tony Stewart, Kyle Larson, Christopher Bell came from the open wheel stuff. Midgets, Sprints.

[Cardirt0]

Justin Allgaier. Use to love seeing him race Dirt at FarmerCity and Fairbury. hes 5 in points in the Xfinty S.

[kidrock]

Justin Allgaier. Use to love seeing him race Dirt at FarmerCity and Fairbury. hes 5 in points in the Xfinty S.

You are correct I forgot about Justin and Schrader

[chupp n bloomer fan]

Many moon ago, Jack Pennington raced in Nascar. Ne never won, but finished second for the rookie of the year standing when Nascar decided to posthumously give the award to a rich guys kid who got drunk and killed himself and a 27 year old nursing assistant, wife and mother who was driving in the opposite lane in a highway accident instead. I think he lead 6 laps in the Daytona 500 and when he and Moroso raced together in the same events always finished ahead of him. However, he didn't have the funding to race the full series.Sounds about right outta NASCAR.

[DIRT522]

Purvis. Cup and Busch. Won several races despite only running limited schedule. Snowball and All American 400 winner. I think he’s only 3 time winner of AA 400. I would think nobody ever won AA 400,
Snowball and World besides him. Maybe someone can research and respond.

[CageFaraday]

You are correct I forgot about Justin and Schrader

Buck Simmons ran some in Cup, Jack Pennington as mentioned by someone else, he also won "Cool move of the Race" at one track. John Gill ran ARCA and Bloomquist too. DAvenport ran some truck races. Freddy Smith ran Daytona. Ralph & Dale Earnhardt. There are more and open wheel has only been a more recent pool for talent to Cup. Seems like Mike Duvall was offered a ride and turned it down because at the time Cherokee paid better, Dale Sr took that opportunity..
Recent history isn't the only history...

[DIRT522]

I remember when Buck used to whip up on Elliott at Dixie all the time.

[kidrock]

Buck Simmons ran some in Cup, Jack Pennington as mentioned by someone else, he also won "Cool move of the Race" at one track. John Gill ran ARCA and Bloomquist too. DAvenport ran some truck races. Freddy Smith ran Daytona. Ralph & Dale Earnhardt. There are more and open wheel has only been a more recent pool for talent to Cup. Seems like Mike Duvall was offered a ride and turned it down because at the time Cherokee paid better, Dale Sr took that opportunity..
Recent history isn't the only history...

I agree and glad you brought others up. I couldn't remember everyone that has made it to nascar and your right the open wheel guys have been the last what 20 years.

[smith19]

shrader, kahne, Larson, stewart, bell, Stenhouse, newman and jj yeley are open wheel guys

[muddy mike]

Rodney Combs, Mike Wallace, Rusty did a little bit

[racincowboy02]

Thanks for the information i had no idea that any of the early names like buck simmons and those guys ran nascar but of course im not that old either. I just got to thinking about Red(not a nice word)(not a nice word)(not a nice word)(not a nice word) and Clements and missing seeing those guys run on dirt and got to thinking and wondered how big the numbers were that made the jump from dirt to the "holy grail" of racing

[Krooser]

Steve Kinser ran Nascar in the Quaker State car IIRC....

[Krooser]

Steve Kinser ran Nascar in the Quaker State car IIRC.... then there's Tim Richmond.

[Bloomerdirtking]

Carl Edwards and Clint Bowyer

[zyoung25]

shrader, kahne, Larson, stewart, bell, Stenhouse, newman and jj yeley are open wheel guys

Jeff Gordon ran some sprint stuff in his younger years.

We had Patrick Sheltra that ran in some arca races. He had one of the hardest wrecks I can remember ever seeing. Donnie Moran and Lanigan also tried arca.

[EvelB7]

Moyer tried Arca as well as Kevin Gundaker (I am sure there is a youtube video of his crash at Daytona with the ambulance driver getting hit). Also know Steve Boley came down south and ran a Busch race or two.

[lokwaidid]

They had a race car at Daytona speedway that had names all over it of drivers that had raced there and signed the car. I found chuck mcwilliams and Ralph lathan's name on the car. This was about 20 + years ago. I don't know if is still there since they remodeled.

[Josh Bayko]

Ed Ferree and Davey Johnson have both run a fair amount of NASCAR races, and both ended up returning to dirt.

[jr29]

shrader, kahne, Larson, stewart, bell, Stenhouse, newman and jj yeley are open wheel guys

Schrader started in stock cars then went open wheel racing but he never stopped racing late models. The whole time he was running USAC he was still racing late models quite a bit. There were nights when he'd run 3-4 classes.

[Highside Hustler25]

Ryan Unzicker has had some good runs in the ARCA Series.

Few years back, Wallace and Schrader both were racing Late Models but have since switched to Mods.

[dmr37]

in the old days, all the Nascar drivers were dirt track drivers

[Illtsate32]

Ed Dixon ran.Arca for a while...

[golddirt]

Unzicker ran the old asa I believe and Eric smith ran asphalt
Too

[Bumpandrun]

Dale Fischlein from Davenport, Iowa ran some Busch Races. He also I think was Dave Marcis’s crew chief. And now is some sort of shop manager for Kevin Harvick.

[waaac77]

Dave Blaney

[brsteg]

I think Lanigan attempted to run some Busch races. I'm thinking Dale McDowell did some ARCA.

[Trax53]

Dale McDowell and Donnie Moran ran ARCA in 1990. I have the trading cards of them.
Davey Johnson
Rodney Combs
Jack Pennington
Freddy Smith
Stick Elliott
Billy Scott
...to name a few.

[chupp n bloomer fan]

Ed Ferree and Davey Johnson have both run a fair amount of NASCAR races, and both ended up returning to dirt.Davey was not happy whatsoever with the guy he raced for in NASCAR. I remember an interview he did in I believe Dirt Late Model Magazine, was burned bad money wise, not a happy camper.

[No_Weak_Links]

I didnt see Joey Coulter listed, and the Dillon brothers.