ASK THE DRIVER

ask the

DRIVER

Photos: Jacy Norgaard

DRIVER: JOSEPH JOINER

HUNTING THE FRONT

By Ashley Zimmerman

Dirt Empire is taking questions provided by YOU and will seek out your favorite drivers to get you the answers to your long awaited questions! All you have to do to submit your question is just Like Dirt Empire on any social media and include #DEasks with your question. Then watch for the next issue to see if your question is featured!

WITH THE GROWTH of racing across social media platforms, live streaming and YouTube, race fans have the ability to tap into racing around the world with just the click of a mouse, whether it’s live as the race is happening or raw behind the scenes footage from race teams; dirt track racing is thriving in an era where grassroots race teams can find themselves as well known or sought after as teams spending their time following a series around the United States. Joseph Joiner, through the management of his brother Jonathan, is capitalizing through the reach of a YouTube channel Hunt The Front to share their racing success to nearly 100,000 follows through their blog style recaps each week.

It’s through this unique racing point of view that Joseph Joiner and family have been able to chase racing dreams in the late model world and shared the exciting moments of their 2021 race season success with their fans near and far. Fans have garnered the opportunity to enjoy the ups and downs as Joiner has debuted at Eldora, tackled Bristol on dirt, share in the celebration of big wins like the Super Bee for $50,000, and the realities that no race team is invincible against. With an expansive point of view offered by Joiner and Hunt The Front, it came as no surprise when the requests came in to feature Joseph in our segment #DEAsks, where we sat down to quiz this late model driver on all the things fans just HAVE to know.

Dirt Empire: You have a substantial social media following and platform built with Hunt The Front to showcase the entire team, how did this decision to begin such an inclusive platform begin?

Joseph Joiner: Well, that wasn’t really my decision; that was my brother Jonathan and whoever else that all kind of came up with that idea. I’m just the guy that kind of gets to reap the rewards of getting to drive the race car because of it. I’m not really sure where exactly that really originated. I know Jonathan, it was mainly him there with the videos and stuff, and now I just get to find myself in the seat.

DE: While I am sure it was your goal for the platform to grow and reach fans that you might not potentially be able to meet during your time at the racetrack, did you expect it to grow to the size it has? How time consuming is it to maintain fan engagement at this size?

JJ: Of course not, you know there’s no way you could expect that. We’re just going to keep riding the wave and hopefully it’ll take us a long way, we’ll just see.

DE: The Hunt The Front team is largely composed of your family, does this make balancing family life and your racing career a bit easier or more complicated?

JJ: Well, the thing about it is there’s not really a thing such as family time anymore. It’s basically, if we’re together, we’re racing, so there’s really no weekends off where we just do nothing. We’re always busy racing and trying to make the best of family time while we’re at the racetrack. I mean, it’s working out, but it is a little bit different than what it used to be.

DE: What does a race day schedule look like for you versus a day away from the track?

JJ: I don’t even know what a day away from the race track or race shop is like. Honestly, I don’t even know how to not be working every day. I don’t know, if I’m not at the race shop or the racetrack working on something, I feel like I need to be doing that. I don’t think about much else.

Photo: Zach Yost

DE: How would you summarize this race season in comparison to seasons of the past? What do you believe you did different as a driver or as a race team to make the outcome so different?

JJ: I feel like this year we wanted to make ourselves a threat to win when we to a race basically anywhere we went, we wanted to be a contender. I feel like, we’ve done a pretty good job of being a contender at races, mainly at most any races we go to, I think we’ve done a good job at that. Of course, we

Photo: Zach Yost could always be better, and I feel like we’re doing as good as what we were expected to do. There’s still a lot of room for improvement and we’ll get there, but we’re doing okay.

DE: Having to make social media content along with preparing for racing, when these last minute changes occur, how do you balance ensuring both receive focus?

JJ: It just kind of goes together, the social media and the racing. If we’re not racing, we don’t have any content or if we’re not working, we don’t have any content. We have to race and work on race cars, and that’s where the content and everything comes from anyway. So, it all just flows that way because of the racing and the work it takes, there’s plenty to do all of the time, so there’s always news to report.

DE: The 2021 race season required an ability to roll with the punches and last minute changes between supply chain issues and COVID-19 creating a shortage in tires and difficulty finding replacement parts. Along with rising costs, how did you

Joiner running hard at Fairbury American Legion Speedway this summer.

adjust to anticipate these issues or try to prevent them from affecting your team?

JJ: It’s definitely present, mainly with tires and not being able to get new tires, you can definitely feel it. Right now, we have a motor that is just sitting there waiting for pistons before it can be put together, it stinks that there are so many things you just can’t get, and things that just aren’t readily available in the process. When you can get something, it’s almost doubled in price on a lot of things. It’s definitely different times we’re living in. We’re thankful for the YouTube channel and the fan base that we’ve built that allows us to continue to do these things with the rising costs and the availability of things.

DE: How did you feel about running Eldora for the first time? Reviewing how you felt going in, what is your post-race opinion of the things you anticipated experiencing or thought you should be concerned about?

JJ: I felt like we wanted to go there and look like we belonged there. I feel like we did that. Things could have been a lot better, but we went up there and did what we needed to do. We got in there and made the races. I wish we could erase the last night and finished it off and I wish we could have made all the races. But, with the motor issue we had, we decided to load up before the last night, but it was still a good time, nonetheless. I enjoy running at races like that if nothing else, and I advise anyone that hasn’t been there that you really need to go and experience it in person for yourself. We did well there, though, and I think we have a lot to build on.

DE: How does winning a large race like the Super Bee 100 and the $50,000 impact you as a driver?

JJ: I think that’s a really big deal, the Super Bee thing. It was a lot more of a lower key race, which just paid a lot of money. There wasn’t a whole lot of national competition there but there were a couple of really good national cars and a lot of regional cars there with drivers that were really good and did a

Photo: Ryan Roberts

good job. It made it really tough on us. We had to be good, you know. We went there and did what we had to do, that’s a race that we knew going to that we needed to be a contender, and we put ourselves in that position all weekend to capitalize on everything we had.

DE: If there was one lasting impression as a driver that you wanted to leave on the dirt track racing community, what would it be?

JJ: Just someone that goes to the track and tries hard, races hard, and does all that he can.

Photo: Mike Ruefer

action

CAPTURE

Photo: Kirsten Snyder

It’s a Frostbuster throwback! Mike Mahaney gets some early season air at Selinsgrove Speedway last March and busts some recently thawed mud clods.

short track

STARS

Sebastopol, California

Photo: Paul Trevino

JOEL MYERS JR.

CA TEENAGE TALENT KEEPS COMING

By Alex Nieten

IN THE OPEN-WHEEL world, California might currently be best known for its knack of producing talented racers before they’re even old enough to get a driver’s license. Kids barely old enough to walk begin by getting behind the wheel of karts to hone their skills. Before you know it, their parents are picking them up from their first days of high school and heading to the track so they can climb aboard a 900-horsepower sprint car. It often doesn’t take long before these teens are visiting victory lane, and fifteen-year old Joel Myers Jr. is currently on track to carry the torch of the developing west coast trend.

Kyle Larson and Brad Sweet are a pair of well-known names to have taken the path of rapid progression in California. The duo cut their teeth in the Golden State before ultimately parlaying their talents into opportunities with a variety of series across the map. A uniting detail of their careers is tearing through the outlaw kart ranks of California. The two accomplished drivers mastered the agile machines en route to many victories, and Myers Jr. jumpstarted his career by doing the same.

The success in karts didn’t come immediately for Myers Jr. The Sebastopol native faced an early learning curve and had to conquer the natural fears of a young driver. He first hopped in a race car when he was only four years old.

“At first, I kind of sucked,” Myers Jr. said with a laugh. “My first year I had a couple accidents where I hit the wall head on and it kind of scared me so I would do a lap and pull off.”

After moving beyond those troubles, it didn’t take long for him to ascend through the karting ranks and turn plenty of heads. While his age was still single digits, he claimed dozens of victories, sometimes consecutively.

“I turned six, and it was like flipping a light switch. We won a lot and traveled a lot and did a lot better,” Myers Jr. reflected. “I think it was my first year of having a new kart, and I don’t know quite what happened, but we ended up doing really well. That year, I went on to win about sixty races in a row and got two championships. That kind of set it all off and just went on from there.”

Like some other stars before him, acing California’s karting scene has led to impressive results behind the wheel of a sprint car. The fifteen-year old has battled local legend Andy Forsberg all season long in search of the Placerville points title. In only his second start with the Northern Auto Racing Club’s prestigious King of the West series, Myers Jr. snagged a podium. He very well may have earned his first win with the series at Petaluma in only his fifth start but contact with a lapped car while leading with only a dozen laps left ended that bid.

Sprint cars don’t have much in common with karts aside from a similar weight-to-horsepower ratio. So, Myers Jr. being the latest in the growing line of teens battling for wins against veterans twice their age begs a key question.

Photo: Joe Shivak

What exactly is so unique about the California racing scene that allows kids to translate their talents so quickly to sprint cars? Myers Jr. points to the plentiful opportunities with karts out west allowing kids to get such an early start at racing along with California’s leniency regarding age.

“I feel like if you go anywhere back east, there really isn’t much kart racing. It’s all kind of west coast stuff,” Myers Jr. explained. “Also, now you’ve got all of these young kids getting in them (sprint cars) because now the age rule has turned to fourteen. Back east, you’ve got to be older because its all 410 racing. California has kind of lightened up on that age rule more with 360 racing, so it helps younger kids get in it faster.”

In addition to offering a chance to start making laps at such a young age, the elements of kart racing may offer another benefit to future sprint racers despite the two machines being vastly different. The outlaw kart tracks are often short and narrow and require sharp instincts and a quick reaction time. Those same qualities are necessary for bullring racing in a sprint car. Myers Jr. has found his experience in karts helped him adapt to racing at one of the trickiest tracks in the country, Placerville. As mentioned earlier, Myers Jr. was at the top of the El Dorado County quartermile’s standings for much of the year.

“Placerville is definitely a different track for sure,” Myers Jr. said. “Placerville kind of races like Red Bluff outlaw karts and other go karts with how small and technical it is, how it races. It’s tight, and everyone is kind of aggressive toward each other, so I can kind of compare it to an outlaw kart track and take what I know with having to be careful around people and stuff like that.”

Moving forward in 2022, Myers Jr. hopes to build off already impressive performance and improve on his tenth place finish in the NARC/KWS standings.

Looking even farther down the road, Myers Jr. has some lofty goals and is eyeing a path aligning with that of Larson and Sweet. Thanks to their talents, both Californians landed midget rides with some of the top teams in the country. Racing on the USAC National Tour helped pave the way for even more opportunities. Larson has become arguably the top driver on the NASCAR circuit while Sweet has amassed more than 70 World of Outlaws victories along with three titles. Myers Jr. is firmly aware of the trend and hopes to follow it.

“I definitely hope to be able to try a midget by the end of this year or next year. I feel like midgets are what takes you now onto the World of Outlaws or NASCAR. Its kind of the road you have to take… Hopefully I can end up in NASCAR or running with the Outlaws.”

While he has a way to go, Myers Jr. has certainly laid a strong foundation for the heights he hopes to reach. The teen continues to display remarkable ability behind the wheel at the demanding bullrings of the west coast, and it is only a matter of time before eyes across the country begin to take notice. Once he grabs that first win, don’t be surprised if the dam breaks leading to many other trips to victory lane and eventually trips out east to broaden his racing. California’s valleys and fields may be best known for yielding some of the nation’s best fruits and vegetables. However, Myers Jr. is the latest in an annually growing crop of gassers that might prove the land is even more fertile for producing some of the country’s greatest young sprint car talent.

Photo: Joe Shivak