Danny Dietrich made it abundantly clear where he stands when it comes to drivers attempting to compete in races when they have flat tires.
Dietrich shared his thoughts during the most recent episode of Pit Bull where he reacted to Dalton Cook’s decision to remain on the track during his World 100 heat race with two laps despite having a flat left front tire.
He said, “At the end of the day we have some dumbass for safety that are absolutely not needed. Flat tires are not a dumbass safety rule. If you have a flat tire-. We’re going too fast to be dealing-. This isn’t the Chili Bowl. This isn’t things in that nature. These are full blown 3,000+ pound cars. They need all four tires pumped up. Even Sprint Cars in the same boat. You get a flat tire, you go in the pits. Late Models should be absolutely in the same boat: you get a flat tire, you can’t keep racing like that.”
“These things are way too expensive. There’s way too much on the line. Somebody could get hurt,” he explained. “We’re doing things that are trying to be safer for fans, which I agree with, but then we have dumb [crap] like this that absolutely needs to be handled and taken care of going forward after this season.”
“Flat tire? You’re off the race track. Go get it fixed. Come back out,” he declared.
Dietrich also emphasized that the decision to pit needs to be taken out of the hands of the drivers because they are going to make the decision to stay out especially when it is a Crown Jewel race such as the World 100 and making the Granddaddy of Them All is within arms reach.
“You’re going to have to tell him to go off the race track. He’s not going to do it on his own is what I’m getting at.”
To that point, Dalton Cook said that he chose to stay out because if he pitted with 2 laps left in his heat race, it was highly likely that his night would have ended given only positions 4-11 moved on to a B-Main.
“The way the circumstances is, I actually got to hear Dale, and he’s really right. The problem is this format don’t let you just automatically go to a B-Main and just try, do what you can. It’s like you got to finish, I think, 11th in order to get to the B-Main.”
“And I’m like weighing it out,” Cook continued. “I’m like, ‘Well, you know, I got two laps left. I’ll probably get passed. I might struggle.’ So I’m just weighing, ‘Like, dude, I got to try to give myself a shot. I’m pretty good. Car is pretty good. We’re still in the game.’ It’s $5 grand to make the show. I know I’m not going to be out there fighting to win the race. I know where I’m at on the pecking order, but it’s like we had a legitimate shot to make the show. And it cost a lot of money to get up here and do this. And I’m like I can’t just not give it all I got to maybe try to get it.”
“If I had pitted and came in and got a tire, there really wasn’t much of an opportunity that I would even have got that B-Main shot,” Cook elaborated. “So it’s like I’m sitting fourth. I can give up tons of spots and ride around like a three-legged dog. I thought I could make that happen. It just didn’t happen.”
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