105 Speedway

Dispatches: Erb's become a fan of EAMS

October 30, 2025, 11:31 am

From series, staff, track and other reports

Tyler Erb in victory lane at East Alabama. (Tyler Erb Facebook)

Among the latest notes and quotes from around Dirt Late Model racing from Oct. 30-Nov. 2 with the concluding Fall Clash weekend and East Alabama’s National 100. Also find a listing of live-streaming video from specials around the country:

Terbo really likes it

Tyler Erb isn’t a fan of too many tracks in the Southeast. He’s never hidden his feelings about racing in the region.

But East Alabama Motor Speedway? The 28-year-old driver from New Waverly, Texas, happily includes the 3/8-mile Phenix City oval on his Fun Tour.

After winning Sunday night’s 52nd National 100 for the second straight season, Erb stood in victory lane gushing over East Alabama and its marquee annual event.

“It’s awesome to be here,” Erb said. “This is probably the fifth or sixth time I've ever been here … hopefully they have this event and keep having it, man. I love coming here.”

Erb’s success rate in the National 100 is very noteworthy. He entered it for the first time in 2019 and finished second to Chris Madden of Gray Court, S.C., a three-time event winner. In his second try, in 2022, he was again a runner-up to Brandon Overton of Evans, Ga., who won it for the second consecutive year. And in ’23 Erb placed fifth before capturing it two years in a row, becoming the 12th driver in history to win the National 100 multiple times.

The triumph, worth $30,000, also matched Erb’s career-richest first-place payoff, duplicating the prize he received for winning 2021’s 53-lap I-80 Nationals at I-80 Speedway in Greenwood, Neb., 2022’s Gateway Dirt Classic at The Dome at America’s Center in St. Louis, Mo., and last year’s National 100.

Erb’s repeat came after he started the weekend with two frustrating outings. He finished third in Friday’s 30-lap feature after being overtaken by Overton and was 10th in Saturday’s 35-lapper following a spin.

“I just had to quit making mistakes,” Erb said. “The first night in traffic I smoked a lapped car and let Brandon get by me and got flustered, and last night Brandon threw a banana peel out getting into one there and I spun out.”

In the century grind, though, Erb’s Best Performance Motorsports Rocket Chassis became faster “the longer the race went on.” Starting outside the front row, he ran second or third early, fell to seventh after pitting on lap 38, then worked his way forward to grab the lead for good on lap 83 from Dalton Cook of Smiths Station, Ala.

Erb was a bit surprised that EAMS stacked up a hefty cushion, which kept him from flexing his muscle until the surface slowed down more to his liking.

“You’d like to think we know what we’re doing, but I didn’t expect it to have a cushion like that,” said Erb, who beat veteran Dennis Erb Jr. (no relation) of Carpentersville, Ill., to the finish line by 1.274 seconds. “You could really make hay (around the top) … like Juice (Cook) and Jimmy (Owens) and them guys, they were just gouging it, and I was like, ‘Man, at some point this thing is going to die, but maybe it’s not.’

“I was just glad we finally got off that cushion there … and that was actually a really good race track for probably 40, 50 laps (at the end) there. I just kind of felt the cushion was dying, so I moved down. This was similar to how it got at the end of last year’s feature, and man, once it gets in that condition, I feel really, really good.”

Registering his 14th overall victory of 2025, Erb thanked his crewmen, Cody Carl and Caleb Todd, for their hard work and his chassis builder for whipping his machine into shape for the weekend.

“A huge shout out to everybody at Rocket Chassis, Steve Baker, Mark (Richards) all their guys,” Erb said. “I wrecked this car last week (at Whynot Motorsports Park in Meridian, Miss.) and had to get a little TLC done, and we went from Mississippi to (Rocket in) West Virginia and back (to Alabama), so that was awesome.

“Just a really, really good night. Good way to cap our weekend and we’ll head to Charlotte (for this weekend’s World Finals) and see what happens.” — Staff and track reports

Clinching perfection

Mason Zeigler lost to his pal Trever Feathers on his familiar turf in Bernheisel Race Components Fall Clash action. On Saturday night at Potomac Speedway in Budds Creek, Md., the 33-year-old driver from Chalk Hill, Pa., returned the favor.

“Trever came and whipped my ass in my hometown,” Zeigler said, recalling Feathers $20,000 triumph in Oct. 25’s Keystone Cup at Bedford (Pa.) Speedway, “and I had to come back and try and get him in his.”

Zeigler was on his game at Potomac, leading the 50-lap feature from flag-to-flag to close the inaugural Fall Clash with a $10,000 victory that also brought him the miniseries championship. The title was worth another 10-grand for Zeigler as he claimed the title by 127 points over Winchester, Va.’s Feathers, who finished third.

The triumph was just the second for Zeigler in the eight-race Fall Clash — he also captured Aug. 29’s opener at Bedford — that saw Feathers win four times, including three in a row heading into the series-ending Halloween weekend doubleheader at Georgetown (Del.) Speedway and Potomac. But Zeigler capped the series with a strong finish that began with a runner-up finish to Gregg Satterlee of Indiana, Pa., on Friday at Georgetown and a big checkered flag in Potomac’s Daryl Hills Memorial.

Zeigler knew he would have to deal with Feathers to secure the championship. He felt good about his chances as soon as he hit the track at Georgetown with a rebuilt Rocket Chassis.

“Trevor was just so good there these last couple of races, we really had to get up on the wheel,” Zeigler said. “We were so good earlier this year in this car and then I blew a tire out and got into the wall at (Pennsylvania’s) Selinsgrove and we sort of struggled for three races after that. I got to take hats off to my crew and (crew chief) Brian (Liverman) — they took this thing and disassembled it down to bare-bones and found honestly a couple of little tiny things that were so minimal that I wouldn’t even think would make a difference, and the first thing we do is pull out last night at hot laps and we’re two-tenths better then the field and I’m like, ‘She’s back.’”

Zeigler’s path to glory at Potomac wasn’t easy, though. He had to deal with nine caution flags that kept him anxious the entire distance.

“I hated all those early cautions, because that top was starting to get black and that bottom, I felt like (eventual runner-up) Gregg (Satterlee) was real good (there),” Zeigler said. “And at some point I was going to start taking the bottom on the restarts because I felt if (Satterlee) timed his restart just right he was probably going to get me. It was getting hairy. I didn’t know really what line to choose.

“I think there was one caution that I liked, you know. I can’t remember what lap that was, but then that one there at the end killed me because I started getting a real good rhythm and it just basically gets everyone a chance to reset and come back at me as I’m just finding my rhythm … but we persevered and we came out on top, so I guess that’s all that matters.”

And those cautions did keep Zeigler from having to deal with a huge amount of lapped traffic.

“I just felt like I really wanted to push it as hard as I needed to, but as soon as I’d see the lapped traffic out ahead, I’d really think to myself, I do not want to get bottled up behind these lapped cars,” Zeigler said. “So I would try and ride as long as I could and push it as hard as I had to to feel like (Satterlee) wasn’t going to pass me, but also not catch lapped cars because they’ve just cost me so many different times. Nothing they’re doing wrong, it’s just me as a driver, I gotta get better. Jonathan Davenport told me one time, ‘When you can see them ahead of you, you don’t want to catch them.’ So you know, I find myself starting to think a little bit now about that and it definitely helped us tonight.”

How did Zeigler sum up his enjoyment level after his 10th overall victory of a successful 2025 season?

“I feel amazing,” Zeigler said with a broad smile. — Series and staff reports

Back on track

Georgetown (Del.) Speedway hasn’t treated Gregg Satterlee well over the past three years. On Friday, though, the 41-year-old from Indiana, Pa., finally found the right combination of speed and good fortune to tame the big half-mile oval.

Outdueling Mason Zeigler of Chalk Hill, Pa., for the lead on lap 30, Satterlee marched on to score his first-ever victory at the First State track in the caution-free 40-lap Mid-Atlantic Championship Weekend feature for the Fall Clash series. The $8,000 triumph was Satterlee’s richest among 12 this season and snapped a stretch of four winless starts since his last win on Sept. 19 at Selinsgrove (Pa.) Speedway.

“This sport sometimes can make it tough on you,” Satterlee said. “You have some bad luck or, you know, get in a bad groove and things don't go your way … but we got a really good team (with) my crew chief Robby (Allen). We didn’t start off the night the greatest with the dash, we were a little bit off, but we made some good changes thanks to (Allen). I kind of just let him do his thing and our car came to life after a couple of laps in the feature.”

Satterlee, whose last three appearances at Georgetown — all for Lucas Oil Late Model Dirt Series events — yielded a pair of mechanical problem-induced DNQs (2024 and ’25) and an eighth-place finish in ’23, came from the fourth starting spot to battle Zeigler for the lead. He wondered early in the distance if he’d have anything for Zeigler and Trever Feathers of Winchester, Va., the winner of four of the last five Fall Clash events who led the opening five laps before ceding the spot to Zeigler.

“They fired off a little bit better than I did and they were kind of driving off and I was like, ‘Oh man, I'm in trouble here,’” Satterlee said. “And then I just tried to change some things that I was doing with the car and they started coming back to me, and before I knew it I was racing for the lead.”

Satterlee’s Rocket Chassis proved better than Zeigler’s as they tussled for the top spot.

“It was good racing with Mason,” Satterlee said. “We were battling pretty hard there. It was a fine line going too hard or not hard enough around that bottom. It was kind of latched up on the straightaways but it didn’t really matter where you were, just whoever could kind of get through the corner and back to it fastest was better.

“The track had a lot of character to it tonight, so it was a lot of fun.”

Zeigler said that settling for a runner-up finish “sucks” after he led laps 6-29 and felt he had a winning entry, but he “goofed up on the right-front shock and made it way too soft” and the setup decision doomed him.

“He just was better than them holes,” Zeigler said of Satterlee. “Early in the race, I really think I had the best car. I mean, I was just on a Sunday stroll, and as soon as the holes started getting worse, I got worse and worse and worse and worse. That bottom groove started really cleaning up and taking rubber, and getting in was just rough enough that I just would upset the car so bad trying to get in that I couldn't stick the bottom.

“I felt like if I just pinched the bottom down in three and four protecting, or one and two, he was just gonna roll me on the outside. So I got to the point where I was just pinching and pinching and pinching trying to focus on defense driving (but) at the end of the day he just had a better car and could get through the hole so hats off to those guys.”

Zeigler also acknowledged that he couldn’t quite let it all hang out with his eyes on the inaugural Fall Clash championship, which he’ll look to clinch in Saturday’s series finale at Potomac Speedway in Budds Creek, Md.

“At the end of the day we want to win the points and we’re trying to be as consistent as we can, but anyone who was watching tonight knows I was here to win and I was giving all I had,” Zeigler said. “But I actually had to check myself whenever we got to that lapped car. I was like, ‘Damn, don’t … we got to points race a little bit here too. Don’t do anything stupid.’” — Staff and series reports

Troutman’s near-misses

Every driver loves to talk about the races they won. But often the races that drivers can recall in even greater detail are those they almost won.

The high point of Drake Troutman’s debut season with the World of Outlaws Real American Beer Late Model Series undoubtedly came in June at I-55 Federated Raceway Park in Pevely, Mo., the site of his first WoO victory. But had things gone a little differently one year ago at The Dirt Track at Charlotte, that crowning moment could have come seven months earlier.

Against a field of more than 60 of the toughest competitors Late Model racing has to offer, the then 19-year-old Hyndman, Pa., driver earned the pole position in a World Finals preliminary in Concord, N.C. Troutman held his own early on, keeping names like Ricky Thornton Jr., Chris Madden and Mike Marlar at bay for the first 22 circuits.

It wasn’t meant to be that night though, as Thornton eventually found a way by and cruised home to the checkers, leaving Troutman with a career-best second.

“I could tell you every lap about it,” Troutman said. “You don’t really sit back and think about the ones that you won, you think about the ones that you feel like got away. I felt like that was one that could have been a pretty big break for us.

“We went down there, had a motor that was about lapped out, she was getting pretty wore out. I feel like that was definitely one that got away, but we were still ecstatic at the time with the results that weekend. It was a solid weekend all around. I feel like this year, we’re going in a lot more prepared, better equipment. Hopefully, this year we can get her done.”

Showings like that in his own equipment caught the eye of G.R. Smith, who named Troutman as the newest driver for Team 22 Motorsports for 2025. Armed with another year of experience on the road and the best equipment he’s ever had, Troutman signed up for his first full World of Outlaws campaign intending to make waves. He’s done exactly that, scoring three Late Model wins on the year between the World of Outlaws and the DIRTcar Summer Nationals, and enters next weekend’s Charlotte action seventh in the standings with a 166-point lead in the MD3 Rookie of the Year chase.

“I felt like in a lot of aspects, we definitely met or surpassed our expectations,” Troutman said. “Over the last month or so, two months, we’ve been struggling here a little bit, but we changed some stuff around in our program and were able to get things going again. We had a lot of speed this past weekend down there at Whynot (Motorsports Park in Meridian, Miss., for the unsanctioned Coors Light Fall Classic), just didn’t have a whole lot of luck to go with it.

“I think we’re all pretty happy and pretty excited for next year. We’ve got a little bit more of an idea on what we need to do to be better. That’s the biggest thing, just every year, try to keep on growing. We’re all young, it’s a young team, and even G.R.’s a young car owner. Every year, we’re going to try to be better, and G.R. has definitely done a good job at giving us the right equipment to get out here and do this deal to the fullest.’

Troutman is set to debut a brand-new Longhorn Chassis at Charlotte. The team has also picked up local support from LakeHouse Wine Bar & Grill on nearby Lake Norman, which will be adorned on the side of Troutman’s new black ride throughout the week.

“Even though we only race (at Charlotte) one time a year, this is about as close as we get to (Smith’s) house,” Troutman said. “This weekend is really special to the whole race team, and aside from that, there’s probably 20,000-30,000 people there. It’s definitely a really important weekend to take in, and you want to run good, you want to come with your best. I try to do that every weekend, but I feel like there’s definitely a little bit more effort to put in for this race.” — Spence Smithback