Full Throttle

Thursday’s Super DIRT NorthEast modified series race at Middletown’s Orange County Fair Speedway will have a distinct NASCAR feel.

Carl Edwards, currently the NASCAR Busch Grand National series point leader and Jack Roush, his team car owner, are scheduled to appear at the event with Edwards expected to drive a big-block modified in the scheduled Advance Auto Parts race.

Edwards and Roush will be in the area for this weekend’s NASCAR Nextel Cup event in Delaware, beginning with practice and qualifying on Friday.

Also planning to be in attendance Thursday at Orange County are Nextel Cup Rookie of the Year candidate and Busch Series driver, David Reutimann and his legendary racing father, Buzzie Reutimann.

The senior Reutimann, now 66, won Super DIRT Week’s first two Syracuse/Eckerd races in 1972 -73 (then the Schaefer 100), once dominated modified racing on Orange County’s “hard clay” half-mile flat oval.

In 1972, the Zephyrhills, Fla. Native, who spent summers in Middletown racing his No. “00″ Dover Brake modifieds, won the track’s Eastern States 200 fall modified classic and the 1974 points championship.

The event for Edwards will be his second in two years. He failed to qualify for the DIRT series race last year, said Joey Barbagallo Jr., who’s providing a modified for the former USAC Silver Crown championship car driver.

“Carl was really upset about not qualifying last year and said he’s even more excited to come back and make a better run,” Barbagallo said. “In his first time here he arrived late and only got a lap or two of practice. That kind of set him back for the night as its tough to get around Orange County even when you know the place. He was offered a promoter’s option to start the race but turned it down feeling he didn’t deserve it.”

Edwards also has raced former USAC Silver Crown cars in Premier Racing Association events and is expected to enter Oswego Speedway’s PRA event scheduled Aug. 10.

Dover Brake, long-time sponsor of Buzzie Reutimann’s modified cars, will have a new Bicknell-built car numbered “00″ with “Dover Brake” on its side for David Reutimann’s dirt-track racing experience.

An even stronger contingent of name NASCAR drivers also will be racing on the dirt, June 6 at Tony Stewart’s demanding high-banked half-mile Eldora Speedway in Western Ohio.

The old school dirt upon which many of today’s racing stars built their status will play host to Stewart’s third annual “Nextel Prelude to the Dream” late model race.

The list of drivers which Stewart has invited are interesting; some have Stewart’s background and others do not.

They are: Juan Pablo Montoya, Kevin Harvick, Mark Martin, Bobby Labonte, Matt Kenseth, Denny Hamlin, Jeff Gordon, Kasey Kahne and more.

HBO Pay-Per-View will present the event live to the entire nation. Proceeds from the event will support the Victory Junction Gang Camp and the Tony Stewart Foundation.