Modified driver Ryan Watt didn’t take the easy road this season to victory lane. He went through three different chassis before hitting on the winning combination this past Saturday night at Grandview Speedway in Bechtelsville, Pennsylvania.
He started off the season with the same 2019 Bicknell that he finished off a successful 2023 season with.
“I got into the wall bad at Grandview,” Watt, of Boyertown, Pennsylvania, said. “It was so bad that I junked the chassis.”
After wrecking that car, Watt brought out a 2024 Troyer that his son Logan raced at Oswego Speedway during Super DIRT Week.
“It was fast right out of the box,” said Watt. “We got a couple of top 10s. Then we started to struggle. I didn’t know if it was the car or the motor.”
His car owner, Ron Roberts, urged him to try the 2017 Bicknell that Logan ran as a sportsman modified. It had gotten into a bad crash at Big Diamond Speedway in Pennsylvania.
“We made that car into a small-block car, in case Ronnie wanted to run it at Bridgeport [Motorsports Park in New Jersey],” Watt said. “Logan flipped it, but it was repaired. It had a small block in it, ready to go.”
Watt took the 2017 Bicknell out for this first time this past Saturday.
“The car had its bumps and bruises,” said Watt. “It had been around the block and even at one point had a big block in it.”
While it may have been a 2017, its setup wasn’t from that vintage.
“We set it up like the 2019 Bicknell,” Watt said. “It was good, but I wanted it tightened up more to put more drive in it for the feature.”
Ryan Watt passed a few cars from the top of the track early in Saturday’s feature.
“Then I went for the bottom,” said Watt. “I’m not known for running the bottom, but I went there hammer down.”
His decision led to a $10,000 win.
“We are fortunate to have a couple of cars to choose from,” Watt said. “We put the same setup on both cars [Bicknell and Troyer] — the same shock-and-spring package. The Troyer was a little on the tighter side. That’s the only difference I felt.”
Mike Adaskaveg has written hundreds of stories since the website’s inception. This year marks his 54th year of covering auto racing. Adaskaveg got his start working for track photographer Lloyd Burnham at Connecticut’s Stafford Motor Speedway in 1970. Since then, he’s been a columnist, writer, and photographer, in racing and in mainstream media, for several outlets, including the Journal Inquirer, Boston Herald, Stock Car Racing, and Speedway Illustrated. Among Adaskaveg’s many awards are the 1992 Eastern Motorsport Press Association (EMPA) Ace Lane Photographer of the Year and the 2019 National Motorsports Press Association (NMPA) George Cunningham Writer of the Year.
Photographers
The Outside Groove contributor from Macungie, Pennsylvania, has covered the sport since 2012. Sabo serves as the official track photographer of Grandview Speedway in Bechtelsville, Pennsylvania. Photography is a family ordeal for Sabo. He shoots with his daughter, Abby, at Shellhammer Dirt Track in Shoemakersville, Pennsylvania. At Grandview and other venues Sabo travels to, he and his father, Stephen “Poppa Pepper” Sabo Sr., capture the night’s action with their cameras.
