Modified driver Curt Spalding finished the 2025 DIRTcar Nationals with two Big Gators, the trophy for the finale win and the points championship. He hadn’t won a DIRTcar Nationals feature since 2020, his only victory in the annual kickoff series to the new season at Volusia Speedway Park. However, that fact didn’t deter him — it motivated him to better his program.
“The first year I went to the Nationals, we won a Gator,” Spalding, of Watervliet, Michigan, said. “The next four years — nothing. That’s the kind of stuff that makes you work harder. We went from one Gator to seven Gators in a week’s time — that just blows my mind.”
There was no magic bullet to becoming a Gator-winning machine, according to Spalding.
“We worked for years on our program — we just didn’t find something last week,” said Spalding. “We took lots of notes in the past years, all in preparation for this past week. It’s the biggest race there is for us. All the top drivers are there, so our preparation was extensive.”
That preparation consisted of paying attention to the entire package that he brought to the DIRTcar Nationals.
“You have to work on every detail, not just one thing,” Spalding said. “From the engine combo to the body, to the aerodynamics, to the suspension, to the shocks — they all add up.”
Every night during the DIRTcar Nationals presents a different situation. Spalding said he had to be prepared for anything.
“You have to tune the car to each night’s track conditions,” said Spalding. “Sometimes you can be set up for the top, other times for the bottom. We knew we had to be set up neutral enough to go where we needed to go.”
Spalding works with his son, Tyler, on preparing his modified. Their Chris Terry-owned car is Lethal chassis with a Rhyne engine.
“We run little different engine combo than most, and we are always playing with different suspension setups, that’s what makes it fun,” said Spalding. “We work very close with David Stremme [owner of Lethal Chassis], and while we have different baseline setups due to different driving styles, it’s fun to work together to reach the same end result.
“Tyler and I, we do our own thing. We worry about ourselves and don’t get caught up in what others are doing. We stick with our plan.”
When it comes to the DIRTcar Nationals, Spalding offered some advice to those considering on competing in it in the future.
“There are no ‘little things’ when it comes to maintaining and setting up a race car,” Spalding said. “Pay attention to your own program. Your race car will tell you what it needs, you just have to listen to it. A little luck on your side doesn’t hurt either.”
While Curt Spalding and his son Tyler will return home with a boatload of Gators, including two Big Gators, he remains pragmatic about his 2025 season.
“Just because I won down here doesn’t mean I won’t go home and get my butt kicked at the next local event,” said Spalding.
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.
