BAKERSFIELD, Calif. – Casey Roderick will make a cross-country trip from Lawrenceville, Ga., to Irwindale (Calif.) Speedway to race in the Sunrise Ford All-Star Showdown presented by the West Coast Stock Car Hall of Fame on Feb. 6.
The season opener for the SPEARS SRL Southwest Tour will pay a record $30,000 to the winner of the 200-lap event.
It is a West Coast journey that Roderick, a two-time Southern Super Series champion and three-time Blizzard Series champion, has been looking forward to for many years. With his recently formed self-owned program, it is an excursion that has finally become a reality.
“I’ve been trying to make it out there for the last six years, but we weren’t really able to make it happen,” Roderick explained. “What I have set out to do, with my own program, is to hit all these marquee events that mean a lot to me as a short track racer. I want to expand beyond all the tracks out here in the Southeast, that I’ve won a lot at. I have a lot of Pro (Late Model) wins and a decent amount of super (late model) wins as well, but I want to branch out, go out on a limb, and go to some of these bigger races that mean a lot.
“Racing for $30,000 is a lot better than for racing for $5,000. Even though we are going across the country, the racing is the same. We just have a little more travel expense.”
Roderick is very excited that an opportunity to compete at Irwindale has finally come to fruition. He feels that he has a great opportunity to win, in his Casey Roderick Motorsports entry, against a formidable group of competitors.
“With the way our program is, with the car I have, and the guys I have helping me, I feel like we have a really good shot at doing it. It is one of the goals I set out to do when I built this racecar, and we are finally able to make it out there,” Roderick noted. “I see all these competitors that I race against travel all over the place and do all these big races, I just wanted to set out and make it happen, and it finally did.
“I am really excited to get out there,” Roderick expressed. “I feel like we have a really good racecar. We’ve got what we need to win, it just needs to all line up right. All the local guys are gonna be really tough, and I’m excited to race against all of them. I’ve got a lot of respect for the other drivers out there, and I want to go out there and earn their respect.”
Roderick has had success in both pro late models and super late models. He was best known for his pro late model success, early in his career, but he has expanded his super late model prowess over the last half-dozen years.
He has pro late model championships at the tough Nashville Fairgrounds Speedway, Montgomery Motor Speedway, and a pair at 5 Flags Speedway. He is a two-time champion of the Show Me The Money Pro Late Model Series. He has pro late model wins in events like the Baby Rattler 125 at South Alabama Speedway, Red Eye 125 at New Smyrna Speedway, and two at the SpeedFest 125 at Watermelon Capital Speedway.
In his super late model, Roderick is a three-time Blizzard Series Champion at 5 Flags Speedway. His last championship was in 2018, finishing just ahead of fellow All-Star Showdown entrant Chris Davidson.
Roderick has two Southern Super Series championships, having scored nine career wins in the premier super late model series in the Southeast. Last year, Roderick scored a crown jewel victory, taking the checkered flag first in the All American 400 at Nashville Fairgrounds Speedway.
He is a Rattler 250 winner at South Alabama Speedway and a World Crown 300 winner at Gresham Motorsports Park as well.
Roderick will bring the Casey Roderick Motorsports Rowdy Chassis, which debuted at 5 Flags Speedway in June in the track’s Blizzard Series for super late models, to California.
It is the same car that brought him the All American 400 win and a car that he is very impressed with.
“We have six races on the car, including the Snowball Derby,” Roderick stated. “This will be the seventh, and hopefully it’s the lucky number seven. It’s really a Hamke car, but they go by Rowdy Manufacturing in name. It is a really good race car, and I would recommend it to anyone thinking of getting one. The thing I like about the car is that it is very tunable, and you can feel very minute changes. It is very well-built, and it is just a very clean race car.”
The former NASCAR Xfinity racer will be making his first trip to Irwindale, and in addition to his lack of experience on the track, he will face another challenge.
A vast majority of the SPEARS SRL Southwest Tour Series competitors will be new to the two-time CARS Super Late Model Series winner.
Roderick will be looking to bring home a victory in the event, but at the same time, he is looking to gain the respect of the drivers in the SRL.
“I’m excited to race against them,” Roderick said about the competition out west. “I want to earn their respect and race them the way they expect to get raced. I race clean and race other people like they race me. I’m not going out there thinking I’m gonna wax those guys. The guys are good, and I want to earn their respect. I’m coming to their playground. Of course, I want to win and do well, but I don’t want to do anything to bring attention to myself, by doing the wrong thing.
“You have to have give and take in racing. Some days you are gonna have good days and somedays are not your day.”