~ By Tom Boggie

When Albany-Saratoga Speedway opens the pit gates for its 57th season of racing Friday, one of the invaders who will be coming through the gate will be Matt Sheppard.

There isn’t a dirt track racing fan alive who doesn’t know the name Matt Sheppard. The Savannah, N.Y. native comes to Malta with 424 career wins, and is an eight-time Super DIRT Series champion. So far this year, he’s won two races that paid $25,000 to win. And he’s no stranger to Albany-Saratoga Speedway.

Sheppard spent the 2007 season at Albany-Saratoga, driving for Hall of Fame owner Randy Ross (that was Sheppard’s first year in a big block after campaigning sportsman and 358 modifieds), and recorded his first career win at Albany-Saratoga on June 22 that year.

Since then, he’s always come to Malta for the big-dollar shows. But the thing that amazes me is that he’s only managed to get to victory lane on two other occasions. He won the “Stampede at ‘Toga” in 2017, driving the Vic Coffey-owned Sweeteners Plus car, and won “The Tribute,” which celebrated the careers of both Jack Johnson and C.D. Coville, in 2018.

Prior to making Albany-Saratoga Speedway his Friday night home in 2007, Sheppard had been running the Ross No. 44 at Brewerton and Fulton, so there was a big learning curve when he made the switch to Malta.

He was also running against some incredibly tough competition in 2007. Ken Tremont Jr. won five features at Malta that year, Brett Hearn had four wins and Ronnie Johnson had three. Sheppard also had two runner-up finishes that year, finishing behind Mike Ronca on July 13 and behind Tremont the next week. Throw in a pair of thirds, and he had six podium finishes in 2007.

After 2007, his visits to Malta were sporadic, but very successful. There was one stretch during Sheppard’s career when he had nine consecutive top-three finishes at Albany-Saratoga. That run started in 2014, when the rain-delayed “Big Show 6” was completed. Promoter Lyle DeVore threw in a regular-distance 35-lapper so the big-block drivers wouldn’t be hauling in just to finish “Big Show” and Sheppard finished third in both races.

Three must be his favorite number, because he finished third in “Big Show 7” in 2015, third in “Big Show 8” in 2016 and third in “Big Show 9” in 2017.

But the 2017 season also included his win in “Stampede at ‘Toga,” which carried a winner’s payoff of $4.000.

Sheppard showed up for the 2018 season opener, which paid $7,500 to win, and put on a wild side-by-side late battle with Tim McCreadie, with McCreadie getting the win coming out of the fourth turn on the final lap.

Two months later, Sheppard took the checkered flag in “The Tribute,” earning $6,112, and he again provided some late-race drama, as his car began to smoke with two laps left. “I’m glad the race ended when it did,” he said later. “We must have broken an oil line or something. There’s oil leaking all over the place.”

Two weeks later, Sheppard’s run of podium finishes ended in bizarre fashion in “Big Show 10”. Sheppard started on the pole and because of a long green flag run, opened up a seven-second lead. But with just five laps left, a lapped car driven by Wllly Decker got into the rear of Sheppard’s car between the first and second turns, dropping Sheppard to a 12th place finish.

Two stops at Malta in 2019 produced finishes of fifth and fourth, and he came across the finish line ninth in the DIRTcar OktoberFAST series race in 2020 before getting back to the podium last year, finishing third in the Super DIRT Series 100-lapper at Malta Massive Weekend.

Overall, Sheppard’s best year was in 2017, when he won 41 races, including sweeping the 358 and big block races at Oswego during Super DIRT Week. And yet, he’s only got those three wins at Albany-Saratoga. That definitely says something about the competition at Malta.

NOTES
Thanks to the generosity of longtime Albany-Saratoga sponsor Bart DeRocha, there will some serious money on the line for the modified drivers at Friday’s opener, including $6,500 to win. DeRocha has put up a $200 bonus for heat race winners, a $300 bonus for the driver who gains the most spots in the feature and a $500 bonus to the winner if he starts 15th or deeper in the field.

DeVore announced Wednesday that the feature will be 40 laps, which will make for some hard charging.

Wow, it’s hard to keep up with all these purse increases. On Thursday morning, West End Towing kicked up the winner’s share of Friday’s sportsman purse to $2,000.

While the focus will be on the modifieds, Tim Hartman Jr. will be trying to make history. Hartman Jr. and Mike Ballestero are tied at the top of the all-time sportsman win list with 32 victories. Ballestero is in position to play spoiler, however, as he came out of retirement a couple of years ago to resume his racing career. Although he hasn’t won a race at Albany-Saratoga since 2008 (Hartman Jr. didn’t get his first career win until 2009), Ballestero pulled off a stunner earlier this season, winning one of the sportsman features at All Tech Speedway in South Carolina in February. He crossed the finish line second to Brian Calabrese, but Calabrese was disqualified for a rocker arm infraction.

One of the young drivers to keep an eye on this season at Albany-Saratoga is sportsman competitor Brock “Bam Bam” Pinkerous. Pinkerous turned 12 (yes, I said 12) on Feb. 26 while the team was racing in South Carolina, and he celebrated his birthday by winning a qualifying race, picking up a check for $500.

While researching Sheppard’s history at Albany-Saratoga, it reminded me of some other drivers who pulled in for a season and then were gone. Robbie Green won four races in 1993 before promoter C.J. Richards decided to switch back to big blocks, Alan Johnson won three features in 1995 while driving for Dennis Tremont, and Jeff Heotzler picked up four wins in the Reclamation car in 1997.

Weather permitting, Lebanon Valley Speedway will be holding a practice session from 4-8 p.m. Saturday.