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Schatz Looking To End World Of Outlaws "Slump"

Schatz Looking To End World Of Outlaws "Slump"

Anne Proffit

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Anne Proffit has worked in the automotive field since - well, not telling you that. She's been a car salesperson (before it was popular to hire... More

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Donny Schatz photo courtesy Tony Stewart Racing

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After winning four World of Outlaws Sprint Car titles in a row from 2006-2009, Donny Schatz has been in a slump.

Granted, it's the kind of slump most race car drivers would love to have.

Schatz, driving for Tony Stewart Racing, is looking to emulate his boss and bring it on home again this year.

A victory tally of 13 feature wins in the last two seasons might have pleased other drivers. Not Schatz, who averaged 16.5 feature wins each season during his championship runs and won the vaunted Goodyear Knoxville Nationals each year. His win at Knoxville last year was a bright light for a guy accustomed to whipping his competition.

"The last couple of years we've definitely been off our game a little bit," Schatz said. "You can't have success without failure because if you don't learn what not to do you don't know what to do. The team that Tony has assembled, we're all competitive people. We pushed each other to the limit and maybe even over. That same mentality that got us in trouble is what brought us back to the winning stages and having a dominant race car."

The focus is simple for the Minot, ND native. After his team ended last season by sweeping that Lowes Foods World Finals he has returned to focusing on winning races. "We're kinda just going after wins," he admitted.

Taking a cue from his boss Stewart, the three-time NASCAR Sprint Cup champion who won his most recent title with wins in the Chase playoffs, it appears Schatz took that lead: "Win as much as you can and the championship takes care of itself."

First he has to conquer the 41st annual UNOH DIRTcar Nationals. Schatz has won four of the 19 World of Outlaws features at Volusia's quick, half-mile oval and in 2009, he won two of the three races held. "Volusia is a place you can go and be extremely good or extremely bad," he mused. "It can set the tone for the whole year.

"Volusia is a big track and the conditions can be so different from day to day. You just have to keep as much speed up as possible." Sure sounds like Donny Schatz is tuning up in Florida as he begins that quest for a fifth World of Outlaws Sprint Car crown.