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Trent Gower Photo
The North Pole Nightmare drives by Macedo and survives Gravel’s late charge for popular victory
There might’ve been small earthquakes registered on the Richter scale in Alaska and Wisconsin on Friday night thanks to Bill Balog.
Balog did it. He finally made his way back to World of Outlaws NOS Energy Drink Sprint Car Victory Lane at Talladega Short Track, and the entire sport united in joy for the 45-year-old. Not a single fan disapproved. Not a single competitor wasn’t happy for their fellow driver.
After snowmobile racing in his youth and not getting in a Sprint Car until 20 years old, the Hartland, WI resident by way of North Pole, AK scratched and clawed and built a career in the sport. He racked up 10 Interstate Racing Association (IRA) titles and made the choice last year to join The Greatest Show on Dirt. This win was a culmination of that decision.
Sure, he had a previous World of Outlaws win under his belt, but that was as a local defending home turf in 2016 at Beaver Dam Raceway. This was in unfamiliar territory. Balog had just one prior Talladega race on his résumé. This was charging forward from fourth. This was holding off defending Series champion David Gravel. This win was everything.
“It’s unbelievable,” Balog said. “I can’t tell you how hard these things are to win. I’ve been doing this a long time, on and off with the Outlaws and stuff. Just unbelievable. We had a great car. We made the right decisions. I didn’t think we were quite good enough there a couple times throughout the night in the Heat Race and Dash. So, we did a couple things we do at other tracks with similar shapes.”
The “North Pole Nightmare” had to earn this victory by giving everything he had behind the wheel. A hungry Cole Macedo led the field to green in search of his first World of Outlaws win. Sprint Car titans Logan Schuchart and Carson Macedo started ahead of Balog in second and third. He wheeled his way by all of them by Lap 17 after a thrilling duel with Cole Macedo to secure the top spot.
But it was far from over. Gravel and his Big Game Motorsports team are at the top of the sport right now, and the No. 2 grabbed the runner-up spot on Lap 23, but Balog couldn’t be rattled. He stayed smooth, hit his marks, and held off the champion for his first World of Outlaws win in 3,177 days.
“I think we were just a little bit better kind of there through the middle,” Balog said of the early battle with Macedo. “He wasn’t going to cut under me. We were just really good on entry and could kind of baby it through the middle, and with our HP Engine, we could step on the gas and it would just go. It was awesome.”
Gravel settled for the runner-up spot as he and the Tod Quiring-owned team continue their early season tear. The Watertown, CT native has been on the podium in six of this season’s seven races, and the one time he wasn’t he finished fourth. His average finish is 2.29.
“I saw Bill move up the racetrack, and it worked out really well for him,” Gravel said. “Everybody was just around the bottom, so I tried it as well and got a couple guys. Man, those two lapped cars were hitting the bottom just good enough that I couldn’t clear them. Once I got clear of them, it seemed like the track kind of cleaned up and was officially one lane on the bottom. I felt like when Bill made those moves the track was still multiple grooves. We were just a little too late.”
Completing the podium was Logan Schuchart and the Shark Racing crew. They continue to piece together the foundations of a bounce back campaign after a subpar 2024. The third place effort marked their fourth podium of 2025, which already surpassed the total they had all of last year.
“It’s nice to be in the mix running around there with Cole for a little bit,” Schuchart said. “I knew I probably wasn’t going to get him in open air, but I was hoping once we got to traffic I could move around a little bit. That restart when Bill drove around the outside of me in (Turns) 3 and 4, I knew he was really good because he was floating the middle of (Turns) 1 and 2. I think I tried it one lap, tried to get the wing back a little bit and float the middle, and I definitely didn’t feel the same way that he looked.”
Brothers Cole Macedo and Carson Macedo completed the top five.
Chris Windom earned his second consecutive KSE Racing Hard Charger.
David Gravel claimed his third consecutive Simpson Quick Time in Honest Abe Roofing Qualifying.
NOS Energy Drink Heats One and Two belonged to David Gravel and Carson Macedo. WIX Filters Heat Three went to Bill Balog.
Cole Macedo topped the Toyota Dash after receiving the SPA Technique #1 Redraw.
Giovanni Scelzi won the Micro-Lite Last Chance Showdown.
The Smith Titanium Brake Systems Break of the Race went to Chelby Hinton.
UP NEXT: The World of Outlaws NOS Energy Drink Sprint Cars complete a weekend in the “Dirty South” on Saturday, March 8 at Columbus, MS’s Magnolia Motor Speedway. For tickets, CLICK HERE.
If you can’t make it to the track, catch every lap live on DIRTVision.
FEATURE RESULTS:
NOS Energy Drink Feature (35 Laps): 1. 17B-Bill Balog[4]; 2. 2-David Gravel[5]; 3. 1S-Logan Schuchart[2]; 4. 2C-Cole Macedo[1]; 5. 41-Carson Macedo[3]; 6. 15-Donny Schatz[8]; 7. 83-Michael Kofoid[7]; 8. 14-Spencer Bayston[6]; 9. 55-Hunter Schuerenberg[9]; 10. 99-Skylar Gee[10]; 11. 19-Brent Marks[15]; 12. 17-Sheldon Haudenschild[13]; 13. 23-Garet Williamson[11]; 14. 6-Zach Hampton[16]; 15. 9-Kasey Kahne[12]; 16. 7S-Chris Windom[22]; 17. 39M-Anthony Macri[14]; 18. 28M-Conner Morrell[20]; 19. 18-Giovanni Scelzi[19]; 20. 88-Austin McCarl[23]; 21. 32-Bryce Lucius[17]; 22. 73-Logan Julien[24]; 23. 40-Howard Moore[18]; 24. G6-Chelby Hinton[21]
For complete results, CLICK HERE.
