CASA GRANDE, Ariz. (Jan. 11) — Bobby Pierce doesn’t really know what it feels like to struggle, let alone not win, while competing in the Rio Grande Waste Services Wild West Shootout. That’s how spectacularly he’s performed in the annual January miniseries over the last decade.

Which makes Pierce’s results in the event’s opening-weekend doubleheader at Central Arizona Raceway so noteworthy. He not only went winless in consecutive races — something he didn’t experience during either of the last two Wild West Shootouts — but finished a non-contending 13th in Saturday’s 50-lapper and couldn’t hold onto the lead en route to placing third in Sunday’s 40-lap feature.

A pair of losses certainly isn’t reason to set off warning bells around Pierce’s racing operation, especially with the 29-year-old superstar from Oakwood, Ill., facing the challenge of figuring out a unique track he’s never previously visited and showing decided improvement Sunday after languishing outside the top-10 in the opener. But after he spent several postrace minutes Sunday huddling with his father and crew chief, Bob, and Longhorn Chassis technical representative Matt Langston, the assessment he offered of his start to the Wild West Shootout made it clear success will come a little harder this year.

“We have some work to do,” Pierce said while standing behind his car in Central Arizona’s chilly, wind-swept pit area. “We have to get better.”

Pierce conceded that, as he attacked the 3/8-mile Central Arizona oval, he was pining for Vado (N.M.) Speedway Park, the Royal Jones-owned track that hosted the Wild West Shootout for the last four years. While he’s glad the miniseries has returned to its Arizona roots — a move that puts the action just 45 minutes away from the home of his uncle Larry Hack, who lives in Chandler, Ariz., and sponsors both Pierce and the Wild West Shootout through his Rio Grande Waste Services business — he can’t shake Vado from his mind.

“Like in my opinion, it’s good the Wild West Shootout is in Arizona, but I really miss Vado,” Pierce said. “I’m not saying this is a bad track. It’s not a bad track, and they’re doing a good job with it. I just … my personal preference is, I like Vado. I think Vado is the perfect track size. That’s my own preference. People might vary on that.”

Vado is also a place that Pierce came to dominate. He won 10 times in Wild West Shootout competition there, including two in 2023, four in ’24 and four again in ’25. His last 11 starts at Vado over the last two Shootouts produced eight victories and two runner-up finishes; his worst finish was a seventh in 2024’s finale after a late-race flat tire knocked him from the lead.

Pierce had Vado down pat, so arguably no one was more disappointed to see the miniseries leave the track. The home track-like advantage he had built at Vado was wiped away with the event’s move and Central Arizona has proven to be a bit more difficult for him to master.

A sweeping, D-shaped layout with turns banked to a healthy degree and a surface that differs from Vado’s, Central Arizona requires new setup combinations and driving techniques from Pierce. It’s been an adjustment for the supremely talented racer whose 16 career Wild West Shootout triumphs — he also won six times during the event’s 2017-21 stint at the now-closed Arizona Speedway in Queen Creek — tops the miniseries’s all-time win list.

“I just feel like, you know, this air is so dry out here, and you see how much they prep the track, but after like 15 laps, (the surface) just goes away,” Pierce said. “So what was kind of more moisture, brown dirt, turns to kind of sandy, crummy stuff. And I’m not very good on dirty tracks like that. I like a track to get kind of clean, but that sandy stuff, that’s kind of like, I don’t know, it’s kind of hard. It burns up the tires.”

Pierce said Central Arizona’s size is daunting as well. It’s listed as a 3/8-mile oval, but it seems even larger. There’s not much straightaway, allowing drivers to carry plenty of speed.

“It’s a big-ass racetrack,” Pierce said. “It feels like a little bit like (the closed) I-80 (Speedway in Greenwood, Neb.), a little bit like Moberly, Mo., a little bit like … what did I say a little bit ago? Las Vegas. Like, it kind of feels like (the Dirt Track at) Las Vegas. I’m telling you, it’s big. 

“And it’s just very demanding. The frontstretch has got that dogleg. It’s just a big racetrack. Fortunately, the weather’s been cold, so, like, we’re running good temps (helping engine life), but it’s just very demanding.”

Pierce was actually surprised by Central Arizona’s size and speed. In fact, it led him to park the car he ran on Saturday — he started 13th in the feature and never made any headway before retiring with four laps remaining — and unload a brand-new Longhorn machine that was equipped with a bigger engine. He had the car along strictly as a last resort because he was planning to debut it in Jan. 22-24’s season-opening World of Outlaws Late Model Series weekend at Volusia Speedway Park in Barberville, Fla., but he changed his mind because he was in need of more power.

“I kind of got to change my plans around on what I’m going to do (for Volusia) if I race this car, the next, well, one practice night (Tuesday) and four race nights,” Pierce said. “That’s five more somewhat nights on it there. Like, I don't really want to run six nights here and then go run three nights at Volusia … and, well, if you also consider the February (DIRTcar Nationals) races, that’s nine races at Volusia. That’s a tough way to start the year, on these big tracks.”

Pierce made strides in Sunday’s program, winning a heat race and leading the first 10 laps of the feature off the outside pole before being overtaken by eventual winner Hudson O’Neal of Martinsville, Ind. He slipped as far back as fifth but rallied to finish third.

“I figured out a line there at the very end of the race and it got us back in the third,” Pierce said. “So maybe if another caution would have came out, I feel like maybe I could have got (runner-up Mike) Marlar. We were about the same speed if I ran that line, but Hudson was pretty good. I feel like if the track still had some moisture left in it, we’d have been OK (to battle O’Neal for the win). But that’s the thing — (the surface) transitions around, moves around.”

Pierce anticipates that as he gets more of a handle on the technical aspects needed to win at Central Arizona, so too will the track-prep crew — comprised of Fairbury (Ill.) Speedway’s Chad Bauman, Lewis Breeden and Cullen Breeden, Kokomo (Ind.) Speedway’s Reece O’Connor and miniseries promoter Chris Kearns’s son Blade — massage the surface to create increasingly better racing.

“It definitely was better tonight,” Pierce said of Sunday’s conditions. “The holes, you know, they’re forming down there on the bottom (through the turns), and I think it’s because they cut down the infield (to widen the track), and when they did it, I feel like the infield doesn’t have banking, so you kind of run into (a situation where) the water goes down and sits right there when they water the track, and that’s where it gets rough.

“We’re going in there, hauling the mail, going 100 mph, right-rears are digging in, and it creates holes. You got to keep an eye on the holes and miss the holes because you don’t want to go in there at a 100 mph and hit a hole. I’ve done that both nights so far, and it’s like, every time you do it, it makes you grit your teeth.

“But it definitely was a lot more racy at night,” he continued. “ I would not want to be the track-prep people because I knew this would be a hard racetrack to figure out, but I think they’re doing a really good job. It’s crazy how much water and prep they do, and in a matter of like 20 laps (the moisture’s) already blown off again. Just this desert air … but they’re doing a great job with the racetrack. I really look forward to Wednesday night. This is two nights now where they got it more figured out. I think the third night they will have it even more figured out. They'll get multi-lanes going out there.”