Earlier this year DIRTcar Racing made a change to its scoring system that was believed to have an enormous impact on the Super DIRTcar Series this season. DIRTcar Racing had announced there will no longer be a DIRTcar Hometrack program for the Super DIRTcar Series Big-Block Modifieds.

Traditionally, in order to compete for the Super DIRTcar Series championship, drivers needed to run weekly at a DIRTcar-sanctioned home track. At the end of the year, the drivers' home track points were added to their overall Super DIRTcar Series points. When combined, those two points categories were the drivers' overall points for the series.

Watch the Hall of Fame 100 LIVE on FloRacing

Saturday, July 28 | 6:30 PM EDT | Weedsport Speedway

Without the DIRTcar Hometrack program, it allowed for more drivers to be eligible to compete for the championship and open more opportunities for weekly racing.

Drivers and teams now have the opportunity to take a weekend off and alleviate some of the strain associated with travel costs.

With 10 series races in the books, we decided to reach out to four of this season's top Super DIRTcar Series drivers to see if the change has made an impact on the series or not.

Erick Rudolph

Series Standings: 2nd, 811 Points

Rudolph, who currently sits second in the points chase, was intrigued to follow the tour this season because of the change. Rudolph hadn’t followed the series full-time since 2014.

“It made it easier to do,” Rudolph said about the change. “The way it’s worked out this year, I would have had home track points anyway. I’ve been running weekly at Land of Legends Raceway. I wasn’t planning to, but we’ve been running well there. Not having to have home track points, however, was a deciding factor to join the tour again.”

Series director Mike Perrotte knew many drivers would still run weekly but was open-minded to the change hoping to see more drivers coming around that couldn’t before because they had to have home track points to be eligible to be in the chase for the points championship.

Matt Sheppard

Series Standings: 1st, 932 Points

The current points leader and reigning champ thinks dropping the home track points was a bad decision.

“I think the change was made to get more people to follow the series, which I don’t believe happened, but at the same time the series guys aren’t required to run weekly,” he said. “But I think overall, it hurts the weekly tracks.”

Perrotte thought the change would not only benefit the series but would also benefit the DIRT sanctioned tracks. If drivers decided not to run weekly at a track, it would open the doors for other drivers to win and become local heroes.

“I feel like there’s no incentive for a track to be DIRT sanctioned if the guys don’t have to run weekly,” Sheppard added. “There’s a few tour guys that don’t run at a weekly track. They run here or there, and that hurts the weekly tracks. The original intent was to get more guys to follow because they don’t need home track points but that didn’t happen. I don’t see where it improved anything.”

Three out of the top 10 drivers currently in the points chase don’t run on a weekly basis at a home track and only two new drivers out of the ten have joined full-time this season.

Jimmy Phelps

Series Standings: 4th, 752 Points

Another benefit of not having to have home track points was to help with travel costs for drivers and teams and allow them to take a weekend off when need be. The driver of the J&B Installations No.98h machine, Jimmy Phelps, doesn’t find that to be necessary.

“Until you see a player in the series that isn’t running a weekly track and in contention for the points title, then I don’t think the change has any effect, which was my point all winter long,” Phelps said. “It’s not super necessary. Every guy somewhat committed to the series is in a title hunt at a DIRT-sanctioned track.”

Phelps believes running weekly is necessary to help a team’s program be successful.

“I haven’t seen too many guys taking weekly venues off,” he said. “That was the fear all track promoters had, but they’re all still committed to their weekly tracks. People still have to work on their craft. You don’t want to get off track with your program, therefore you have a home track to be able to stay in line. I never thought this change would hurt the tracks because guys still need to work on their programs.”

Peter Britten

Series Standings: 7th, 727 Points

So, was the move to drop the home track points a success?

Britten, the driver of the No. 21a Graham Racing Big-Block Modified, thinks the change hasn’t made any effects but thinks it’s a good move for the long term.

Last year Britten was a self-owned, one car team with just one motor, trying to compete on the series. Just like many small car teams, it took a toll on him.

“To be a part of the series you have to go to a weekly track all year and race against some of the same guys that run on the series too, so it’s almost like a series race at your weekly track and you’re getting paid nothing for it,” he said. “It devalues the series and isn’t right making people have to run a weekly track if they don’t want to. I don’t think a weekly track should determine how you do on a series. I think it should be separate from weekly racing.”

With only 10 races in the books so far this season, Britten admits the change hasn’t made much of an effect.

“I don’t think it’s done anything,” Britten said. “Nobody has jumped on board. I think in the future someone might though. I think it’s a good thing. Given the climate we’re in now, the numbers and cents don’t add up anymore. The system used to work well back in the day, but currently, I think DIRTcar made the right move. Forcing teams to run weekly is wrong. I think it’s an outdated deal. It probably won’t change the series at all this year, but it may help it in the future.”

Unfortunately, Britten has been struggling all year with severe back issues, which has played a huge impact on his racing this season. Britten was scheduled to run weekly at Albany-Saratoga Speedway, but unfortunately, the team quit early in the season. Britten has been to a majority of the Saturday night races at Land of Legends Raceway.

“My back gets aggravated,” Britten said. “With my back problems, it wasn’t a bad year for me for the rules to change. If it was a requirement to run weekly, we could have made that happen but we chose not to. Skipping some Saturday night shows just helps make it easy on my back.”

Britten feels this change won’t make a difference for the bigger teams but will definitely help the smaller teams in the long run to be able to participate and compete on the series.

“To be good enough, you have to race more than just the series,” Britten noted. “I don’t think you’ll ever get a guy that’ll win the championship that doesn’t run weekly somewhere.”