Written by: Dylan L Ellis
This weekend, the Xtreme Outlaw Series hits the highway and their destination is Paragon Speedway in Paragon, Indiana. Today, I will be bringing you into the know about this weekend.
With three weeks left in the season, the race for the championship and the $25,000 grand prize is tightening up. This weekend’s races at Paragon are going to play a crucial part in setting the championship battle in Oklahoma here in a few weeks. Friday is a $4,000-to-win race and Saturday is a $5,000-to-win show. The Xtreme Outlaw Midgets will be accompanied by 410 Non-Wing Sprint cars (both nights) with Bombers on Friday and Hornets on Saturday.
The 3/8th mile Paragon Speedway is similar to Martinsville Speedway with a paper clip-like configuration. Paragon is one of Indiana’s many tracks that host weekly 410 Sprint Car racing. The 3/8th mile-long facility is located 40 miles southwest of Indianapolis and will host the Xtreme Outlaw Series for the first time in series history.
DRN’s driver to watch
Jade Avedisian:
DRN’s driver to watch this weekend is 16-year-old Jade Avedisian. Avedisian resides out of Clovis, California and I have been very impressed with her season up to this point. This is why she has made the DRN driver too watch.
She has been on fire this year with 4 wins, 13 top 5’s, and 18 top 10’s. She has an aggressive driving style and sometimes that style of driving does get her into some situations she doesn’t want to be in and sometimes that aggressive driving does get her a really good finishing position and sometimes, the checkered flag. Since late July, her luck has either been close to her favor, in her favor, or not in her turn at all.
As previously stated, she has a total of four wins on the season, two of which came right here in Southern Illinois. Her first win in 2023 came in Du Quoin at the Southern Illinois Center in March.
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This was also her first race weekend with her new team; KKM, which made the win even more spectacular and memorable. She also won in Marion, Illinois at Southern Illinois Raceway in July. In my time covering races at Southern Illinois Raceway (SIR), that has to be the cleanest race I have ever seen run there. Full highlights from Du Quoin and Marion are attached.
After Davenport last weekend, a one-point difference was put towards Avedisian’s gap to McIntosh. Her ability to be able to keep up with the leader or stay in the lead in almost every single race is setting up a jam-packed finale in Oklahoma in October. Her team at KKM (Keith Kunz Motorsports) will be trying to capture their first championship in their first year together.
Avedisian closed her gap from 24 down to 23 points after an average finish of 5th place (7th Friday and 3rd Saturday) over the two days at Davenport. This weekend, she will be visiting Paragon for the first time in her career. The last time we witnessed Jade in unfamiliar territory, she nearly won her feature. She got the runner-up position (2nd) over Daison Purlsey on the final night of Appalachian Midget Week at Path Valley. She, however, won her first-ever start at Atomic Speedway after having a huge run on the top of turn four and stealing the win from Daniel Whitley at the line.
To regain the points lead she took after both events at I-55, she will either need to match or finish better than McIntosh.
Where to watch and find info
This will be a jam-packed weekend of racing. If you want to know more drivers to watch other than mine, you can find the rest of the drivers to watch at www.xtremeoutlawseries.com. You can find all the driver points and where the series heads next on their website as well. Make sure you follow the Xtreme Outlaw Series on Facebook, Instagram, and X (formally known as Twitter), and you can find race highlights on YouTube. Make sure to subscribe to their channel.
Tickets for each night of racing will be on sale at the gate on race day. If you can’t be at the track to watch in person, stream every lap live on DIRTVision!
What's after Paragon?
Excellent question! Where is the series heading after this weekend?
After Paragon, the series will take a week-long break before a three-day, Illini Showdown later this month on the 15th-17th. The three-day Illinois weekend includes Jacksonville Speedway, of which the series has raced before – then, on Saturday and Sunday, the series makes its debut at the legendary Highland Speedway in Highland, Illinois (Saturday) and Red Hill Raceway in Sumner, Illinois (Sunday). As the same with this weekend's events, everything will be streamed on DIRTVision! More information to come on the Illini Showdown as time progresses.
Information in this article is credited to Xtreme Outlaw (website listed above). The picture of Jade Avedisian is credited to Lee Greenawalt. The top image is the property of DRN.
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