1/29/2024
Hunt The Front Super Dirt Series
Josh Putnam to chase second Hunt the Front Super Dirt Series championship in 2024
Reigning Hunt the Front Super Dirt Series champion Josh Putnam is ready to defend his title. The Florence, Ala., native has announced that he will once again follow the regional tour in search of its whopping $50,000 first-place prize money. Last year, Putnam topped Milton, Fla.’s Joseph Joiner by a scant 10 points to win the title on the upstart series.
A tooth-and-nail battle between Putnam, Joiner and Hawkinsville, Ga.’s Wil Herrington, who finished just 14-points back in the championship chase, provided a wealth of excitement during the series’ first season. It also provided Putnam with a career-high $20,000 payday for winning the crown. With the champion’s pay more than double that in 2024, Putnam is eyeing yet another career-topping payoff.
The 35-year-old Alabaman picked up one series win last season, a $10,000 triumph in May 13’s Governor’s Cup race at Magnolia Motor Speedway in Columbus, Miss. While he wrapped up the Hunt the Front championship with a fifth-place finish in the tour’s final points race of the season at Swainsboro (Ga.) Raceway, Putnam had two wins and 13 top-fives in 47 overall starts last in 2023. The Swainsboro finale was one of his eight top-five finishes with the tour. After wrapping up the championship, Putnam carried that momentum to Whynot Motorsport Park in Meridian, Miss., where he won a Coors Light Fall Classic semifeature to open the doubleheader weekend.
Putnam, who will again steer a Rocket Chassis with assistance from Horne Auto Salvage, came close to victory lane a number of other times with runner-up finishes in Hunt the Front events at Cochran (Ga.) Motor Speedway and Duck River Raceway Park in Wheel, Tenn.; a co-sanctioned Valvoline Iron-Man Southern Series-Mississippi State Championship Challenge event at his home track North Alabama Speedway in Florence; and Duck River’s unsanctioned WinterFest in February.
Logic would say Putnam should fare even better in 2024 as he returns to tracks that were a bit unfamiliar last season. After a season-worst 27th-place finish at Talladega Short Track on Sept. 29, he showed his ability to bounce back by finishing fourth the next night. If he can make improvements at tracks like Florida’s All-Tech Raceway and continue to improve at Georgia tracks like Swainsboro and Senoia, Putnam’s consistency could put him in the mix for a second championship.
Article Credit: Robert Holman | Josh James Artwork
