Mike Spatola’s been coming to The Dome at America’s Center since the very first Castrol Gateway Dirt Nationals in 2016 and has put forth respectable showings over the years, even finishing on the podium on his prelim night in 2019.

“Yeah, we’ve came to them all and always seemed to have decent car,” Spatola said. “We just, when we get in the race, we run on fifth to 10th, that range and don’t ever really tear it up. It seems like the ones we didn't make the show were because I got caught up from someone else's wreck.”

But the 34-year-old’s frequently walked away from The Dome with the feeling that there’s more he can do as a racer to maximize his performances. Preparing for this year’s eighth running of the indoor spectacle, specifically watching old highlights and races from the indoor fifth-mile oval, the Manhattan, Ill., driver had finally figured out where he’s lacked.

“I watched back all the videos the last couple weeks just trying to figure out what we need to do with the car,” Spatola said. “The one common denominator was, like, every video I watched (gave me the impression of), ‘Man, you just don't drive.’ Like, you have to get up on the wheel.”

“That's what these guys are doing. So, yeah, I mean, that's what I came here and intended to do.”

On Thursday’s opening prelim night, Spatola rode his mantra of getting up on the wheel to Gateway Dirt Nationals victory lane as he outlasted Ashton Winger and Brandon Sheppard for the $5,000 victory and Gateway Arch trophy. While Spatola went virtually unchallenged in the 25-lap prelim he controlled from start to finish from the pole, his real winning move really transpired in his heat race.

Spatola pulled off a sporty last-lap pass of Joseph Joiner, who had led the first seven laps until a caution staged a one-lap dash to the finish, that required the 2023 Fairbury (Ill.) Speedway track champ to drive harder than he’s ever had at the Dome. While Joiner restarted low, Spatola hung wide on the single-file restart and crossed Joiner over entering turn one, finding a window to slingshot past the Hunt the Front driver and complete the slider.

“The last (caution) played in my favor, but I was wanting to do that because I could see he was entering three really high,” Spatola said. “Then he was turning across the track slowly to block the bottom lane and try to drag race off, but there really was nothing there to go down the straightway good.

“I was wanting to do it (when we were restarting) two-wide, but I was like, ‘Man, if it doesn't work, this guy just chose the inside, and I could go to fifth really quick.’ So when the caution finally came out and they said we were going single-file, I'm like, ‘All right, this is it, this is my shot. If I can a lay out there and get a run and slide him.’

“We don't start on the pole, I highly doubt we win that race. We had a really good car and everything, but this track position is everything. It usually is here.”

Spatola’s right-rear quarterpanel wasn’t as abused and tattered as some others, but he still didn’t want to come away from another Dome feature questioning why he didn’t drive harder.

“We blew the deck out of it in the heat and the feature,” Spatola said. “But we got the trophy and the check and we can fix it.

“The difference between running the top and not using the wall — like running right below it, compared to laying on it, getting your right foot on it, knocking the right-rear in where you can get your your tire on the wall — man, it’s about a second a lap time it feels like. That's what I learned tonight. You have to get your right-rear up on the concrete, and that’s what we did. It worked out.”

Not missing a Dome event has given Spatola a first-hand look at how the indoor spectacle has evolved. He remembers the first year that “everyone came because you just wanted to be a part of it” and that his point of view was “we're racing indoors, at least it’s going to be cool” no matter how things went.

“A lot of people didn't think it’d work, a lot of people did,” said Spatola, who went to add that “by year two or three, some people quit coming because it was just hard on equipment.”

“Like I just said this whole interview, you have to knock the deck out to be fast,” Spatola continued. “So it's just hard. People are like, ‘I'm not gonna do that to my car.’ But now I think it's got to a point where you see these big names coming back because of the event it has turned into.”

Spatola, who’s also a frequent competitor at Eldora Speedway’s major events, puts the Gateway Dirt Nationals comfortably at No. 3 on his personal list of major events.

“This is, I would say, behind the World and the Dream,” Spatola said. “This is the biggest stage. I mean, I don't know attendance at any of those races, but from racing at them all, this is where everyone is. And those who aren’t here, they're watching at home. I mean, everybody's watching Flo. Everybody's here. This, it’s become an event where it doesn't have to pay the most money or anything like that, it’s just all eyes are on it.” 

In eight years racing the Gateway Dirt Nationals, he’s qualified for nine of 15 total features, counting prelims, and has now qualified for four Saturday main events. Twice he’s qualified for Saturday's finale by virtue of locking into the top-three on preliminary night.

This year’s outright lock-in start for the Saturday finale is a little sweeter because he hasn’t the smoothest season overall. Spatola does have five victories now over his last 11 races, including two being $2,500 victories at Fairbury (Ill.) Speedway and another a $5,000 XR Super Series payday at Kokomo (Ind.) Speedway, but despite that he says “it's actually been probably one of my worst years in racing.”

“We just started off slow. We’ve had a lot of bad luck,” Spatola said. “It’s been bad with our motor program this year. We’ve had motors that were outdated and not really competitive. Being outdated, they started to break. We were probably waiting four or five races and had mechanical failures leading them. “

While Spatola’s in good position to better his best career Saturday finish of fifth in 2022, he thinks, if all the cards fall his way, he’ll have a legitimate chance at bagging the $30,000 payday.

“Yeah, we're gonna try, we're gonna give it everything we have. I think we got we got the equipment. We got the car, the motor. Like I said earlier, track position here is a lot of luck and play with lapped traffic and all that. I think I got a real lucky tonight with lapped traffic.

“We're gonna give it 100 percent. Hopefully you're interviewing me again.”