Driver Michael Norris enters Lernerville's Firecracker weekend in partnership with longtime area car owner Corrado

Michael Norris still gets a surreal feeling when he looks for his position on the scoreboard.

That’s because he no longer is searching for the familiar No. 72 from his family-owned team. Instead, he is looking for the No. 10.

Norris, a Knoch grad, has combined his efforts with his family-owned team with longtime area car owner Joe Corrado for the 2023 season.

They will be taking on the national touring drivers of the Lucas Oil Dirt Late Model Series during the Firecracker 100 this weekend at Lernerville Speedway in Buffalo Township.

“It’s probably been a couple years in the making,” Norris said about the new partnership. “We’ve been competitors against them for 10-plus years. My dad and him are really close friends. It almost happened last year, but we just couldn’t get the particulars worked out. We felt like it would be beneficial to both of us to combine our programs. It’s been pretty good so far.”

Norris comes into the Firecracker weekend in good form.

He won at Port Royal and got a second-place finish at Bedford during Appalachian Mountain Speedweek in Central Pennsylvania last week.

Norris has a pair of wins at Lernerville this year, including an impressive one June 9, when he had to start last after an accident in his heat race. He maneuvered his way through the field and passed Alex Ferree on the final lap to steal a win.

“I was a little flustered from the heat race, so that probably focused me for the feature,” Norris said. “Dan (Bauman) had the track in great shape, the car was really good and everything fell our way. Holes opened for me here and there, and it was our night. You take them when you can get them and try not to get too high. You also don’t want to get too low on the lows. That’s pretty much what we’ve been trying to do all year.”

Norris is one of a handful of drivers who are doing double duty. He is racing a RUSH series crate late model this weekend for the Bill Emig Memorial, which pays $20,000 to win Saturday night.

There is a new format for the Lucas portion of the Firecracker featuring a split field for preliminary nights Thursday and Friday with twin features paying $5,000-to-win each. Saturday’s 100-lap main event is paying $50,000 to win.

Norris has been the most successful local driver in the Firecracker 100 weekend. He won a preliminary feature in 2018 and 2019 when the race was sanctioned by the World of Outlaws. In 2018 he was driving his family-owned car, and in ’19, he was racing a car owned by Todd Cerenzia.

He could add a third car to the list he has driven into Lernerville’s victory lane during the Firecracker this weekend.

“I’d be happy with another prelim win,” Norris said. “I’ve never won a Lucas race. I just want to be competitive and represent Western Pennsylvania well. I feel that regionally and locally we have a pretty good group of guys, and it’s pretty tough here. I want to let everyone that comes in here know that this is a pretty tough area.”