Nick Hoffman is finally a winner of his home state’s biggest dirt track race.
The Dirt Track at Charlotte has been the premiere showplace for the sport in the Carolinas from the day it opened in 2000, and Dave Smith Motors World of Outlaws World Finals has been its signature event since 2007. Hoffman has fond memories of attending the event as a fan for several years, and it’s been one of his most wanted trophies in his past four years as a full-timer with the World of Outlaws Late Model Series presented by DIRTVision.
Hoffman has always had a knack for racing at Charlotte, as evidenced by his three World Short Track Championship titles in his DIRTcar UMP Modified days. That open-wheel success had started to translate to the Late Model as of late, as Hoffman entered Friday’s program on a streak of five-straight finishes of seventh or better at World Finals. But when he won his Heat Race and drew the Bilstein Pole for the Feature, Hoffman knew he had his best chance yet to finally break through.
Hoffman didn’t let the opportunity pass him by. The NOS Energy Drink No. 9 was the class of the field throughout the 35-lapper, leading every circuit on the way to the checkered flag. Ryan Gustin stayed within a second of Hoffman to keep him honest, particularly in traffic, but he never got close enough to go for a race-winning move. Jonathan Davenport got around Gustin for second with four laps remaining, but by then, it was too late to get to run down Hoffman.
In his final World of Outlaws weekend as the driver at Tye Twarog Racing, Hoffman climbed out of the car in Victory Lane surrounded by Twarog and plenty of other friends and family members.
“I have a couple great memories of sitting in those grandstands watching Scott Bloomquist win the Colossal 100 here,” Hoffman recalled. “And then Jimmy Owens was so good. Hell, there was one year that Jason Feger came down here and put on a show running above the cushion. That’s one thing tonight, they did a hell of a job to turn this racetrack around. If you would have told me four or five hours ago that it would turn out like this, I would have called you a liar. Pretty wild that it got slick and didn’t get rough.”
Behind Hoffman, Davenport and Gustin, Ricky Thornton Jr.’s bid for an eighth-straight Late Model win ended in fourth, while Chris Madden rounded out the top five.
RACE NOTES:
Chris Madden won Heat 1.
Dallon Murty won STAKT Products Heat 2.
Ryan Gustin won Keyser Manufacturing Heat 3.
Chris Ferguson won Jarrett Rifles Heat 4.
Nick Hoffman won WIX Filters Heat 5.
Trey Mills won Heat 6.
Tim McCreadie, Drake Troutman and Ethan Wilson won the Last Chance Showdowns.
Nick Hoffman won the Bilstein Pole Award.
Ricky Thornton Jr. won the FOX Factory Hard Charger Award.
Daulton Wilson won the MD3 Rookie of the Race Award.
Jonathan Davenport was the Air National Guard Second-Place Finisher.
Ryan Gustin was the WIX Filters Third-Place Finisher.
Ricky Thornton Jr. was the ARP Fourth-Place Finisher.
Chris Madden was the MSD Fifth-Place Finisher.
Dallon Murty was the Swift Springs Sixth-Place Finisher.
Max McLaughlin was the Penske Racing Shocks Seventh-Place Finisher.
Brandon Sheppard was VP Racing Fuels Eighth-Place Finisher.
Bobby Pierce was the COMP Cams 10th-Place Finisher.
Ethan Dotson was the Quarter Master 11th-Place Finisher.
Tim McCreadie was the Cometic Gaskets 12th-Place Finisher.
Jordan Koehler was the Quarter Master 13th-Place Finisher.
Jadon Frame was the ARP 14th-Place Finisher.
Kyle Bronson was the Arizona Sport Shirts 18th-Place Finisher.
Feature (35 Laps): 1. 9-Nick Hoffman[1]; 2. 49-Jonathan Davenport[10]; 3. 19R-Ryan Gustin[3]; 4. 20RT-Ricky Thornton Jr[18]; 5. 44-Chris Madden[6]; 6. 13-Dallon Murty[4]; 7. 8M-Max McLaughlin[11]; 8. 1S-Brandon Sheppard[13]; 9. 1-Tyler Erb[8]; 10. 32-Bobby Pierce[12]; 11. 74X-Ethan Dotson[25]; 12. 9M-Tim McCreadie[19]; 13. 114-Jordan Koehler[15]; 14. 81F-Jadon Frame[16]; 15. 5-Drake Troutman[20]; 16. 58V-Daulton Wilson[26]; 17. 28-Dennis Erb Jr[27]; 18. 40B-Kyle Bronson[9]; 19. 6-Hudson O’Neal[7]; 20. 8-Kyle Strickler[17]; 21. 14-Trey Mills[2]; 22. 5J-Braden Jones[14]; 23. 19-Dustin Sorensen[28]; 24. 1Z-Logan Zarin[30]; 25. 11-Austin Smith[23]; 26. 16-Ben Watkins[24]; 27. 5W-Ethan Wilson[21]; 28. 11R-Josh Rice[22]; 29. 20TC-Tristan Chamberlain[29]; 30. 22-Chris Ferguson[5]
This article was republished with permission from the World of Outlaws Late Models. The original article can be found here: https://worldofoutlaws.com/latemodels/hoffman-wins-first-world-finals-feature-for-20th-world-of-outlaws-victory/
0 Comments