Dale McDowell finished second for the second straight year at the World 100 this year behind Ricky Thornton Jr. and he shared why he struggled to close in on Ricky Thornton Jr. following a number of late race cautions.

McDowell originally started the race in 19th after taking a provisional and fell back to 25th just 14 laps into the race. However, he began working his way through the field over a green flag run and was up to 17th with 63 laps to go when a caution came out for debris.

On the next restart he was able to make up a number of positions due to a number of drivers such as Brandon Overton and Tim McCreadie, who were ahead of him, heading to the hot pit to make adjustments. Nevertheless, he had found his way up to 12th with 61 laps to go when the caution came out again. On the ensuing restart he lost 2 positions and fell back to 14th when the caution came out for Garrett Smith with 59 laps to go.

When the race got back to green, McDowell began marching through the field again. He broke into the top 10 with 53 laps to go. He made it into the top 5 running around the bottom of the track with 34 laps to go. With 15 laps to go he got around Ryan Gustin and moved into third. As he was closing in on Jonathan Davenport to take the second position, Tim McCreadie suffered a mechanical failure and drew a caution with 13 laps to go. On the restart, McDowell stuck to the bottom and was able to work around Jonathan Davenport to get into second with 11 laps to go.

The entire race took a huge twist when a caution came out for Chris Madden and Davenport who dominated much of the beginning of the race went to the hot pit for a flat right rear tire. Ricky Thornton Jr. also showed his racing IQ when he decided to take the bottom line on the restart in an attempt to deny McDowell his preferred line that had allowed him to cut his way through the field. However, McDowell countered on the restart and let Ricky get ahead of him so he could dive to the bottom in turn 1. He was able to pull beside Thornton through the turn, but Ricky got a good run and cleared him heading into 3. Not only did Thornton clear him, but he dove to the bottom through 3 and 4 to take away McDowell’s line. That saw McDowell fall into the clutches of Hoffman who briefly took second with 10 to go. However, McDowell was able to eventually get back around him with 5 to go. But by the time he cleared Hoffman, Thornton had extended his lead to 1.6 seconds. The gap was too much to make up and Thornton went on to win not only his first World 100, but his first crown jewel at Eldora.

Speaking to FloRacing’s Mike Norris following the race, McDowell explained how the late race cautions stymied his chance at the win and besting Thornton. When Norris posited that he didn’t need the caution, McDowell said, “I don’t think so. I mean we don’t know. Just on depth perception I was catching them and I don’t know if I could have got to them. But I definitely had some momentum going. It was kind of like the tires sealed up a little bit and I couldn’t take back off on those restarts. I don’t know. I needed to carry momentum. We were lacking just a little bit of compliance and the race car was a little rigid. Shane said when we lost fuel load it got a little more rigid.”

“So I’m dejected a little bit. I’m bridesmaid, but you can’t be dejected with this crowd and the best racers in the world here. So I’m proud to be apart of it. And, you know, two firsts and a second over the weekend I just-. Man, I want to get one before I quit. Hopefully, we’ll be back next year. And it looks like we’ll be back next year so hopefully we can take another shot at it,” he added.

McDowell reiterated his comments when he was asked by FloRacing’s Michael Rigsby if there were too many cautions at the end and asked to elaborate on what happened, “I think so. I was gaining on them. When you get there you don’t know what it will do with air, but I was kinda running a different line. So I thought maybe the cautions would help me, but it didn’t. I couldn’t get refired. It was like the tires glazed up a little bit or something and I couldn’t get going. It took me a little bit to get going. And when I rolled under Ricky I just couldn’t pull off the corner like I needed to and/or I would have had to wash out into him, you know, when I did it, and that’s just not how we raced each other. So I kind of pinched it off and tried to pull off the bottom and it didn’t, it wouldn’t. So I did everything that I could do behind the wheel and Shane’ll take notes.”

“Man, these things are so tedious here. You make just little bitty changes and it changes a lot. So he worked his tail off all weekend,” he added. “So I’m proud to be here. You get a little-. Like I’m bridesmaid. But you can’t complain ’cause we don’t race a full schedule. And to race with these guys, man, there’s just the top racers in the country are here. And so what we do and to be up here I’m pleased for myself and the guys do a good job. The crew guys do a good job.”

NEXT: Chris Madden Blames Clay Stuckey For Losing World 100 Night 1 Feature To Jonathan Davenport