Hudson O’Neal was the epitome of patience early on in the race, he bided his time, and then struck at an opportunistic moment to take the lead with 20 laps remaining to get his first Lucas Oil Late Model Dirt Series win of the year.
O’Neal started fourth, but quickly made his way to third getting around Brandon Overton on the top side as part of a third-wide move heading down the front stretch and into turn one. After that it didn’t take him long to move into second. He followed Mark Whitener past Clay Harris with just 46 laps left in the 50-lap feature.
From there, O’Neal settled in behind Whitener and began logging laps never letting Whitener get away from. A caution with 33 to go for a Michael Leach spin reracked the field and O’Neal was able to follow in the footsteps behind Whitener as they jockeyed for position behind him.
However, Whitener was able to put a healthy gap on O’Neal, but O’Neal began closing that distance and eventually struck at an opportune time as Whitener got bottled up behind the lap car of Brenden Smith. With 20 laps left O’Neal went to the bottom of 3 and 4 while Whitener went to the top. O’Neal was able to complete the pass coming out of turn 4 while Whitener got stuck behind Smith, who also ran around the top.
O’Neal would then pace the field until a late race caution came out for Whitener, who climbed the wall into turn four and ended his night due to right-front suspension damage. That wreck came in the wake of a heated battle with Brandon Overton for second. The caution reset the field with 5 laps left, but O’Neal was up for the challenge easily holding off Overton, who rallied to finish in second as well as Clay Harris who rounded out the podium. Garrett Alberson finished fourth and Carson Ferguron took it home in fifth.
In victory lane, O’Neal made it abundantly clear he did not want to see the late race caution, “Definitely didn’t want to see that caution. I felt like I had a good race car, but the top getting into one was so far out there and I felt like it really opened me up to a slide job if I didn’t get a good restart. So I just tried to focus on my restart there, made sure I kinda pinched that last tire and got as low as I could down this front straightaway and try as get as much separation as I could.”
“I really thought Whitener was going to be hard to beat. And he was running that top really good. And he was on the ragged edge. And I was just trying to pace myself. Luckily, I found this bottom down here in lapped traffic, and it all worked out, man. I’ve never won here before, so it’s such a good feeling to win somewhere new. And with some of the switches we made with shocks and everything this year it feels really good to get off to Speedweeks on a good note.
Brandon Overton was tickled about his second place finish and his start to the year as well, “We’ll take it because this was going to be our bad week track. We set fast time, I think, every night in our group, won two heats, and two of the three nights we were on the podium. So I’ll take it.”
“This place is just super tricky,” he added. “I think I had a winning car tonight. I just literally have been struggling so bad around the bottom them first couple of laps. I tried to poke my nose down in there and just let them go around me on the top. So just got my ass up there and went for it. It is what it is. Congrats to Hudson and Clay. They’ve been fast all weekend too.”
Finishing Order
- Hudson O’Neal
- Brandon Overton
- Clay Harris
- Garrett Alberson
- Carson Ferguson
- Frank Heckenast Jr.
- Devin Moran
- Brandon Sheppard
- Cory Hedgecock
- Kyle Bronson
- Dan Ebert
- Josh Rice
- Brian Shirley
- Max Blair
- Chris Madden
- Ross Robinson
- Brenden Smith
- Ricky Thornton Jr.
- Mark Whitener
- Daniel Hilsabeck
- Dillon McCowan
- Michael Leach
- Dallon Murty
- Cory Lawler
NEXT: Ricky Thornton Jr. And Koehler Motorsports React To Disappointing Start At All-Tech Raceway
0 Comments