Jonathan Davenport shared what he needed to best Show Me 100 race winner Bobby Pierce after he notched another second place finish this year.

Davenport started third for the feature and quickly moved into second place and set a torrid pace right behind leader Hudson O’Neal for about the first 10 laps of the race until the first caution came out. Following the restart, the two once again stretched out their lead with Davenport drifting up the track to find a way around O’Neal. He eventually found his way around with a strong run down the back stretch underneath O’Neal. He got a good run through 3 & 4 and took the lead with 80 laps to go.

Davenport would control much of the middle of the race albeit, O’Neal didn’t let him get away and the two even came together as they started to get into lap traffic. Nevertheless, Davenport maintained his lead. After a spout of cautions, O’Neal eventually found his way back around Davenport through the outside of turns 3 & 4 with 55 laps to go. However, O’Neal’s lead would be short-lived. He slipped up just a little bit coming out of Turn 2 and allowed Davenport to jet past him down the backstretch with 53 laps to go.

After another series of cautions, Davenport would next be challenged by Bobby Pierce with 32 laps to go. Heading down the front stretch, Pierce gave Davenport a shot in the shorts and then dove underneath him in 1 & 2 with a slider. Davenport attempted a crossover, but Pierce found a ton of group on the outside of 3 & 4 and motored past him to solidify the lead with 31 laps to go. Pierce would not look back and went on to win the race while Davenport finished in second having to race hard to hold off O’Neal who rounded out the podium in third.

Following the conclusion of the race, Davenport spoke with FloRacing’s Ben Shelton saying, “It was really tough. The line moved a lot there until the very end. Hats off to the track prep crew. This is Lucas Oil Speedway. It’s awesome whenever it moves around like that. I wish it would have made that last change and would’ve pushed that cushion over the top because, obviously, I didn’t set up to run around the cushion. Everybody knows I’m kind of middle to bottom and we really made big gains today on it.”

“When we could run around the middle to the bottom, we was really, really good there,” he continued. “Once Bobby slid me there —  I was kind of messing with the laps cars there a little bit, not trying to be super aggressive, but try to move through them as quick as I could. And then he got rolling on the top like we know he always does. But then just the lap cars, they would just race me so hard. As soon as he would clear them, they would just move right back up and right back behind him. I would be right there. So that would mess me up in that corner and I couldn’t get a good leave through that exit. And so then I have to try to slide them and then couldn’t leave the next corner. Just the way it goes.”

He later added, “I should have been a little bit more aggressive early on in lap traffic.”

Davenport would reiterated and elaborate on these points while speaking to DirtonDirt.com’s Kevin Kovac. However, he also noted that the rain water that hit the track overnight before Saturday’s Show Me is what gave the track so much grip, “It’s traction from the heavens for sure.” He went on to explain how he didn’t set his car up that, “Obviously we didn’t set up for that. I thought it might get fast, but I didn’t think it would stay there that long. It needed to make one more change. I think if it would ever push the cushion off the top where we would have to start migrating back low, I think we would have been OK.”

“I mean, we were still pretty good, but I was just a handful,” he added. “I was way too tight and starting to bottom it out once we got all the way up to the wall. As long as we could run around the bottom or the middle, I felt like I was doing really good.”

He also pointed to the lap cars again, “There was two or three cars there. Like, I couldn’t believe what they was doing because I’d run in there knowing I couldn’t slide them but at least show them that I was there, and I thought, ‘Well, maybe they’ll roll out, do a little decent courtesy.’ I mean it’s 75 grand, we ain’t racing for peanuts out here. … But as hard as they raced [Pierce], I felt like they moved right back up on me, and, well, then that would kill me for that corner, because obviously, they’re not as fast as me and him was around the top. Then I couldn’t leave, and then the next corner, I would actually not have a run on them and have to slide them anyway, so that would actually hurt me even worse.”

Davenport indicated he wouldn’t forget the lappers like Cade Dillard who raced that way, “I’ll remember that. One day I’m going to get old and slow and they’re going to get better, so I’ll just put that in the back of my mind to race people like they race me.”

Davenport currently sits in second place in the Lucas Oil Late Model Dirt Series points. He’s 15 points behind current leader Ricky Thornton Jr. He has a 140 point advantage over third place Devin Moran and a  345 point lead over fourth place Hudson O’Neal. He’s ahead of fifth place Garrett Alberson by 495 points.

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