Earl Pearson Jr. is on a roll as he picked his fourth straight Lucas Oil Late Model Series win Friday night at the Tri-City Speedway in Pontoon Beach, Illinois. This $10,000 win came in dominating fashion as Pearson led the entire distance in the Budweiser 50.
Pearson started on the pole alongside Billy Moyer, but it was fifth-starting Scott Bloomquist who quickly moved to second to chase the leader. The top five cars of Pearson, Bloomquist, Moyer, Chris Wall and Don O’Neal put some distance between themselves and the rest of the field through lap ten and as EPJ started to work lapped traffic Moyer and Bloomquist battled for second. One lap after Moyer slipped by Bloomquist, the only caution of the event came on lap twenty-one when Tyler Reddick slowed on the topside of the speedway.
With the Delaware-style restart, Moyer chose the inside groove and that allowed Bloomquist to discover the top line around the speedway. Fellow “Team Zero” ace Jimmy Owens went to the top as well and it was now Pearson leading Bloomquist and Owens with Moyer back to fourth. On two consecutive laps Bloomquist was able to make a run up to the back bumper of Pearson coming off of turn two, but he couldn’t make the pass. Then when he stumbled a bit on the turn one cushion that was all that Pearson needed to pull away once again.
As the laps wound down, and with Pearson way out front, the race to watch was for second through fifth as Bloomquist, Owens, Moyer and Brian Birkhofer were each working one of four different lines through turns three and four. Moyer’s line would prove to be the best as he came back to take the checkers in second a car-length ahead of Bloomquist while Birkhofer made a final lap pass of Owens to take fifth. Don O’Neal would hold on for sixth ahead of Dale McDowell who used a series provisional to start from row twelve. John Blankenship finished in the eighth spot, Jimmy Mars was ninth and Ray Cook nipped Steve Casebolt at the line to round out the top ten.
Lucas Notes…..Forty-two Late Models were on hand for the event and the series moves to the Lucas Oil Speedway in Wheatland, Missouri, on Saturday night for the Diamond Nationals…..Pearson and Bloomquist started side-by-side on the front row in the first heat and the initial start that saw Bloomquist take the lead into turns one and two was called back by series officials. On the second try it was Pearson who had the lead with Bloomquist chasing. I’m pretty sure that I saw the white flag wave on lap seven (some others around me thought they did too) and again on lap nine of the ten-lap race. Pearson’s win put him on the pole for the feature and before the second heat could take the green Bloomquist had driven his four-wheeler to the infield to have a discussion with the Lucas series official…..Wisconsin driver Pat Doar qualified well and started on the pole of the second heat. He faded to fifth at the finish putting him on the front row of his B-Main, but he could not stay in one of the top three transfer positions so he watched the feature from his trailer……Ray Cook started seventh in the second heat after flying back from Cherokee Speedway in South Carolina where his Southern Nationals ran an event on Thursday night. Cook moved quickly up to third only to have his left front tire go flat during a lap three caution. He went ahead and restarted with the flat and was able to hang on for seven laps to finish third….John Anderson started outside of Moyer in heat three and had the advantage coming out of turn four on the first lap, but when he slapped the wall with his right rear it was all he could do to save it and he faded to sixth……Dan Schlieper held off a last lap charge from Billy Moyer Jr. to take the fourth and final transfer out of the third heat……Mark Burgtorf started eighth and drove by series regular Brad Neat late to take the fourth transfer in the final heat race……In the second B-Main Brian Shirley appeared to have passed Terry Phillips in the final laps to take the third and final transfer, but Shirley was docked two positions back to fifth for jumping Mark Voigt on the final restart……The checkered flag flew on the Lucas Oil main event at 10:49 p.m……Twenty-seven UMP Pro (Crate) Late Models started their feature after victory lane festivities came to a close, but when one of the up-front starters spun in turn two on the opening lap six cars piled into him. As officials tried several times to get the final three rows to line up the way that they wanted them, we decided to call it a night……A solid field of UMP Modifieds were still waiting in the wings. The Modified second heat may have been the best race of the night as the top five drivers raced three-wide for several laps before Michael Long took the win ahead of Kenny Wallace and Dean Hoffman……The NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series was supposed to be racing just down the road at Gateway International Speedway tonight but a power outage attributed to a downed power line on a nearby highway forced the postponement of the race to Saturday afternoon. Take a hat, it is supposed to be ninety-five degrees!
The road trip continues, check back in tomorrow to see where we end up!
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