Thursday, May 23, 2013

Owens and Dotson Dominate Thursday's Warm Up for the Show Me 100


The Thursday night before the Show Me 100 has traditionally been a practice night for drivers to get their cars dialed in for qualifying on Friday night in hopes of making the big show on Saturday. This year however the Lucas Oil Speedway in Wheatland, Missouri, decided to make it a night of racing on Thursday with a points race for the Lucas Oil MLRA series and the change went over quite well with seventy-three Late Models and fifty USRA Modifieds signed in for competition.

If tonight’s Late Model show is an indication of what is to come this weekend, it would be a pretty safe bet that Jimmy Owens will score his third straight Show Me 100 title. “The Newport Nightmare” earned a front row starting spot by tallying enough passing points in his heat race and he simply drove away from pole-sitter Steve Shaver at the drop of the green. As Owens pulled away the race for second was interesting to watch, especially near the mid-point of the forty-lapper as Tyler Reddick eased ahead of Shaver. The veteran driver fought back though and put the 17-year-old native Californian back to third for a few laps before Reddick was able to complete the pass for position.

Reddick could see the leader Owens a full straightaway ahead of him at that point and while he may have gained a few car-lengths in traffic he was still way back as Owens took the checkers for the $5,000 victory. Reddick had put some distance on Shaver as well while Lebanon’s Tony Jackson Jr. did the locals proud advancing from eighth to fourth. Jack Sullivan was fifth, Billy Moyer finished sixth with his son Billy Jr. right behind him in seventh. A.J. Diemel, Don O’Neal and Earl Pearson Jr. rounded out the top five.

The top sixteen in passing points from the seven heat races qualified for the main event and then the top two from each of three twenty-lap B-Mains also made the show. One of the most entertaining races of the night was the third B-Main as Chris Simpson held the lead with Ryan Gustin in hot pursuit and Earl Pearson Jr. closing in. On lap ten the leader Simpson made contact with the lapped car of Mason Oberkramer in turn four and slid sideways down the track. Gustin had to turn hard right to miss him and that allowed Pearson to vault from third to first. The scramble also allowed young Bobby Pierce to close in and over the final three laps both he and Gustin used every inch of the racetrack battling for that second spot. With the checkers waving the two young phenoms came out of turn four door-to-door and it was Pierce who prevailed by inches to take the final transfer spot.

The Modified feature saw a runaway winner as well, but this driver had to come from the outside of row four to do so. Hometown driver Jason Pursley paced the field through the early laps using the lowest line possible around the 3/8-mile oval. The man on the move though was Matt Dotson who had started eighth and was up to second by lap six. Three laps later Dotson cruised around the outside of Pursley to take lead and then motored away for a convincing victory. Terry Schultz got by Pursley late to take second, Steve Muilenberg finished where he started in fourth and Jason Russell rounded out the top five. Sixth through tenth were Jeff Cutshaw, Rylan Long, Bobby Bryant, Jon Sheets and Mickey Burrell.

That will likely be all the racing for me as I have some other important activities to take part in this Memorial Day weekend. Stay safe and enjoy the Holiday, but be sure to take a moment and thank all of those men and women who have served our country to give us the freedom we so deeply cherish.

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