With the closing of East Bay Raceway Park and the shuffling of the Lucas Oil Late Model Series schedule as a result of this, Ocala Speedway, or Bubba Raceway, as some still prefer to call it, finds themselves as the presenters of the final week of Lucas Oil Late Model racing during the Florida Speed Weeks series. Five nights of racing will be topped by the fifty lap feature event on Saturday night. But before that, there will be four other nights of racing, the last three of which will offer full Lucas points while the first two shows, while being non point nights, are still nice paying events and tune ups for what comes later.
Thirty eight drivers signed in for opening night racing action with a thirty lap feature race to highlight the evening. At least seven more rigs were also in the pits with those drivers, for a variety of reasons, opting to pass up Tuesday night racing. One crew that was very busy was the Ricky Thornton Jr. team who had a new Longhorn chassis shipped to them over night from North Carolina and they were busy putting the motor in the car and getting everything ready for racing later this week.
One interesting moment in pre race activity found a pick up truck delivering six new Clements racing engines to the pits where they were distributed by a fork lift operated by Dirt Late Model Hall of Famer Rick Eckert to various teams waiting for fresh "bullets" for the rest of this week and beyond.
It was interesting to note that the banner that East Bay had prepared for last year's final series of February races with pictures of all former winners of that storied series is now hanging over the tech shed here at Ocala.
Qualifying of a quick race track saw the entire field within a second of each other and showing off a pattern that would continue all night, Devin Moran turned the best lap at 14. 361 seconds, even though he was the thirty fifth driver to hit the track for time trials. Brandon Overton was quickest of group one and those two would later battle it out for the feature win.
The format would be a familiar one for Lucas, with four heats and a pair of B Features setting up the field for the main event. Because it was a non point race, there would be no provisional starters and just twenty four taking the green. However, on this tight and oddly shaped track, twenty four drivers is plenty. Some good drivers would miss the main including Dennis Erb Jr, Freddie Carpenter and Donald McIntosh as the preliminary action was frantic. The strangely shaped turn four area took its toll as several quarter panels and spoilers were knocked off in that area as some drivers unfamiliar with this track found it to be a tricky exit to the front chute.
Overton and Moran shared the front row for the main event during the quick paced program with Overton taking the early lead. Moran and Carson Ferguson battled for second with Ferguson narrowing his car up some on that tricky turn four wall. Jonathan Davenport was looking for racing room after he started in the fourth row.
Luckless Brian Shirley had more bad things happen as he was running in the top five when he got a flat tire, triggering the first yellow flag and spoiling what might have been a promising night.
Overton continued to lead as racing resumed but Moran was showing strength as he closed in on the leader with Ferguson still third as Hudson O'Neal and Davenport battling with him for position.
The first long stretch of green flag racing saw Overton catch the back of the pack and they were tough to get by, all being fast and racing for position. Overton's pace was slowed and Moran jumped at the chance, making several serious attempts to get past the leader.
Finally, on lap twenty four, Moran was able to squeeze past and take over the point, just before the second and final yellow flew for a spinning Daulton Wilson who called it a night.
Moran would power away on the restart with Davenport and Overton swapping second before Overton reclaimed the position with just a couple laps to go. He made a final corner attempt on Moran but came up short as Devin drove home for the win. Ferguson finished up fourth and O'Neal was right behind him as twenty of the starters were still on the track at the finish, all on the lead lap.
IMCA Mod Lites were also on the racing card for both the Tuesday night and Wednesday night shows. An all star field of forty eight drivers, from all parts of the country, were on hand to race on Tuesday night. Their twenty four car field would find Riley Clem from Bakersfield California come home with the feature win. He was followed by Corey Babbitt from Texas and Ryan McKenney from Deleware.
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