Thursday night, February 26th brought the best weather of the week so far to the Ocala Speedway for night number three of the Lucas Oil Late Model Series. On a night when the track surface took a back step in providing the kind of racing that everyone was hoping for, Hudson O'Neal nevertheless was pleased with the outcome as he was able to drive under Kyle Bronson near the halfway point and then hide out amongst the slower cars and take the forty lap feature win worth ten grand.
The biggest story of the night was no doubt the track conditions that led to the kind of racing that we saw for much of the main event, and while I don't want to make too big a deal about it, it was significant in that it affected the style of racing we saw.
All week the track prep crew has been working very hard, trying to work with the new dirt applied to the track while mixing in the variables such as temperature, sunshine, wind and humidity, stirring it all up and trying to create a track that has bite, is fast but is not so fast as to prevent passing and certainly also not rubbering up.
So far, the first two nights have seen a very fast track that has made it a bit hard for passing, even as they cut down the amount of water applied to the track each night. The track was distinctly drier on Thursday as James Essex reported, "they took the keys out of the water truck." Unfortunately, at least on this night, that didn't prove to be the answer either.
Forty one drivers signed in to race on Thursday for the first night of Lucas point awarded here this week. Four first time drivers were in the pits while three others decided their "fun meters" were pegged and they headed for home or for the beach. However, the four that were new were clearly stronger than the departing three, so the overall strength of the field just increased. And while the overall racing was pretty staid and uneventful, there were several notable things that happened during the course of the racing.
The first would be the quick time award which was won by rookie driver Dallon Murty as he turned a lap at 14.232 seconds with the vibrations felt all the way down to Florida from all the Hawkeye fans dancing in the streets over that development. And while the quick time was excellent, ultimately the evening proved to be another learning lesson after he pounded the first turn wall on the opening lap of the main event and went off on the hook. This corner was the focal point of much action during the night and the Bruening Team would have two cars to fix as Tyler Bruening pounded that same wall during the first lap of a heat race and went off on the hook also. In fact, Bruening would later take a trip to a local hospital for a CT scan after complaining of neck pain. No further word on his was available.
Jonathan Davenport was one of four heat winners from the front row after he turned the quickest time in the second group at 14.448 as the track started to slow down quickly, starting showing some slick but still during the heat races didn't widen out as they had hoped. The true lone outside lane pass attempt was made by Brandon Sheppard on a last lap run at Brandon Overton during the final heat race but it didn't work and he had to pull back in line to salvage second.
A pair of B Features set the final starters for the main and with the provisional positions starting to kick in for this point race, there were fourteen rows of drivers ready for the forty lap main event.
And there was much craziness in the first few laps, even if the racing itself was less than scintillating. Things started out with a bang on the opening lap with Kyle Bronson and Davenport barreling into turn one, going for the lead. Davenport knew he had to make his move quick because the drivers felt that the track would soon rubber up and go one lane. Unfortunately, as Davenport tried to race around the high side of Bronson he managed to hook his outside quarter panel, sending Bronson spinning and Davenport slamming into that dog gone turn one wall again. Davenport nearly turned over and he reported after the show that his car would have to go back to Longhorn for repairs. Bronson had some nose damage but would restart the race. It was also reported that both drivers talked out the issue, there were no hard feelings as both understood it to be just a racing incident.
The race was restarted with Bronson again on the pole but turn one spoke up again with both Murty and Garrett Alberson pounding the wall with both off on the hook. This was a strange start to the race for sure. While under yellow three laps later, both Brian Shirley, running second, and Brandon Sheppard, in the top ten, both pitted for new rubber after getting flat tires and the top ten running order was changing rapidly.
With four yellows in the first five laps, this was not a classic way to start a feature but after that, things settled down with over thirty straight laps of racing. Bronson held the lead over Brandon Overton but Overton couldn't hold his car down in the corners as he put the reversers on and faded back.
O'Neal, who started ninth, had worked his way forward mostly due to others wrecking and disappearing in front of him and suddenly he found himself in second. He began to pressure Bronson who was having his own issues keeping the front end down and on lap fourteen, O'Neal snuck past on the inside down the back chute to take over the lead.
Hudson then pulled away from the pack with O'Neal soon catching the back of the pack. By the halfway point the rubber was building up, everyone "walled up" into a single lane right on the inside of the track and passing came at a premium. For a number of laps Devin Moran challenged Bronson for second as Kyle tried to make his car was wide as possible.
In front of that battle, O'Neal had managed to lap Ross Robinson but couldn't get past Cory Hedgecock and rode behind him for many laps but as long as he had Robinson for a blocker, he was in good shape. It is strange to see the leader back off from and not be able to pass the tail end cars but that is what was happening as O'Neal had to frequently slow to keep from running up the back of Hedgecock but there was no way he was going to attempt an outside pass at this point.
Moran finally got past Bronson for second but he still had Robinson blocking him from a challenging effort. A late yellow set up a three lap dash to the finish with the lapped cars finally moved out of the way, but O'Neal was not about to make a mistake and he kept his car nailed to the inside line and drove home for the win.
Moran finished second with Bronson holding on for third. It has been a couple of trying days for Bronson after having broke a driveshaft while leading on Wednesday followed by his hair raising opening lap incident tonight.
Ricky Thornton Jr stayed the course and moved up from tenth to fourth while Tim McCreadie used some early race openings to move up as he came from twenty first to complete the top five. Only four drivers failed to finish the feature and all four used up their cars on the first turn wall.
Racing will continue on Friday night with round four of this week's series.
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