Morton Wins During Rain-Shortened Wheatland Program

JC Morton in action at Lucas Oil Speedway. (GSS Media photo)

WHEATLAND, Mo. – Lucas Oil Speedway was only able to complete one of its five scheduled weekly division features on Saturday night before rain postponed the remainder of the program.

J.C. Morton rallied from sixth at the start to capture the 20-lap Hermitage Lumber Late Model feature in the Moon Brothers Racing Rocket chassis.

The Hickamo Super Stocks were to be the featured division of the night, but were only able to complete four laps before action was halted. Jared Hays had the lead over fellow front-row starter Kenny Carroll when the rain began.

The postponed features will be made up later in the season.

Morton made a mid-race pass for the lead in the late model feature and went on to beat Robbe Ewing for the victory.

Justin Russell started on the pole and had opened a one-second lead when a caution flew on lap four. Ewing was able to wrest away the lead on the restart, as the sixth-starting Morton cracked the top three by lap five.

Ewing had a half-second lead over Morton with Russell fading to fifth when a lap-seven yellow flag again slowed the field.

Morton moved to the top groove and sailed around Ewing for the lead on lap nine. It didn’t take long for Morton to open a 2.2-second lead, but that was wiped out on lap 11 with the event’s third caution.

Ewing hung close to Morton for a couple of laps after the restart, but Morton was then able to drive away as action remained caution-free. He finished 1.5 seconds clear of Ewing at the finish.

Russell rallied back into third with Jake Morris fourth and Hunter Bergen fifth.

With rain in the forecast, the Easter Bowl Enduro 150 that was scheduled for a 150-lap feature to conclude the action was canceled earlier on Saturday.

The finish:

Hermitage Lumber Late Models A-Feature (20 laps): 1. 72-JC Morton [6]; 2. 32-Robbe Ewing [3]; 3. 12J-Justin Russell [1]; 4. 7J-Jake Morris [5]; 5. 19-Hunter Bergen [8]; 6. 20-Alan Westling [2]; 7. 1A-Bryon Allison [4]; 8. 18-Scott Bergen [7]; 9. 3K-Richard Kimberling [9]; 10. 1T-Tucker Cox (DNS); 11. 18E-Shawn Eggeman (DNS).