Davenport & Rice Share Dream’s Preliminary Spoils

ROSSBURG, Ohio – Friday night‘s pair of 50-lap preliminary races for the 31st Dirt Late Model Dream showcased the contrast between an all-time legend and a fresh name thrusting himself into the spotlight.

Jonathan Davenport and Josh Rice, respectively, collected $30,000 checks for their victories at Eldora Speedway in a twinbill forced after Thursday night’s main was rained out at the half-mile dirt oval.

The two races only served to set the starting lineups for Saturday’s six traditional heat races, but the allure of winning at Eldora was no less palpable for both drivers.

While what was supposed to be Thursday’s headliner was run to cap off the night, it was undoubtedly the most intense one.

In just 50 laps, there were two flips, four lead changes, and the second half of the race saw the top three under a proverbial blanket most of the way.

Polesitter Wil Herrington led the first eight circuits, but after he jumped the cushion in turn four it was Tyler Erb who took control, with Rice and Bobby Pierce hot on his heels.

With 20 laps to go, Erb jumped the cushion himself in turn two, allowing both Rice and Pierce to slip by him after he’d led a race-high 21 laps. Rice took the lead, but Pierce threw a slider on the next lap in turn three to overhaul him.

Rice got back past Pierce in turn two on the outside, but another slider from Pierce cemented the lead officially on the 33rd lap for Wednesday night’s FloRacing Night in America winner.

Pierce got stuck in heavy lap traffic though, and with 11 laps remaining, Rice threw a slider on Pierce into turn one to take the top spot back. Pierce sailed it off into turn three to try to slide Rice again, but was unable to make it stick, and Rice took control for good.

The drama wasn’t over, though. Hudson O’Neal hit the wall in turns three and four to draw a caution with 10 laps to go, setting up a restart. On the first attempt, Herrington spun in turn one and was hit by Jimmy Owens, flipping him over.

The car did a full rotation and landed back on all fours, and Herrington was able to drive away.

The next attempt saw Rice jump out to the lead quickly, while Erb and Pierce battled each other for second. Rice pulled away by 4.677 seconds and claimed the win in the biggest moment of his career to-date.

His father, James Rice, won the first ever Sunoco American Late Model Series race at Eldora 30 years ago, so Friday’s triumph was extra special for the Crittenden, Ky., driver.

“I thought Brownstown (Speedway in Indiana) was hard to win at, (but) this place is damn near impossible to win at,” an emotional Rice said in victory lane. “Especially to do it over [Pierce]. He wins every damn weekend. We’ve been good here recently … and tonight [it was] a good thing we hot-lapped again. I’m happy it rained out [Thursday] because I probably never would have won. We hot-lapped there tonight and it wasn’t very good. Threw (a setup) we though would be close on it, but honestly we didn't know if it was going to be close or not, but it worked.

“Thirty thousand (dollars), holy shit.”

The most dramatic moment of the night came when second-starting Carson Ferguson hopped the cushion in turn two, climbed the wall and flipped during the initial green flag. The car landed on its side, with the roof facing oncoming traffic.

Chris Simpson had nowhere to go and hit Ferguson at nearly full speed, with the impact going into the top of the roll-cage and flipping Ferguson back on all four tires. Thankfully, both drivers were OK.

While Rice kept the lead on the final restart, Erb was able to get back by Pierce for the runner-up spot. Erb kept second until a few feet from the finish line, when Pierce passed him on the inside to take runner-up honors by just .005 seconds.

The first 50-lap feature of the night was contested by Friday’s scheduled drivers, with hot laps and heat races run earlier in the day for those drivers. While Thursday’s drivers put on a show, Friday’s drivers never got a true chance to do the same.

That race was marred by nine cautions, including two green-white-checkereds. Davenport started in sixth, but took the lead from polesitter Timothy Culp on lap nine and was strong from then on.

‘Superman’ seemed unaffected by the number of cautions and restarts, with Ricky Thornton Jr. making the only real challenge for the lead on a restart with 10 laps to go.

Thornton led one lap, but Davenport got back by quickly and went on to a 1.193-second win over Brandon Overton, who passed Thornton for second on lap 49.

“It[‘s] huge,” Davenport said in victory lane. “Hats off to my guys. They have worked their tails off for the past three days. Yesterday we didn’t race, obviously, but they still tore that thing apart and went all through it and changed a bunch of stuff. Obviously, we found something that was wrong. It still wasn’t exactly right after qualifying and the heat race. We found a few other little, small things. When you start changing parts, that’s the way it goes.

“But I can’t thank them enough. Can’t thank everybody that helps us enough. It was a great race, man,” he added. “I thought Ricky was going to steal one from me. And I'm like, ‘I'm either going to hit the inside wall or I'm going to slide him’ because I've run second way too many damn times this year.”

Dan Ebert blew a right rear tire just after the leaders crossed the finish line to make Davenport’s lap-nine pass official, generating the first yellow flag. From there, it was all-out chaos.

The next caution came on lap 16, when Donald McIntosh jumped the cushion in turn two, damaging the nose of his car so badly he had to almost stop on the backstretch to get to the pits.

Cars jumping the cushion became a trend, as the track surface was so rough that drivers would either spin out or nearly stop when they jumped it. Among the casualties were Mike Marlar, Trey Mills, Mark Whitener, and Dustin Sorensen – and all that was prior to the overtime at the end.

After his brief back-and-forth with Thornton on the lap-40 restart, Davenport set sail and eventually took the white flag. With one lap to go, it seemed that Davenport had it in the bag, but going into turn one, Whitener spun just in front of the leaders and forced the eighth caution.

With Eldora’s rules calling for a green-white-checkered finish if there is a caution on the last lap, as well as true double-file restarts through the entire race, the action wasn’t quite over.

Davenport took the green for the two-lap shootout, but before the field entered turn one the caution flew for the ninth and final time when Dylan Thornton spun at the tail of the field as everyone checked up awaiting the green.

Once again, Davenport lined up first and this time took the green. Despite RTJ’s best attempt in turn one, Davenport kept the lead and completed the final two laps to earn the win.

‘JD’ then spun a four on the ‘Wheel of Misfortune,’ inverting the top four starters in each heat-race lineup for Saturday’s program. The top three from each heat lock into the $100,000 Dream finale.

With the heat race lineups set, all that is remains is Saturday night’s 31st Dirt Late Model Dream. Action starts at 6 p.m. ET, with every lap available live on FloRacing.

The results:

Thursday Feature Make-Up (50 laps): 1. 11R-Josh Rice [5]; 2. 32-Bobby Pierce [6]; 3. O1-Tyler Erb [4]; 4. 9-Nick Hoffman [16]; 5. 18D-Daulton Wilson [8]; 6. 17M-Dale McDowell [9]; 7. 111-Max Blair [3]; 8. 10S-Garrett Smith [17]; 9. 40B-Kyle Bronson [22]; 10. 22-Chris Ferguson [10]; 11. 10-Joseph Joiner [11]; 12. 20-Jimmy Owens [14]; 13. 20TC-Tristan Chamberlain [24]; 14. 101-Forrest Trent [25]; 15. 89-Mike Spatola [20]; 16. 11-Austin Smith [12]; 17. O9-Michael Leach [7]; 18. 4-Kale Green [13]; 19. 93L-Cory Lawler [19]; 20. 15K-Wil Herrington [1]; 21. 71-Hudson O'Neal [23]; 22. 99JR-Frank Heckenast Jr. [26]; 23. 22X-Drake Troutman [21]; 24. 99-Devin Moran [15]; 25. 93-Carson Ferguson [2]; 26. 32S-Chris Simpson [18].

Friday Feature (50 laps): 1. 49-Jonathan Davenport [6]; 2. 76-Brandon Overton [2]; 3. 20RT-Ricky Thornton Jr. [3]; 4. 58-Garrett Alberson [7]; 5. C8-Timothy Culp [1]; 6. 9M-Tim McCreadie [17]; 7. 1-Brandon Sheppard [4]; 8. 44-Chris Madden [22]; 9. 25-Shane Clanton [16]; 10. 97-Cade Dillard [26]; 11. 96-Tanner English [18]; 12. 19M-Spencer Hughes [15]; 13. 15-Justin Duty [19]; 14. 25F-Jason Feger [25]; 15. 114-Jordan Koehler [24]; 16. 19-Dustin Sorensen [5]; 17. 16-Tyler Bruening [21]; 18. 13-Dylan Thornton [9]; 19. 5-Mark Whitener [14]; 20. 60-Dan Ebert [10]; 21. 74X-Ethan Dotson [8]; 22. 157-Mike Marlar [11]; 23. 14JR-Trey Mills [13]; 24. 19R-Ryan Gustin [12]; 25. 79-Donald McIntosh [23]; 26. 29-Clinton Keenan [20].