OGILVIE, Minn. — Jake O’Neil was in hot pursuit of the Mod Wars trophy at the Ogilvie Raceway Saturday night but it was a different Jake getting to the checkered flag first and earning an $11,000 payday.
O’Neil started on the pole to kick off the 42-lap main event for the Summit USMTS National Championship presented by RacinDirt and was the class of the field through the first 37 laps of the non-stop race.
Looking for his seventh USMTS win of the season, O’Neil had just five laps to go when a lapped car checked-up in turn 2, forcing O’Neil to hit the brakes and causing his car to bounce left and shoot up the track.
Able to keep the engine running, O’Neil righted his ship and kept moving but not until Jake Timm and Tanner Mullens were able to race by and inherit the first two spots.
Just when it looked like Timm was on his way to victory, a lapped car turned around in turn 2 resulted in the first caution flag of the contest on lap 39 and gave life to several racers seeking a winner’s circle interview.
A strong restart, however, gave Timm the cushion he needed as he cruised the final two laps to score his fourth career USMTS feature win and second at the Ogilvie dirt oval.
In desperation, O’Neil screamed around the high side of the racetrack for the final two circuits but came up short in the end and had to settle for the runner-up paycheck.
Mullens followed O’Neil to the finish line and took home third while Dereck Ramirez and Zack VanderBeek claimed the rest of the positions among the top 5.
Terry Phillips, Clayton Wagamon, Dan Ebert, Shane Sabraski and Darron Fuqua rounded out the top 10. Sabraski, who started 21st, earned the FK Rod Ends Hard Charger Award.
Meanwhile, points leader Dustin Sorensen failed to back up his win on Friday night and struggled to a 14th-place finish. It was just the third time in 22 starts that he finished outside the top 10.
The Finish:
Feature (42 Laps): 1. (7) 49 Jake Timm, 2. (1) 0 Jake O’Neil, 3. (3) 02 Tanner Mullens, 4. (8) 4R Dereck Ramirez, 5. (5) 33Z Zack VanderBeek, 6. (9) 75 Terry Phillips, 7. (4) 14W Clayton Wagamon, 8. (10) 60 Dan Ebert, 9. (21) 7A Shane Sabraski, 10. (17) 87 Darron Fuqua, 11. (16) 69 Lucas Schott, 12. (13) 12 Jason Hughes, 13. (11) 173 Andy Jones, 14. (12) 19 Dustin Sorensen, 15. (23) 10C Cayden Carter, 16. (19) 18A Landon Atkinson, 17. (22) 4 Jeremy Nelson, 18. (2) 38T Dylan Thornton, 19. (25) 20 Rodney Sanders, 20. (20) 21K Kyle Brown, 21. (24) 65D Kollin Hibdon, 22. (26) 21 Jacob Bleess, 23. (6) 4W Tyler Wolff, 24. (15) 44S Shane DeVolder, 25. (18) 56 Colton Horner, 26. (27) 2C Dave Cain, 27. (14) 11 Jody Bellefeuille