LOCUST GROVE, Ark. — Tim McCreadie won his second Nutrien Ag Solutions Topless 100 Presented by Big River Steel on Saturday at Batesville Motor Speedway.
McCreadie took the lead on lap 66 when race leader Ricky Thornton Jr. was forced to pit for a flat tire.
McCreadie then led the rest of the race holding off Jonathan Davenport to win the Lucas Oil Late Model Dirt Series-sanctioned event for the first time since 2008.
McCreadie earned $50,000 out of the $150,000 purse for his 38th career series victory. It was also McCreadie’s first win for Mark Richards Racing, Rocket1, the team he started racing for in March.
Davenport, who started 15th, came through the field to finish second to McCreadie. Garrett Alberson was third. Completing the top five were Ethan Dotson and Thornton Jr.
“I don’t know what to say. It was a grueling race, beating the cushion down for that many laps is way quicker than it’s been since probably the last time I won here,” McCreadie said. “Hats off to this Rocket1 team, it’s been a grind. I will tell you these guys haven’t had one bad day, if they did, I would never know it. They do have their faith in me, and I have my faith in them. I told people it’s going to take a little longer when you’ve got two strong-willed guys like me and Mark. It’s been a work in progress; he set down and built this new XR1.2. It’s been bad fast since we’ve got it off the truck.”
Thornton led the first 41 laps until a caution slowed the action. On the restart Thornton and McCreadie exchanged slide jobs for the lead with McCreadie taking the point on lap 42.
“I just had to put some pressure on Ricky. I mean I don’t know if I was clear or not, but I’ve had plenty of them thrown at me in the last three years where none of them were clear, so I figured well it’s 50 grand on the line,” McCreadie said. “He’s [Thornton] won a lot of big races this year and I’ve got none so maybe I will tame it down next time, but I had to get to the lead as quick as possible because when he gets out there and gets cruising he’s so polished and he’s not going to make a mistake. I knew if we pushed him a little and he had a failure it was to our advantage,” said McCreadie.
McCreadie held command of the race until traffic became an issue as Thornton caught McCreadie retaking the lead on lap 59. Thornton started to pull away extending his lead over McCreadie, but with 65 laps complete slowed down the backstretch with a flat right rear tire. Thornton would pit rejoining the field on the tail.
As McCreadie inherited the lead back on a lap 66 restart he would now have to contend with Davenport, who had moved into second after starting on the inside of row number eight. Davenport, the Topless 100 winner in 2022, would put pressure on McCreadie. However, McCreadie would pull away in the final ten circuits to win the race by 1.970 seconds.
“My guys gave me a really great car,” said Davenport. “They have been working hard and you know everybody out here works hard. Man, it was hot and it’s hard on us old guys. I will tell you that we just keep working at it. This was a brand-new car. I just wasn’t quite comfortable with it qualifying like I wanted it. In the heat race last night, I just chose the wrong lane on a restart so that put us in a B-main and we just had to claw our way back from there. We done some different stuff on tires just to make sure that we could go the entire distance tonight,” said Davenport, who along with McCreadie and Alberson never visited the hot pit to change tires during the race. “I wasn’t as good as Timmy though. I threw everything I had at him. The more I moved up on the racetrack the freer I would get.”
Alberson came from ninth to round out the podium.
“I was a little nervous. I never felt that good early; I had to be way too conservative to take care of my tires. I was hoping this would play out. I knew the pace and the speed you could carry really wasn’t abrasive, but we were just keeping them so hot. I tried to pace myself and tried to let them other guys do their racing and man I am so proud of this Roberts Motorsports team. I love this track, it’s so tricky, so fast and so cool. Congrats to Timmy and Rocket1 they have been working hard for this.”
The finish:
Tim McCreadie, Jonathan Davenport, Garrett Alberson, Ethan Dotson, Ricky Thornton Jr., Hudson O’Neal, Carson Ferguson, Boom Briggs, Dale McDowell, Devin Moran, Max Blair, B.J. Robinson, Jimmy Owens, Timothy Culp, Jared Landers, David Breazeale, Mike Marlar, Brenden Smith, Daulton Wilson, Stormy Scott, Drake Troutman, Tyler Stevens, Billy Moyer Sr., Scott Crigler, Ross Robinson, Clay Harris, Cory Lawler.