WHEATLAND, Mo. — Ricky Thornton Jr. returned to Lucas Oil Victory Lane on Friday night as he won night one of the 19th annual CMH Diamond Nationals presented by Wieland.
Thornton’s winless drought with the Lucas Oil Late Model Dirt Series presented by FloRacing extended back to his last victory with the series on May 17 at Eagle, Neb.
Thornton led all 40 laps to secure his 10th series win of 2025, earning $15,000.
Jonathan Davenport finished second, while Clay Harris moved up from the 11th starting position to earn his first Big River Steel Podium of the season.
Garratt Alberson, who won the previous night at 34 Raceway, finished fourth, and Devin Moran rounded out the top five.
In Lucas Oil Victory Lane for the 52nd time in his career, the defending series champion, now trailing Davenport by 50 points heading into Saturday night’s $25,000-to-win main event.
“Man, I felt like I was on different tires than he (Davenport) was, and I was thinking, man, he’s so good here,” Thornton said. “Did I really make a bad decision to be on different tires? We took off, and he was a little better than I was at times, which kind of surprised me. I felt like I should be a little better on the bottom. I almost overdrove the straightaways, and it was wheelspinning really bad. That caution kind of saved me.
“It calmed me down and let me think about what I needed to do. I had a good restart and thought the top in one and two looked really good, but it was right on the edge. One time when I entered three, I felt like I was going to end up in the wall.”
Davenport, who is aiming for his record-tying fourth national championship, finished second after initially fighting off Brandon Overton early in the race and Clay Harris in the final laps.
“I think it was about tires. It’s so crazy. I don’t know; you think you know a little about tires, and then all of a sudden, something like tonight happens,” Davenport said. “Clay did an awesome job coming from where he did on as soft as tires as you could run. Ricky did a good job too, and he had on soft tires as well. I really thought we were sitting in the catbird’s seat with the hard tires, but it was just a little different night. They had a lot of water on the track, and obviously, you can still see it’s kind of brown all the way across; it was quite shiny black, yet. Hats off to the track crew.”
Harris, who earlier in the day took delivery of another engine after mechanical issues on Friday night at 34 Raceway, nearly matched his best career finish with the series by finishing second at Ocala in 2024.
“It means a lot to come home third tonight. We worked all day, and without Cameron and Chad, I wouldn’t be able to run this well. I didn’t think we’d finish the Lucas season because we broke a motor last night, but the guys stepped up and bought us a new motor today, so we ran good, and I’m happy about it.”
The finish:
Feature: 1. 20RT-Ricky Thornton Jr[1]; 2. 49-Jonathan Davenport[2]; 3. 6-Clay Harris[11]; 4. 58-Garrett Alberson[10]; 5. 99-Devin Moran[7]; 6. 76-Brandon Overton[3]; 7. 18D-Daulton Wilson[6]; 8. 71-Hudson O’Neal[12]; 9. 97-Cade Dillard[14]; 10. 1-Brandon Sheppard[5]; 11. 79-Donald McIntosh[15]; 12. 93-Carson Ferguson[16]; 13. 50-Kayden Clatt[19]; 14. 11-Gordy Gundaker[17]; 15. 60-Dan Ebert[24]; 16. 22-Daniel Hilsabeck[23]; 17. 1XM-Aaron Marrant[9]; 18. 19M-Spencer Hughes[8]; 19. 8K-Tyler Kuykendall[4]; 20. 93L-Cory Lawler[13]; 21. 98-Justin Wells[21]; 22. 56-Tony Jackson Jr[20]; 23. 11T-Trevor Gundaker[18]; 24. 15L-Payton Looney[22]
