WHEATLAND, Mo. — When Dillon McCowan made the commitment to run the Lucas Oil Late Model Dirt Series full time in 2026, the 22-year-old knew it would be a hefty challenge.
So in that regard, posting only two top-10 finishes in 15 series events – and a modest 15th place standing in LOLMDS points – is not a huge surprise.
Still, McCowan remains upbeat as he returns to his home track this weekend to compete in the 13th annual MLRA Spring Nationals. Several of the top LOLMDS regulars, including Jonathan Davenport and Hudson O’Neal — are expected to compete with winning payouts of $7,000 and $20,000 on the line Friday and Saturday nights.
“It’s been a learning process,” McCowan said of taking on the best of the best. “It’s definitely a bigger jump than most people would realize going from regional racing to full time on tour. Those guys, they race at a very fast pace. The show moves at a fast pace. Those guys are intense to race with. It’s been beneficial to us and very good.
“We haven’t maybe had the runs we’ve wanted, but that’s to be expected with essentially a rookie team with only a couple of guys who have done it. It’s not like we’ve got somebody who’s crew chief-ing that’s got years of experience. It’s just me and Riley (friend and crew chief Riley Duncan) and if we can get a little help along the way, that’s what we’re trying to do.”
McCowan was able to grab back-to-back ninth-place finishes at Golden Isles Speedway in early March as his highlights so far. With the LOLMDS on break, he scooped up a second-place run in an Open Late Model show at Springfield Raceway on March 14, a race won by Tony Jackson Jr.
The top-10 runs at Golden Isles in Waynesville, Georgia, during the grind of Florida-Georgia Speedweeks, was a confidence builder that McCowan hopes is a sign of things to come.
“Starting as far back as we did when we got those top 10s, we started in provisional land,” McCowan said. “The car was good enough and the track came around and we were able to pass some cars here and there. It showed the team that we can run top 10 with these guys.
“As the season progresses, hopefully, we can get into a rhythm and get better.”
McCowan feels like he’s back on his game, returning to a Longhorn chassis this season after spending a portion of 2025 in an Infinity. He drove the Longhorn in 2024 when he finished second in the Summer Nationals “Hell Tour.”
“We’re just trying to get back to where we were a couple of years ago, into a rhythm with solid finishes,” McCowan said. “A couple of years ago I felt like we could pull into any track and do good.”
McCowan said the intensity of running the national series is something that, aside from the big budgets of the top teams compared to his modest war chest, stands out the most.
“They’re intense. It don’t matter if it’s a 50-lap or a 100-lap race, it’s go from the drop of the green,” he said. “It’s wide open and get as much as you can get. That’s really what has taken getting used to. These is not any lay back and wait. That’s taken some getting us to, racing regional.
“We’re just trying to learn as much as we can. When we do have bad runs, we try not to get too down. We just have to keep plugging and we’ll figure it out.”
The decision to step up and travel with the LOLMDS this season was a matter of commitment rather than wondering “what if?” for another year.
“I told Dad (Charlie McCowan) ‘we’re just gonna have to do it.’ We’ve sit here before and said we’ll see where we are in points after Florida. That just don’t do it,” Dillon McCowan said. “When you give yourself an out, you’ll be prone to take it. No matter what, we’re gonna race it and we’re gonna finish it. We’re not gonna give ourselves a back-up plan. We’re gonna run it and, win, lose or draw we’re gonna get better or else.
“As far as expectations, we don’t have a lot. We know we need to make the shows. We need to run top-10 as much as we can and make sure and finish every race that we make. That’s the big thing, to have a bunch of DNFs or anything like that.”
The chance to run at Wheatland, about a half-hour from home, is one McCowan relishes. He won Modified track championships there as a teen-ager and was voted the track’s Most Popular Driver in fan voting. He gave home fans a thrill by qualifying for the last three Show-Me 100 feature lineups with a sixth-place in 2023 after running top-five most of the event.
“We always like running there when we can, with so many people who enjoy seeing us race,” McCowan said.
One of the biggest story lines this weekend will be the new configuration in turns three and four. The flat shelf near the wall was removed over the winter with gradual banking now extending to the wall.
As someone who grew up racing at Lucas Oil Speedway, McCowan isn’t sure if he will like the change.
“I was pretty fond of how it was. Who knows? Maybe it’ll work out better than we think,” McCowan said. “The only thing I’m afraid of is it being so far out there, that the bottom is always faster. But you never know. I’ve seen places that you never thought it would ever work and it worked better than you ever would have dreamed of.
“Hopefully it builds a nice little cushion up there and we can stay off the wall, that way we’re not all ripping the deck out of it. I’m excited to see how it goes.”
