MARSHALLTOWN, Iowa — Three FloRacing Night in America presented by Kubota visits to Marshalltown Speedway and three feature triumphs for Hudson O’Neal.
After relinquishing the lead on two previous occasions earlier in the 50 lapper, the fifth-starting O’Neal became the final leader of a spirited feature on a lap-43 restart and led the final circuits to bank his sixth-career miniseries win, which was worth $20,000.
“Marshalltown Speedway, what a race track. We raced all over this thing, we race all over this thing every time we come here,” O’Neal said. “I just figured that the safe bet was (to restart on) the bottom … and then I get drove by on the top and I was like ‘Gosh dangit, I just lost this race, or lost maybe a chance at this race.’ The caution came back out and Bobby (Pierce) threw a Hail Mary (slide job) and kinda got ‘em all stacked up and let me sneak in there and steal one from him.”
Fast qualifier Brandon Overton won the first heat to earn the pole position for the feature with heat three winner Jason Feger joining him on the front row.
Overton led lap one before the fifth-starting Hudson O’Neal surged to the lead on the second circuit.
O’Neal paced the field for the next several circuits as the battle began to heat up behind him with the sixth-starting Pierce moving up to second as 14th-starting Justin Duty charged to third.
Bobby Pierce captured the lead from O’Neal amongst lapped traffic on lap 22. However, O’Neal regained the lead on lap 28 and led until lap 31 until Pierce took command back.
Pierce extended the advantage over the field before Carson Ferguson slowed on the 42nd circuit to draw a caution flag.
On the restart, Overton took to the high line on turns 1 and 2 before ducking to the inside of Pierce in turns 3 and 4. The pair made contact with Overton taking the lead and as the field completed the lap, Chris Simpson slowed to halt the action once again.
On the lap-43 restart, O’Neal surged past both Overton and Pierce to take the top spot exiting turn 2. He went on claim the victory by 1.005 seconds over Overton.
Pierce, Duty and Jonathan Davenport completed the top five.
The finish:
Feature (50 Laps): 1. 71-Hudson O’Neal[5]; 2. 76-Brandon Overton[1]; 3. 32-Bobby Pierce[6]; 4. 15D-Justin Duty[14]; 5. 49-Jonathan Davenport[3]; 6. 16-Tyler Bruening[8]; 7. 19R-Ryan Gustin[12]; 8. 99-Devin Moran[4]; 9. 3S-Brian Shirley[11]; 10. 1-Brandon Sheppard[9]; 11. 58-Garrett Alberson[7]; 12. 28-Dennis Erb Jr[15]; 13. 32S-Chris Simpson[16]; 14. 93-Carson Ferguson[17]; 15. 20RT-Ricky Thornton Jr[18]; 16. 25-Jason Feger[2]; 17. 2-Cody Overton[13]; 18. 1T-Tyler Erb[20]; 19. 18D-Daulton Wilson[23]; 20. 74X-Ethan Dotson[19]; 21. 15-Clay Stuckey[25]; 22. 60-Dan Ebert[26]; 23. (DNF) 14S-Collen Winebarger[22]; 24. (DNF) 40B-Kyle Bronson[10]; 25. (DNF) 38T-Dylan Thornton[21]; 26. (DNF) 22*-Drake Troutman[24]
