FARMER CITY, Ill. — Reigning Lucas Oil Late Model Dirt Series champion and points leader Ricky Thornton Jr. passed Brandon Sheppard for the lead on lap 66 and went on to win the Farmer City 74 on Friday at Farmer City Raceway.
The win marked his second consecutive victory in the annual May race, as the Chandler, Arizona native earned $25,000 for his seventh series win of 2025.
Sheppard, who led the first 65 laps from his pole starting position, finished in second, 1.177 seconds behind the winner. Hudson O’Neal romped from his 17th starting position to round out the podium. Brian Shirley, who ran in second for the first 27 laps of the race, finished in fourth, with Devin Moran rounding out the top five drivers.
“Honestly, moving the tires back out in one and two,” Thornton said. “Once they did, I was kind of mad. I was like it’s really going to kill this middle, but actually it let the track clean up a little bit. I started working around the top in turns one and two, and I was like man if I could ever get a good run, I am going to slide him. I got to him twice, and I’m like I am not going to clear him, and then I really got a good run when he got bottled up in traffic. I went for it and luckily I cleared him.”
Sheppard was left wondering what could have been, as he was in control for most of the race and came home in second.
“Leading that race there, I was just kind of running the line I always run here,” Sheppard said. “I wasn’t moving around at all. I was just trying to maintain my own pace and try to get away from them, but my crew showed me they were getting closer. When they moved the tires out in one and two that kind of messed me up a little bit, but I still felt I was getting through there o.k., and now we have the right rear tire about half flat. I don’t know if that had anything to do with it or not. He (Thornton) definitely found the better part of the track there late in the race in three and four.”
O’Neal, who charged through the field from the inside of row seven, couldn’t get close in the final laps to make a bid for the win.
“We rode around in the back for a long time until the race track really started to slow down, and we could move around a little bit, and that’s when I really started passing cars. Thankfully, we had a lot of restarts, and that helped tremendously, and I was just able to get one or two every restart, and right there at the end, I felt like I had a shot to get up there and mix it up with them. I was on Sheppard’s back bumper, and then it got kind of lane dominant down in three. I tried to get a run going into one, but I just had to fall in line.”
The finish:
Ricky Thornton Jr., Brandon Sheppard, Hudson O’Neal, Brian Shirley, Devin Moran, Tyler Erb, Jonathan Davenport, Dennis Erb Jr., Ethan Dotson, Garrett Alberson, Donald McIntosh, Mike Marlar, Cody Overton, Drake Troutman, Daulton Wilson, Brandon Overton, Jason Feger, Daniel Hilsabeck, Spencer Hughes, Carson Ferguson, Shannon Babb, Mike Spatola, Ryan Unzicker, Donny Walden, Kyle Bronson,
Bobby Pierce.
