HARLAN, Iowa — When Ethan Dotson became a first-time winner with the World of Outlaws Late Model Series presented by DIRTVision last April at Farmer City Raceway, few would have imagined it would take more than 16 months for him to get the next one.
They also couldn’t have predicted the fashion in which that second win would come.
For most of Saturday night’s feature at Shelby County Speedway, Dotson felt like he was in for a good night, but not a race-winning one. From ninth in the starting order, the Bakersfield, Calif., native reached the top five by the halfway point, then got to third in the final 10 laps.
It was looking like Dotson’s Iowa trip was going to end with his third podium in six races, but with more than three seconds separating him from the leaders, it appeared third was as high as he could go.
“Early in the race, we put hard tires on, so I was trying to get them going without tearing the edges off,” Dotson said. “Once I did that, I just made a mistake on that restart and let Bobby [Pierce] get by me. It just kind of put me back and had to pass more cars; he kind of got through there better. I felt like if I could have done that a little bit quicker and not made the mistakes on the restart, I think I could have maybe been up there sooner, not needed to rely on something.”
‘Something’ came along as soon as the white flag waved. Race leader Daulton Wilson’s last-lap spin meant Dotson moved to second for the green-white-checkered restart when second-running Bobby Pierce was sent to the rear for stopping on track.
When Wilson remained committed to the bottom in the two-lap dash to the finish, it left the cushion wide open for Dotson to run well enough to clear Wilson in the final run off Turn 4 to the checkered flag. Before Dotson had time to fully comprehend the sequence of events that had unfolded, he was standing in victory lane as a two-time World of Outlaws winner.
“I just knew [Wilson] was running the bottom there early, and I knew his guys were telling him to run the bottom,” Dotson said. “I was kind of running up there the whole race, so it just kind of worked out for me for him going down there. I just kind of packed it down under caution and then tried to get fired really good on the restart, hit the brown and kind of took off. It wasn’t as good in [Turns] 1 and 2, but you could still maintain. And then [Turns] 3 and 4, I carried a lot of speed down there.”
Dotson’s Shelby County victory may have come in only his second appearance at the track, but his rapid acclimation shouldn’t have come as a surprise. The black-dirt quarter-mile has its similarities to the site of Dotson’s first series win at Farmer City, and he owns plenty of wins at other Iowa tracks from his days racing in the state’s brutally-competitive IMCA Modified ranks.
Before that, he honed his craft on many of the same elbows-up California bullrings that produce some of the most aggressive sprint car talent in the nation. Dotson is proof that the same can be true on the fendered side, and tracks like Shelby County give him prime opportunities to show it.
“It’s a little more up on the wheel and you can race on it,” Dotson said. “I feel like I struggle with them longer race tracks where you’ve got to drive down the straightaway for an hour and then turn left. Whenever it comes to backsteering, I haven’t been that good. Being able to get here, get something to lean on and be able to drive a little harder, I feel like it suits me a little bit.”
Shelby County served as a major boost for the No. 74x crew near the end of what’s been a frustrating 2026 for large portions of the year.
Dotson’s sophomore World of Outlaws season has been a big improvement over his rookie campaign by nearly every metric – his average finish is more than three spots better than 2025, and he’s already racked up three more top fives and seven more top 10s than he did a year ago with nine more races left to add to his totals.
But whether it was due to driver error or other undesirable circumstances, he had no hardware to show for it until Saturday night.
With the monkey finally off his back, Dotson is in position to wrap up 2026 on a high note. Between the biggest race of the year coming up next weekend with the World 100 at Eldora Speedway, followed by more World of Outlaws bullring racing at I-55 Federated Auto Parts Raceway Park and Boothill Speedway, and a home race for ASD Motorsports at Modoc Speedway leading into World of Outlaws World Finals, Dotson feels like he’s rounding into top form at the right time.
“I haven’t won since January [in the Wild West Shootout at Central Arizona Raceway],” Dotson said. “Ran second a bunch and been there, had opportunities to win and just made mistakes and things didn’t work out. Just super refreshing to be able to get one and have everything just kind of fall our way.
“I’ve got a good balance now of how to start the night. We haven’t been as good later in the night, but we’re just trying to make the right decisions throughout the night. I think our race cars are good enough to win, so we’ll just try to keep being there.”
