ORRVILLE, Ohio — Ricky Thornton Jr. went to Wayne County Speedway in need of a breakout night, and that’s exactly what he got.
The Chandler, Ariz., native had amassed three wins in his first 40 Late Model starts of 2026 prior to Thursday’s Lonewolf 40 with the World of Outlaws Late Model Series presented by DIRTVision.
Most racers would gladly take that number, but not the man who has been among the winningest drivers in the sport over the past three years.
The month of May in particular had been a roller coaster for Thornton and his Koehler Motorsports team. After opening the month with a win at Circle City Raceway, Thornton went on to finish in the top five only twice in his next seven starts, including four runs of 18th or worse. With some of the biggest races of the season fast approaching, Thornton was running out of time to regain his footing.
That was until Thornton rolled into Wayne County for the first time. The No. 20rt was fast off the trailer and the speed carried over into qualifying and his heat race. Thornton led the field to green in the feature after drawing the pole, but the start was anything but calm, as Hudson O’Neal and Daulton Wilson briefly made it three-wide for the lead on the opening lap.
The 40-lap contest soon turned into a battle of attrition. O’Neal had to surrender second place due to a flat tire six laps in, then Brandon Sheppard suffered the same fate while running in the same spot later in the race.
Ahead of the final restart with two laps remaining, Thornton remained out front, but by that point, he was being trailed by Nick Hoffman and Bobby Pierce, who worked his way forward from 16th in the starting lineup.
Neither of the two title contenders could find a way around Thornton though, as “RTJ” blasted around the cushion to take the checkers for the sixth time in his career with the World of Outlaws and the first since the 2024 World of Outlaws World Finals.
“We’ve been working hard getting better,” Thornton said. “Not that we’ve been slow, we just haven’t had the luck and the speed that we’ve had before. Feel like we got a lot better there at Wheatland last week and the driver kind of tossed away the first two nights. The final night we were good, and we unloaded here really good. I think I’ve watched Sheldon [Haudenschild] rip the top around here nine million times, but I’ve never watched a Late Model race here.”
Hoffman finished second ahead of Pierce in third. Behind them, Tyler Erb crossed the line fourth, while Dustin Sorensen collected his second-straight top five in fifth.
The finish:
Feature (40 Laps): 1. 20RT-Ricky Thornton Jr[1]; 2. 9-Nick Hoffman[4]; 3. 32-Bobby Pierce[16]; 4. 1-Tyler Erb[5]; 5. 19-Dustin Sorensen[11]; 6. 99-Devin Moran[8]; 7. 6-Hudson O’Neal[3]; 8. 1Z-Logan Zarin[9]; 9. 14-Trey Mills[17]; 10. 28-Dennis Erb Jr[20]; 11. 22*-Drake Troutman[14]; 12. B1-Brent Larson[25]; 13. 9M-Tim McCreadie[10]; 14. 31-Lincoln Smith[18]; 15. 555-Brock Pinkerous[7]; 16. 19R-Ryan Gustin[23]; 17. 1S-Brandon Sheppard[6]; 18. 74X-Ethan Dotson[12]; 19. 20TC-Tristan Chamberlain[24]; 20. 58V-Daulton Wilson[2]; 21. 157-Mike Marlar[21]; 22. 25Z-Mason Zeigler[19]; 23. 5L-Jon Lee[13]; 24. 55E-Eli Johnson[26]; 25. 217-Eric Wilson[15]; 26. 44-Dave Hess Jr[22]
