Wilson grappled with saving both fuel and tires as the field endured a long green flag run. In the midst of it, Courtney came alive on the 65th lap, ripping around Bacon in turns one and two for second and cutting the gap to Wilson nearly in half, down to 2.4 seconds.
Despite that, Wilson was cruising with ease, on rails, with his Wilson Brothers Racing/D.D. Eyes – FK Indy/Maxim/Claxton Chevy down to 80 percent of its full capability, yet still pulling away from the field.
“When you have a car this good, you never win with it,” Wilson said. “Something always happens. You run out of fuel, you blow a tire, you lose an engine. There’s always something that happens.”
However, the team felt they had an ace up their sleeve, which worked in their favor.
“(Crew chief and brother) Clint (Wilson) made the call to go with the hard compound (tire), which not a lot people did, I don’t think,” Wilson explained. “It allowed me to kick it down once we needed to later in the race if I gapped back up. I could kick it down and not have to worry about the tires blowing off of it, just conserve fuel.”
Wilson was patient, never forcing anything despite a closing deficit, and was ultimately able to clear them all as Courtney walked the tightrope on the high line around the traffic.
Eighth-running Brian Tyler, the 2008 Ted Horn 100 winner, went up in smoke with 14 laps remaining to bring out the yellow, erasing Wilson’s gap in a sense, although four lapped cars remained between he and Courtney.
With a clear track, Wilson tipped his cap and drove away once again, showing no ill effects from the breaking of his half-race-long stride.
Behind Wilson, Courtney and Bacon swapped second back-and-forth on laps 92 and 93, but Justin Grant was the man on the move on the final restart, willing himself from eighth to fifth between laps 91 and 95 and then fifth to second run exiting turn two on lap 96.
Up front, Wilson sealed the deal, running seemingly half-throttle in preservation mode during the final laps, just in case.
Wilson closed it out to win by 6.330 seconds over Grant, Courtney, 1990 DuQuoin winner Jeff Swindell and Bacon. He became the third first-time winner of the USAC Silver Crown season, following Kyle Hamilton and Bacon.
Meanwhile, the point race tightened up following point leader Kody Swanson’s mechanical gremlins throughout the night. His Nolen Racing team lost power to two different engines during practice.
Patrick Lawson gave up his ride to Swanson for the main event, where the four-time series champion charged from 29th to 14th to earn KSE Racing Products Hard Charger honors.
Tanner Thorson, in his first USAC Silver Crown appearance since 2015, walked away from a vicious practice accident on the back straightway, in which his steering broke and he went into the inside guardrail before his car nearly split in half from the dash forward.
Remarkably, Thorson walked away uninjured.
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