GREENWOOD, Neb. — Lucas Oil Late Model Dirt Series point leader Jimmy Owens continued his spectacular season by winning Friday night’s preliminary 30-lap event at I-80 Speedway.
Owens took the lead from Tim McCreadie on lap 27 and went on for his 11th series win of the season. Brandon Overton who led early in the race finished in third followed by Devin Moran and Darrell Lanigan.
Overton led for the first nine laps of the race before the only caution flag in two nights of feature racing changed the complexion of the race. On the restart McCreadie cleared Overton for the lead. McCreadie pulled away from both Overton and Owens as he encountered lapped traffic, allowing his two nearest pursuers to close the gap. Owens was finally able to track down McCreadie, taking the lead with three laps to go.
“I was moving around quite a bit on the track and we were in the catbirds seat for once, running in second,” Owens explained. “Timmy was just a sitting duck up there; he didn’t know where to go. I was able to move around enough to get this Ramirez Rocket up front. This should give us a lot of momentum for tomorrow night. This win says a lot for our crew, they busted their tails all week to get ready to come out here. We had to work for three days straight to get everything ready to come out here. It’s like a 16-hour drive out here and everybody pulled together and here we are.”
McCreadie was more than satisfied with his second-place finish.
“It’s so hard to lead here. It’s such a big track and wide, the grooves come and go. Brandon’s out there leading away, I thought he wouldn’t change up much,” McCreadie said. “On the restart, it looked like that little bit of dust off of two cleaned up to where it wasn’t dirty any more. We were good for a while once we got the lead, I didn’t find the line on the track until I was passed. We work hard every night to try to get better. We took a stab at it tonight. I don’t know how we will run tomorrow, but the car’s pretty comfortable.”
Overton led the first seven laps of the race before yielding to McCreadie.
“On the restart that top there in one and two and three and four started to clean up. There was a fine line there, then Jimmy moved up and got by me. He got me going into three and I just got up there too late. Our car was good, it was way better than last night. We should be locked into tomorrow night with a good starting spot.”
The finish:
Jimmy Owens, Tim McCreadie, Brandon Overton, Devin Moran, Darrell Lanigan, Ricky Thornton Jr., Ryan Gustin, Kyle Strickler, Josh Richards, Brandon Sheppard, Tanner English, Hudson O’Neal, Bobby Pierce, Billy Moyer Sr., Chris Madden, Chase Junghans, Jared Landers, Chad Simpson, Frank Heckenast Jr., Kyle Bronson, Tad Pospisil, Tyler Erb, Stormy Scott, Chris Simpson.