Brandon Sheppard earned his third consecutive WoO Late Models win
The World of Outlaws Morton Buildings Late Model Series continued its swing through the upper Midwest on Saturday night by invading the Plymouth Dirt Track. At the end of the evening it was Brandon Sheppard who stood tall in victory lane at the Wisconsin facility. The New Berlin, IL driver earned $10,000 for his efforts in a race shown live by DirtVision.com.
Sheppard extended his lead in the series standings by capturing his eighth feature win of the season on the WoO Late Models tour.
Brandon Sheppard was fastest in Group A qualifying by turning a lap in 14.412 seconds around the third-mile clay oval to beat out Cade Dillard, Ricky Weiss, Dennis Erb Jr., and Taylor Scheffler.
Jason Rauen led the way in Group B time-trials with a lap of 14.723 seconds to better the efforts of Rodney Sanders, Chase Junghans, Mitch McGrath and Jimmy Mars.
Brandon Sheppard won the night’s first heat race ahead of Ricky Weiss, Taylor Scheffler and Darrell Lanigan while Cade Dillard took the second preliminary by beating out Dennis Erb Jr., Boom Briggs and Jake Timm.
It was Mitch McGrath who steered to the win in the third heat of the night over Scott Bloomquist, Justin Ritchie and Jason Rauen just before Jimmy Mars was victorious in the fourth and final heat race when he bested Chase Junghans, Rodney Sanders and Ashton Winger.
Brent Larson and Justin Schmidt won the two Last Chance Showdown races used to set the remainder of the starting grid for the main event.
The WoO Late Models redraw set a starting order of Jimmy Mars, Cade Dillard, Mitch McGrath, Brandon Sheppard, Dennis Erb Jr., Chase Junghans, Scott Bloomquist and Ricky Weiss.
At the start of the 50-lap feature it was Dillard who took the early lead followed by Mars, Sheppard, Junghans and Weiss. Sheppard moved around Mars to claim the runner-up position on the second circuit then looked to close in on Dillard.
Within just a few laps the top-2 cars found themselves battling for the race lead among heavy slower traffic. However, a lap 11 caution slowed the action when the car of Erb pulled up lame with a flat tire. During that yellow flag period it became apparent that the lead car driven by Dillard also had a flat left front tire which forced him to hand the lead over to Sheppard as he went to the pit area.
On lap 12 Bloomquist and Junghans fought to become contenders in the race as those drivers wrestled for the fourth spot. All the while, Winger became a factor as he moved into the top-5 on lap 14.
Sheppard would then control the race pace as he meticulously worked through slower traffic leaving his rivals to battle in arrears.
Mars did briefly close in just past halfway but Sheppard was able to clear the traffic that had held him up and again pull away. Meanwhile, Junghans began to take the fight to Weiss and Bloomquist by passing both of those cars to move into third on lap 31.
A fast rising Ritchie also threw himself into the mix as he began to work inside the top-5 as the laps clicked off. He then pulled himself up into a battle for second that at one point saw Mars, Junghans and Ritchie go three-wide for that position with just two laps remaining.
But in the end, it was Sheppard who would sail under the checkered flag for his third consecutive WoO win.
*Justin Ritchie was docked three positions for a deck height infraction in post-race inspection. He was credited with 6th although he crossed the finish line in 3rd.
Feature Finish: 1. Brandon Sheppard, 2. Jimmy Mars, 3. Chase Junghans, 4. Ricky Weiss, 5. Scott Bloomquist, 6. Justin Ritchie, 7. Taylor Scheffler, 8. Ashton Winger, 9. Darrell Lanigan, 10. Rodney Sanders, 11. Boom Briggs, 12. Cade Dillard, 13. Justin Schmidt, 14. Justin Reed, 15. Brent Larson, 16. Dennis Erb Jr., 17. Turk Letizia, 18. Jake Timm, 19. Mitch McGrath, 20. Jason Rauen, 21. Jim Schmidt, 22. Mike Mataragas, 23. Brad Mueller, 24. Kevin Baldry
