Dave Hess knocked off the WoO regulars at Stateline(Photo: @WoOLateModels)
The World of Outlaws Morton Buildings Late Model Series kicked off a three-race weekend that will take the tour through Pennsylvania and New York on Thursday night at Stateline Speedway. After an action packed night of racing at the Busti, NY track, it was Dave Hess Jr. who emerged as the feature winner. The Waterford, PA driver collected $10,000 for his efforts in a race shown live by DirtVision.com.
A total of 36 cars were entered for competition.
Dave Hess Jr. proved to be quickest in Group A qualifying when the toured the third-mile clay oval in 15.484 seconds to better the runs of David Scott, Max Blair, Brandon Sheppard, and Deshawn Gingerich.
It was Boom Briggs who led the way in Group B time-trials with a lap of 15.914 seconds topping Chris Hackett, Dennis Erb Jr., Brent Larson, and Chub Frank.
Dave Hess Jr. took the win in the first heat race of the night by beating out Max Blair, Ryan Gustin, and Chris Madden while Brandon Sheppard was victorious over David Scott, Dutch Davies, and Jake Finnerty in the second preliminary race.
Boom Briggs defeated Dennis Erb Jr., Chub Frank, and Tyler Bruening in the third heat race of the night just before Chris Hackett took the fourth and final heat ahead of Cade Dillard, Wyatt Scott, and Jason Genco.
Greg Oakes and Ricky Weiss won the Last Chance Showdown races used to set the remainder of the starting grid for the main event.
The WoO Late Models redraw set the first four rows of the starting lineup as Dave Hess Jr., Chris Hackett, Brandon Sheppard, Boom Briggs, Dennis Erb Jr., Max Blair, David Scott, and Cade Dillard.
Hess went to the early lead at the start of the 40-lap feature with Hackett, Briggs, Sheppard, and Erb in his tire tracks. Briggs and Sheppard double teamed Hackett on lap 3 to take the second and third positions respectively. But Hackett would fight back as he and Sheppard wrestled for third on laps 4 and 5.
Sheppard broke away from his fight with Hackett in order to do battle with Briggs for second on lap 8 just before a caution flag would fly for the spinning car of Dillard.
A big crash on the lap 8 restart involved several cars at mid-pack and brought out another yellow flag. On the second lap 8 restart, Sheppard blasted to second and set off in pursuit of Hess for the race lead. Blair also began to rise as he entered the top-5.
With 15 laps completed, Sheppard was riding squarely on the rear spoiler of the Hess machine. But another caution would again slow the action.
Just before the halfway mark, Blair began to charge as he passed by Briggs for third. At the same time, Hess began to pull away from his pursuers. Madden and Gustin looked to make up spots as the laps clicked away as those two drivers moved to fifth and sixth respectively.
Hess began to struggle with slower traffic on lap 29 which allowed Sheppard to close in. But in the end, it was Hess who would hold on to the lead and sail under the checkered flag to score the victory.
The World of Outlaws Morton Buildings Late Model Series will move to Thunder Mountain Speedway in Knox Dale, PA on Friday night then to Selinsgrove Speedway in Selinsgrove, PA on Saturday. It was the second WoO Late Models win of his career.
“I grew up racing these tracks,” the local hero said in his post-race interview. “We’ve been awesome. This is a whole different level of competition but I knew this could be our race if things went right. The whole night just went flawless. These Outlaws wins are really, really hard to come by. I had a few when I was younger that slipped away with wrong tires and some other things. It feels great to get in victory lane and hold these guys off.”
Feature Finish: 1. Dave Hess Jr., 2. Brandon Sheppard, 3. Max Blair, 4. Boom Briggs, 5. Chris Madden, 6. Ryan Gustin, 7. Dennis Erb Jr., 8. Greg Oakes, 9. Chub Franks, 10. Ross Robinson, 11. Jason Genco, 12. Ricky Weiss, 13. Tyler Bruening, 14. Darrell Bossard, 15. Brent Larson, 16. Chris Hackett, 17. Cade Dillard, 18. Bump Hedman, 19. David Scott, 20. Wyatt Scott, 21. Dutch Davies, 22. Jake Finnerty, 23. Mike Knight, 24. Damien Bidwell
