Dennis Erb Jr. claimed his first Lucas Oil win in seven years
Georgia-Florida SpeedWeeks continued for the Lucas Oil Late Model Dirt Series on Monday evening at the East Bay Raceway Park. The first night of the Wrisco Winter Nationals attracted a stellar field of cars to the facility located near Tampa, Florida. When all was said and done, it was Dennis Erb Jr. who claimed the win after a dramatic night of racing. The Rocket Chassis driver from Carpentersville, Illinois earned $5,000 in a race shown live by MavTV Plus.
A total of 70 cars were signed in for competition.
Brandon Overton was fastest in Group A qualifying with a lap of 14.990 seconds around the third-mile clay oval bettering the efforts of Tanner English, Brandon Sheppard, Kyle Hardy, Max Blair, Tim McCreadie, Shane Clanton and Brian Shirley.
Dennis Erb Jr. proved to be the quickest in Group B time-trials with a time of 15.661 seconds topping Tyler Bruening, Stormy Scott, Tim Dohm, Daulton Wilson, Spencer Hughes, Jimmy Owens and Blake Spencer.
Brandon Overton would start the feature from the pole by virtue of his win in the first heat race of the night ahead of Ashton Winger and Drake Troutman.
Hudson O’Neal took the second preliminary of the night over Tanner English and Max Blair then Devin Moran bested Tim McCreadie and Brandon Sheppard in the third heat.
Dennis Erb Jr. earned an outside front row starting position for the feature by beating out Jimmy Owens and Chase Junghans in the fourth heat.
It was Tyler Bruening who won out in the fifth heat by outrunning Daulton Wilson and Blake Spencer while Stormy Scott was victorious in the sixth and final heat topping Ricky Thornton Jr. and Spencer Hughes.
Shane Clanton and Colton Flinner won the two B-main races used to set the remainder of the field for the main event.
Matt Cosner gained entry into the feature by winning the Strawberry Dash.
When the 30-lap feature took the green flag it was Overton who bolted to the lead with O’Neal, Moran, Dennis Erb Jr. and Winger trailing. Winger charged by Erb for fourth on the second circuit as Overton began to pull away from the pack.
Moran moved by O’Neal for second in the early going as Erb went after Winger for fourth. Further back, Erb took fourth back away from Winger on lap 8. Overton, Moran and O’Neal ran in tight formation as they ran in heavy traffic at lap 10.
Erb made a strong charge back toward the front as the race neared its midway. The No. 28 blasted to second just before a lap 14 caution was shown to the field when Bruening had trouble. On the lap 14 restart, Winger took third while McCreadie broke into the top-5.
Erb then moved in to challenge Overton for the race lead. The pass for the top spot was completed on lap 18 which then opened the door for both Winger and O’Neal to get by Overton. O’Neal then wrested the runner-up position away from Winger at the halfway mark.
A spin by Tanner English on lap 22 brought out a yellow flag with Erb leading O’Neal, Winger, Moran and Overton. On the restart, Overton moved to the topside of the track in an attempt to regain the positions he had lost earlier. From the third spot, Winger also began running a high line as he looked to challenge O’Neal for second.
However, Winger’s car slipped out of the groove on lap 23 and backed into the outside retaining wall. On the restart, Overton grabbed second and looked as if he might threaten Erb’s lead, but instead, he too found the outside wall which knocked him out of the race.
Over the closing laps, Erb held the bottom line to beat back the advances of O’Neal and claim his seventh career win at East Bay.
Feature Finish: 1. Dennis Erb Jr., 2. Hudson O’Neal, 3. Tim McCreadie, 4. Shane Clanton, 5. Stormy Scott, 6. Ricky Thornton Jr., 7. Devin Moran, 8. Tyler Erb, 9. Brandon Sheppard, 10. Jimmy Owens, 11. Spencer Hughes, 12. Tyler Bruening, 13. Earl Pearson Jr., 14. Daulton Wilson, 15. Ashton Winger, 16. Chase Junghans, 17. Blake Spencer, 18. Kyle Hardy, 19. Max Blair, 20. Ross Robinson, 21. Matt Cosner, 22. Tanner English, 23. Ryan King, 24. Drake Troutman, 25. Brandon Overton, 26. Colton Flinner, 27. Garrett Alberson, 28. Kyle Bronson
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