Hudson O’Neal picked up a preliminary win at Florence
Hudson O’Neal wants very much to win the North-South 100 at Florence Speedway and on Friday night he took a step in that direction with a win in a preliminary race for that crown jewel event on the Lucas Oil Late Model Dirt Series
The Rocket Chassis driver from Martinsville, Ind. earned $5,000 for his victory in a race held on the half-mile track located in Union, KY and shown live by FloRacing.com.
A total of 54 cars were signed in for competition.
The Friday night preliminaries will set the heat race lineups for Saturday.
Qualifying Results: 1. Victor Lee, 2. Spencer Hughes, 3. Earl Pearson Jr., 4. Bobby Pierce, 5. Hudson O’Neal, 6. Kent Robinson, 7. Mike Marlar, 8. Chris Ferguson, 9. Trevor Landrum, 10. Justin Ratliff
Heat 1 Results: 1. Bobby Pierce, 2. Mike Marlar, 3. Victor Lee, 4. Justin Ratliff, 5. Tim McCreadie, 6. Joe Godsey, 7. Shannon Babb, 8. Jeremy Creech, 9. Larry Grube,
Heat 2 Results: 1. Hudson O’Neal, 2. Spencer Hughes, 3. Chris Ferguson, 4. Scott James, 5. Derek Fisher, 6. Austin Lay, 7. Doug Drown, 8. Clint Keenan, 9. Brayton Laster
Heat 3 Results: 1. Earl Pearson Jr., 2. Zack Dohm, 3. James Rice, 4. Kent Robinson, 5. Dustin Linville, 6. Trevor Landrum, 7. Ross Robinson, 8. Keegan Cox, 9. Tim Vance
Feature Re-cap: The 25-lap feature got underway with O’Neal leading Pierce, Marlar, Pearson and Dohm. However, a caution just before the completion of the second circuit for the slowing car of Cox slowed the action. Marlar ,moved into the runner-up position on the restart shuffling Pierce back to third.
Pearson caught fire as he jumped by both Pierce and Marlar to grab second on lap 4. Dohm worked to move forward as he passed by Pierce on lap 7 for fourth. At the same time, O’Neal began to slip away from his pursuers until a yellow flag on lap 9 for debris erased the lead of the No. 71 machine.
Dohm moved up to second on the lap 9 restart while Hughes grabbed fourth then third one lap later. Pierce came back into the top-5 when he passed Marlar on lap 14. But again, O’Neal pulled away from the pack.
Pearson regained third from Hughes on lap 15 as he trailed O’Neal and Dohm. A lap 19 caution for a flat tire on the Marlar car again stacked the field. One more time, Pearson moved up on the restart as he took second away from Dohm. Pearson then went after O’Neal as those drivers fought for the lead of the race.
As the laps clicked away Pierce took the to thehigh side and began to close on the top-3. He would eventually get by Dohm but that was it. At the front of the field, Pearson moved to the outside on the last lap in an attempt to steal the victory by O’Neal was able to fight off the challenge and capture the win.
Feature Results: 1. Hudson O’Neal, 2. Earl Pearson Jr., 3. Bobby Pierce, 4. Zack Dohm, 5. Spencer Hughes, 6. Ross Robinson, 7. Justin Ratliff, 8. Dustin Linville, 9. Victor Lee, 10. Trevor Landrum, 11. Kent Robinson, 12. Tim McCreadie, 13. Scott James, 14. Chris Ferguson, 15. Shannon Babb, 16. Mike Marlar, 17. Joe Godsey, 18. Derek Fisher, 19. Austin Lay, 20. Clint Keegan, 21. Tim Vance, 22. Jeremy Creech, 23. Larry Grube, 24. Brayton Lester, 25. James Rice, 26. Doug Drown, 27. Keegan Cox
Please consider also reading:
Jonathan Davenport rules Friday night Group B North-South 100 prelim at Florence
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