Jonathan Davenport
Just a little over two weeks ago Jonathan Davenport earned $50,000 when he won the Saturday night portion of the Karl Kustoms Bristol Dirt Nationals. Of course, the multiple time crown jewel winner is used to cashing big checks. And this weekend will provide another opportunity to do exactly that when the World of Outlaws Morton Buildings Late Model Series goes to the Bristol Motor Speedway for a pair of race nights.
Friday night’s feature at the historic NASCAR track that has been covered with dirt will pay out $10,000 to the winner while the Saturday night main event will hand out $25,000 to the victor.
‘The Fast 49’ took the lead at the halfway mark of the 40-lap feature race in Bristol then drove away to collect that big check. Since then, Davenport has added another major payday this past Saturday night when he collected $21,000 from the Lil Bill Corum Memorial co-sanctioned by the Schaeffer’s Oil Spring Nationals and the Valvoline Iron-Man Late Model Series at the Tazewell(TN) Speedway.
Davenport’s Lance Landers-owned team used the same car to win at Tazewell as was used on the similarly high-banked Bristol Motor Speedway. The 37-year-old driver plans to take that same Longhorn Chassis back to the NASCAR facility for the WoO Late Models affair this weekend.
“We’re always pretty good here in the features but we just miss it in qualifying,” Davenport explained in his post-race interview following his Tazewell triumph. “We learned a lot at Bristol to help us in qualifying here. This is the same car we ran at Bristol and I don’t see why we won’t take it back there next week. This thing is pretty awesome. There’s not a lot to change on it. This place is so elbows up and you’ve just got to get up on the wheel and drive it.”
Davenport scored the win in Bristol just over two weeks ago
Davenport explained the car is so good that he was able to move out of the preferred bottom groove at Tazewell and find a little extra when Kyle Larson closed in on him late in that feature.
“This thing was just phenomenal,” he declared. “I actually moved up through one and two and I could get a really big run on the lapped cars. I kind of got stalled out behind one and I know Kyle is really good in traffic and I knew I had to get by those lapped cars. I could see clean track up above them and I did turn it up a bit in the last ten laps to get by the lapped cars.”
If Davenport’s car is as good as it was the first time in Bristol and as was the case on Saturday in Tazewell, the competition will have their work cut out for them this weekend on the dirt covered half-mile track.
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