Ricky Thornton Jr. gets another win
Ricky Thornton Jr’s dream season continue its run on Saturday night at Lernerville Speedway as he claimed the 17th annual Firecracker 100 presented by Big River Steel. It was the culmination of a three-day event after the track had to fight the weather all weekend.
The Longhorn Chassis driver from Martinsville, Indiana earned $50,000 for his win on the track located in Sarver, Pennsylvania in a race shown live by FloRacing.com.
A total of 51 cars were signed in for competition.
Heat race lineups were determined from the results of the preliminary races held on Thursday and Friday.
Heat Race Results:
Heat 1 Finish- 1. Jonathan Davenport, 2. Garrett Alberson, 3. Spencer Hughes
Heat 2 Finish- 1. Ricky Thornton Jr., 2. Max Blair, 3. Logan Zarin
Heat 3 Finish- 1. Brandon Overton, 2. Hudson O’Neal, 3. Ross Robinson
Heat 4 Finish- 1. Tim McCreadie, 2. Chub Frank, 3. Alex Ferree
Heat 5 Finish- 1. Michael Norris, 2. Colton Flinner, 3. Levi Yetter
Heat 6 Finish- 1. Devin Moran, 2. Gregg Satterlee, 3. John Garvin Jr.
B-main Results:
B-main 1 Finish- 1. Daulton Wilson, 2. Ken Schaltenbrand, 3. Earl Pearson Jr.
B-main 2 Finish- 1. Tyler Erb, 2. Boom Briggs, 3. Mason Zeigler
Feature Re-cap: The 100-lap feature got underway with Davenport leading Thornton, Overton, McCreadie and Moran. On the second circuit, Norris and Moran passed by McCreadie to move into fourth and fifth respectively. One lap later, Moran moved around Norris for fourth.
Davenport, Thornton and Overton kept each other in check as the race passed the 10-lap mark. Thornton closed in to briefly offer a challenge for the lead but Davenport repelled those advances.
On lap 22, the fast rising O’Neal took third away from Overton as the leaders ran in tight formation as they raced among slower traffic. As the race approached the one-third mark, Davenport had opened his lead over Thornton to 1.5 seconds but a lap 31 caution slowed the pace and regrouped the field.
McCreadie, who had to go to a backup car because of an issue during hot laps, slowed to bring out the night’s first yellow flag on lap 31 with Davenport leading Thornton, O’Neal, Overton and Moran.
On the restart, Norris got by Moran for fifth as Davenport maintained the lead. But Zarin would spin on lap 33 to bring out another yellow flag.
On the restart, Alberson, Pearson, Garvin, Ferree and Zarin were involved in a multi-car crash.
On the restart, O’Neal moved in to fight with Thornton for second as Davenport continued to lead. Those top-3 runners then worked to separate themselves from the field.
Thornton charged to the lead by passing Davenport in lap 45 with O’Neal also in the fray. After a three-wide battle, Davenport and O’Neal took turns being scored as the second-place runner. O’Neal finally established himself in second at the halfway mark.
O’Neal took the lead from Thornton in traffic on lap 53 but Thornton did not give up easily as those two ran away from Davenport. Thornton regained the top spot on lap 57 but he and O’Neal continue their fight. Further back, Satterlee moved to fourth by passing Overton but Overton would quickly return the favor.
O’Neal took the lead from Thornton on lap 71 and worked to put some distance between himself and the series points leader. But that effort would prove unsuccessful as Thornton would go back to the front on lap 75 as they cut through traffic.
At that point, Thornton began to pull away building an advantage of two seconds with less than 20 laps to go.
Over the closing laps, Thornton drove away from his pursuers as he went on to claim the lucrative victory, It was his second $50,000(Smoky Mountain) in as many weeks. It was his first Firecracker win.
Feature Results: 1. Ricky Thornton Jr., 2. Hudson O’Neal, 3. Jonathan Davenport, 4. Gregg Satterlee, 5. Devin Moran, 6. Brandon Overton, 7. Michael Norris, 8. Ken Schaltenbrand, 9. Mason Zeigler, 10. Mason Zeigler, 11. Tyler Erb, 12. Ross Robinson, 13. Daulton Wilson, 14. Spencer Hughes, 15. Colton Flinner, 16. Earl Pearson Jr., 17. Tyler Dietz, 18. Logan Zarin, 19. Chub Frank, 20. Tyler Bruening, 21. Levi Yetter, 22. Boom Briggs, 23. Garrett Alberson, 24. Alex Ferree, 25. John Garvin Jr., 26. Tim McCreadie, 27. Gary Lyle, 28. Ryan Montgomery
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