Moran Defends Home Turf
with Muskingum County Triumph!
(July
6, 2024) Hometown driver Devin Moran thrilled the capacity
crowd on Saturday night at Muskingum County Speedway - leading all
the way to win the Lucas Oil Late Model Dirt Series-sanctioned Freedom
60 worth $20,000. Moran’s win was his fourth of the Lucas
Oil Late Model Dirt Series season, but his first series win since
2013 at the track promoted by his father, Hall-of-Famer Donnie Moran
and his family. (Heath Lawson Photo)
Ricky Thornton Jr. came from fifth to finish second
as he trailed Moran by 3.185 seconds at the finish. Max Blair was
third followed by Jonathan Davenport and Matt Cosner. The stats
will show that Moran led all 60 laps, but three different drivers
took their best shot at him during the race with Tim McCreadie,
Tyler Carpenter, and Thornton all holding the runner-up spot at
some point.
McCreadie, who started alongside on the front row
held the second spot for the first nine laps of the race until Carpenter
got going on the top and moved past McCreadie on lap ten. Carpenter
was able to keep Moran in his sights until a lap 30 restart when
McCreadie and Thornton got by him. McCreadie, looking for his first
win in the Rocket1 House Car, yielded the second spot to Thornton
on lap 41 as Blair joined the party and he began to put the pressure
on Thornton for second.
With no caution flags in the last 25 laps, Moran had
to navigate heavy traffic that allowed Thornton and Blair to close
briefly, but Moran would ultimately pull away. In Lucas Oil Victory
Lane for the 12th time in his career, the racer who scored his first
career Lucas Oil Late Model Dirt Series win at the same track 11
years ago, climbed from his #99 to the cheers from the massive crowd
on hand to witness the event that carried an $80,000 feature purse.
“Man, this is just awesome. All the glory to
God and these great race fans. I love coming here! We only get to
come here once or twice a year. It was an awesome night and I’m
glad to be back in victory lane with the Lucas Oil guys. It took
a while to get around those guys in the back. Our car was so good.
I just want to give my car owner, Roger Sellers, a huge shoutout
as he drove all the way up from Tennessee to be here tonight. Thanks
to my dad, my mom and my whole family they put on a great event
tonight.”
Thornton came home in second and will maintain the
series points lead heading to Iowa, Illinois, and Missouri next
week.
“I needed to win the heat race to be able to
stand where Devin is tonight. I felt like I was pretty decent there.
It’s tough to start fifth and pass here. It was so top dominant
there forever. I just never got myself in a good enough position
and then I got a couple of lucky restarts there and I thought I
could run him [Moran] down and the lapped cars were racing harder
than I was for the lead. It was one of those deals, we’ll
take second and head on down the road.”
For the second year in a row, at Muskingum County,
Blair rounded out the Big River Steel Podium with his third-place
finish.
“This track races like Eriez, Pa and like a
lot of tracks back home. I am much more familiar and comfortable
with tracks like this. That was a lot of fun. I thought I was going
to have Ricky there for a long time, I think we raced about 20 laps
side-by-side and we never touched. This crowd was awesome tonight
especially on the Fourth of July weekend, because it’s tough,
there is so much racing going on everywhere so for the crowd to
be this good that is pretty cool.”
The winner’s Roger Sellers-owned, Double Down
Motorsports, Longhorn Chassis is powered by a Cornett Racing Engine
and sponsored by Big River Steel, C&W Trucking, Lazydays RV,
McHugh Chrysler Dodge Jeep and Ram, CarSourceAuto.com, Bilstein
Shocks, Red Oak Pub, Smoky Mountain Speedway, Lincoln Smith Racing,
Pee Wee’s Wrecker Service, and Haulin’ Haskell’s.
Freedom 60 - Lucas Oil Late Model Dirt Series
1. 99-Devin Moran[1]; 2. 20RT-Ricky Thornton Jr[5]; 3. 111-Max Blair[7];
4. 49-Jonathan Davenport[6]; 5. 66C-Matt Cosner[8]; 6. 1-Tim McCreadie[2];
7. 28C-Tyler Carpenter[4]; 8. 19M-Spencer Hughes[15]; 9. 18D-Daulton
Wilson[22]; 10. 71-Hudson O'Neal[12]; 11. 53C-Colten Burdette[11];
12. 20B-Todd Brennan[25]; 13. 93F-Carson Ferguson[14]; 14. 20-Jimmy
Owens[20]; 15. 157-Mike Marlar[18]; 16. 4T-Tripp Gerrald[17]; 17.
93-Cory Lawler[21]; 18. 6-Clay Harris[13]; 19. 17SS-Brenden Smith[19];
20. 10L-Nathon Loney[24]; 21. 58-Garrett Alberson[3]; 22. 7-Ross
Robinson[16]; 23. 144-Anthony Kinkade[26]; 24. 99B-Boom Briggs[23];
25. 7T-Drake Troutman[10]; 26. 156-James Dennis[9]
RUSH 604 Crate Late Models
1. 1/2PT-Damian Bidwell[2]; 2. 37-Logan Reed[1]; 3. 31-Lincoln Smith[7];
4. 25-Zachary Kane[6]; 5. 29-Ryan Hare[3]; 6. 17X-Andy Michael[9];
7. 4-Philip Bubeck[11]; 8. 14JR-Dwight Smith[12]; 9. 34-Brian Nethers[10];
10. 02-Benjamin Easler[5]; 11. L19-Larry Holbrook[8]; 12. 44-Rusty
Redman[4]; 13. 61-Tony Paynter[13]; 14. 1-Blake Morris[17]; 15.
69-Ryan Robey[14]; 16. 93-Jim Cochran[15]; 17. (DNF) 29S-Scott Smith[16]
UMP Open Wheel Modifieds
1. 5-Jess Hartman[2]; 2. 45-Sam Lovejoy[6]; 3. 69-Ryan Robey[8];
4. 76-Aaron Phillis[5]; 5. 42-Cody Parker[22]; 6. 02-Joseph Chambers[9];
7. 71-Tuff Zemba[18]; 8. 75-Tristen Bickford[10]; 9. 10R-Robin Ours[12];
10. 76J-Jeremy Waite[19]; 11. 385-Kirk Bradley[20]; 12. (DNF) 10X-Roscoe
Greiner[11]; 13. (DNF) 17E-Lance Elson[1]; 14. (DNF) 10-Kyle Bond[4];
15. (DNF) 17X-Richard Michael Jr[3]; 16. (DNF) 12X-Brandon McGrady[14];
17. (DNF) 99-Derek Davis[16]; 18. (DNF) 25S-Tim Siddle; 19. (DNF)
12-Kevin Davis[21]; 20. (DNF) 327-Josh Hlad[13]; 21. (DNF) 101-Jesse
Wisecarver[7]; 22. (DNF) 71C-Dakota Carpenter[15]; 23. (DNS) S25-Pete
Caplinger
4-Cylinders
1. 8-Chris Dyer[4]; 2. 13T-Nick Timberlake[1]; 3. 9-Kevin Graap[3];
4. 7-Mick Willison[6]; 5. 777-Howard Rock Jr[5]; 6. 187-Noah Bubeck[2];
7. 2-Bill Tennant[8]; 8. 15-Zach Medley[10]; 9. 16KT-Keira Thomason[12];
10. 21-Bradley Bird[9]; 11. (DNF) 19M-Daniel Moss[14]; 12. (DNF)
0-David Smith[13]; 13. (DNF) 14A-Mike McMahan[18]; 14. (DNF) 51*-Andrew
Smith[15]; 15. (DNF) 7X-Tom Wilson[7]; 16. (DNF) 32-David Smith
Jr[17]; 17. (DNF) 21B-Jeremy Balsley[11]; 18. (DNS) 241-Joe Grimm
Jr; 19. (DNS) 55-Ralph Carnes; 20. (DNS) 51-William Ewing
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