Tyler Erb Becomes First Lucas Dirt Repeat Winner of 2021

TAMPA, FL – Tyler Erb became the first repeat winner this season on the Lucas Oil Late Model Dirt Series tour as he won the Saturday Night finale at East Bay Raceway Park before a packed house. The 24-year-old Texas native stormed to the lead after a lap 32 caution and held off Jonathan Davenport for the win. Davenport finished .322 seconds behind Erb at the finish line. Brandon Sheppard was third, followed by Tim McCreadie, and Hudson O’Neal in the Wrisco Industries Winternationals.

Sheppard led the first 13 laps of the race until Erb was able to get by him on lap 14. Erb held the point until a lap 19 restart when McCreadie took over the lead. McCreadie started to pull away from the field when a caution appeared with 32 laps scored. On the restart Erb went from third in the running order to the lead. A caution for debris on lap 35 halted the action one final time. Erb stretched his lead out over Davenport, but Davenport made it close at the end, coming to within one car length of the winner at the checkers.

Erb made his way to Lucas Oil Victory Lane for the 11th time in his career after starting fourth on the grid. “The top was pretty hard to run and I gave up the lead on a restart by running up there. I was like man, that could have been the race! McCreadie drove off and he was good. I really didn’t have much traction on the restarts, and I picked the top. I had a really good run on those guys, but needed a little luck. He [McCreadie] just kind of missed the bottom getting into one and I was able to get by him.”

“Randall [Edwards] was showing me that my lead was getting a little close at the end, so I just tried to hit my marks. I got real wide on that last corner and hoped for the best. I just tried not to burn my stuff up.  This is the first time we ever put a different tire on here and it worked out. I am just super excited to win.”

Davenport recorded his best LOLMDS finish so far during Florida Speedweeks with his runner-up placing.  “He [Erb] was pretty good. We were reeling him in at the end and I should have moved around a little bit earlier. I thought we could get by him on the last lap. I just tried to throw a Hail Mary at him, but I came up short. We’ve got something wrong with the other car, so I didn’t want to tear this one up.”

Sheppard, who ran most of the race up top came home in third. “We had a good car at the beginning of the week and then we struggled in the middle of the week. We finally got it going again here at the end. I am proud of my guys for sticking with me and working their tails off to give a fast race car. We had fun out there tonight. We got into heavy traffic when I was leading and then Terbo and McCreadie passed me. Congratulations to Terbo, he did a great job. We never got in to lapped traffic again so we could dice it up, but the cautions kept coming out.”

The winner’s Eric and Kelly Brock-owned Best Performance Motorsports Rocket Chassis is powered by a Clements Racing Engine and is sponsored by Industrial Resourcing Group, Roberts Bee Company, First Class Septic, Go Lithium, Bazell Race Fuels, Sunoco, Keyser, Lucas Oil Products, Franklin Enterprises, KBC Graphics, Boxo, and Corey Frazier State Farm Insurance.

Completing the top ten were Bobby Pierce, Boom Briggs, Brandon Overton, Josh Richards, and Ricky Thornton, Jr.

Lucas Oil Late Model Dirt Series
Race Summary
Wrisco Industries 45th Annual Winter Nationals – Presented by Lucas Oil
Saturday, January 30, 2021
East Bay Raceway Park – Tampa, FL

Allstar Performance Time Trials
Fast Time Group A: Brandon Overton / 14.544 seconds (overall)
Fast Time Group B: Brandon Sheppard / 14.644 seconds

Penske Race Shocks Heat Race #1 Finish (10 Laps, Top 3 Transfer): 1. 40B-Kyle Bronson[2]; 2. 9-Devin Moran[3]; 3. 71-Hudson O’Neal[4]; 4. 76-Brandon Overton[1]; 5. 12D-Doug Drown[11]; 6. 111-Steven Roberts[6]; 7. 2D-Dan Stone[5]; 8. 6B-Adam Boyd[12]; 9. 51B-Brandon Carpenter[8]; 10. 311-Ken Monahan[9]; 11. 1G-Ryan King[7]; 12. 18J-Chase Junghans[10]

Summit Racing Equipment Heat Race #2 Finish (10 Laps, Top 3 Transfer): 1. 39-Tim McCreadie[1]; 2. 99B-Boom Briggs[4]; 3. 21-Billy Moyer Jr[2]; 4. 6S-Blake Spencer[11]; 5. 2S-Stormy Scott[3]; 6. 11H-Spencer Hughes[9]; 7. 20B-Todd Brennan[8]; 8. 81-Jason Riggs[10]; 9. 27J-Joe Denby[12]; 10. 2X-Devin Dixon[5]; 11. 0G-Deshawn Gingerich[7]; 12. 56JR-Tony Jackson Jr[6]

Simpson Race Products Heat Race #3 Finish (10 Laps, Top 3 Transfer): 1. 385-Mark Whitener[2]; 2. 14B-John Baker[3]; 3. 76B-Blair Nothdurft[4]; 4. 22-Gregg Satterlee[9]; 5. 94M-Jason Miller[7]; 6. 6T-Zack Dohm[6]; 7. 58-Ross Bailes[10]; 8. 14G-Joe Godsey[5]; 9. 4S-Danny Snyder[11]; 10. 00H-Wil Herrington[8]; 11. 00R-Richie Stephens[12]; 12. 20-Jimmy Owens[1]

Ohlins Shocks Heat Race #4 Finish (10 Laps, Top 3 Transfer): 1. 1S-Brandon Sheppard[1]; 2. 28E-Dennis Erb Jr[5]; 3. 14-Josh Richards[3]; 4. 25Z-Mason Zeigler[4]; 5. 20RT-Ricky Thornton Jr[6]; 6. 51-Dean Carpenter[12]; 7. 3S-Brian Shirley[2]; 8. 36-Matt Irey[7]; 9. 8A-Rob Anderzack[9]; 10. 111M-Matthew Lux[10]; 11. 3W-Brennon Willard[11]; 12. 24D-Michael Brown[8]

MyRacePass Heat Race #5 Finish (10 Laps, Top 3 Transfer): 1. 1T-Tyler Erb[1]; 2. 81E-Tanner English[2]; 3. 32-Bobby Pierce[4]; 4. 16-Tyler Bruening[5]; 5. 1-Earl Pearson Jr[9]; 6. 1ST-Johnny Scott[7]; 7. 25-Shane Clanton[3]; 8. 66C-Matt Cosner[6]; 9. 14R-Jeff Roth[11]; 10. 995-Manny Falcon[10]; 11. 33-Jeff Mathews[8]; 12. (DNS) 7R-Ross Robinson

Fast Shafts Heat Race #6 Finish (10 Laps, Top 3 Transfer): 1. 49-Jonathan Davenport[2]; 2. 157-Mike Marlar[1]; 3. 99JR-Frank Heckenast Jr[3]; 4. 48-Colton Flinner[4]; 5. 0E-Rick Eckert[7]; 6. 212-Josh Putnam[6]; 7. 8-Kyle Strickler[5]; 8. J8-Jadon Frame[8]; 9. C4-Freddie Carpenter[9]; 10. KB0-Kerry King[10]; 11. 29-Larry Grube[11]

LINE-X B-Main #1 Finish (12 Laps, Top 2 Transfer): 1. 76-Brandon Overton[1]; 2. 6S-Blake Spencer[2]; 3. 81-Jason Riggs[10]; 4. 12D-Doug Drown[3]; 5. 2S-Stormy Scott[4]; 6. 2X-Devin Dixon[14]; 7. 20B-Todd Brennan[8]; 8. 2D-Dan Stone[7]; 9. 6B-Adam Boyd[9]; 10. 56JR-Tony Jackson Jr[18]; 11. 311-Ken Monahan[13]; 12. 27J-Joe Denby[12]; 13. 111-Steven Roberts[5]; 14. 0G-Deshawn Gingerich[16]; 15. 51B-Brandon Carpenter[11]; 16. 11H-Spencer Hughes[6]; 17. (DNS) 1G-Ryan King; 18. (DNS) 18J-Chase Junghans

UNOH B-Main #2 Finish (12 Laps, Top 2 Transfer): 1. 22-Gregg Satterlee[1]; 2. 20RT-Ricky Thornton Jr[4]; 3. 25Z-Mason Zeigler[2]; 4. 6T-Zack Dohm[5]; 5. 00H-Wil Herrington[13]; 6. 58-Ross Bailes[7]; 7. 94M-Jason Miller[3]; 8. 14G-Joe Godsey[9]; 9. 111M-Matthew Lux[14]; 10. 36-Matt Irey[10]; 11. 3W-Brennon Willard[16]; 12. 4S-Danny Snyder[11]; 13. 3S-Brian Shirley[8]; 14. 51-Dean Carpenter[6]; 15. (DNS) 8A-Rob Anderzack; 16. (DNS) 24D-Michael Brown; 17. (DNS) 20-Jimmy Owens; 18. (DNS) 00R-Richie Stephens

Wrisco Industries B-Main #3 Finish (12 Laps, Top 2 Transfer): 1. 1ST-Johnny Scott[5]; 2. 48-Colton Flinner[2]; 3. 25-Shane Clanton[7]; 4. 16-Tyler Bruening[1]; 5. 0E-Rick Eckert[4]; 6. 8-Kyle Strickler[8]; 7. 1-Earl Pearson Jr[3]; 8. 212-Josh Putnam[6]; 9. 14R-Jeff Roth[11]; 10. C4-Freddie Carpenter[12]; 11. KB0-Kerry King[14]; 12. 29-Larry Grube[16]; 13. 66C-Matt Cosner[9]; 14. J8-Jadon Frame[10]; 15. 33-Jeff Mathews[15]; 16. (DNS) 995-Manny Falcon; 17. (DNS) 7R-Ross Robinson

Lucas Oil Feature Finish (50 Laps):

Race Statistics
Entrants: 71
Lap Leaders: Brandon Sheppard (Laps 1 – 13); Tyler Erb (Laps 14 – 19); Tim McCreadie (Laps 20 – 32); Tyler Erb (Lap (33 – 50)
Wrisco Feature Winner: Tyler Erb
Arizona Sport Shirts CJC – Presented by DirtOnDirt Feature Winner: n/a
Brandon Ford TV Challenge Feature Winner: Tyler Erb
Margin of Victory: 0.322 seconds
Cautions: Mike Marlar, Josh Richards (Lap 2); Colton Flinner (Lap 5); Stormy Scott (Lap 19); Tanner English, Mark Whitener, Gregg Satterlee (Lap 32); Johnny Scott (Lap 32); Debris (Lap 35)
Series Provisionals: Jimmy Owens, Shane Clanton
Fast Time Provisional: n/a
Series Emergency Provisionals: Earl Pearson Jr., Tyler Bruening, Brian Shirley, Stormy Scott
Track Provisionals: n/a
Berry Barn Pole Award: Kyle Bronson
Big River Steel Podium Top 3: Tyler Erb, Jonathan Davenport, Brandon Sheppard
Penske Shocks Top 5: Tyler Erb, Jonathan Davenport, Brandon Sheppard, Tim McCreadie, Hudson O’Neal
Optima Batteries Hard Charger of the Race: Earl Pearson Jr. (Advanced 16 Positions)
Midwest Sheet Metal Spoiler Challenge Point Leader: Brandon Overton
Hot Rod Processing Most Laps Led: Tyler Erb (24 Laps)
Sunoco Race for Gas Highest Finisher: Tyler Erb
Eibach Springs Rookie of the Race: n/a
Dirty Girl Racewear Fastest Lap of the Race: Brandon Sheppard (Lap #4 – 16.6429 seconds)
Fast Shafts Tough Break of the Race: Mike Marlar
Outerwears Crew Chief of the Race: Randall Edwards (Tyler Erb)
ARP Engine Builder of the Race: Clements Racing Engines
Miller Welders Chassis Builder of the Race: Rocket Chassis
Dirt Draft Fastest in Hot Laps: Jonathan Davenport
Time of Race: 37 minutes 29 seconds