FARLEY, Iowa – Josh Richards made a daring three-wide pass for the lead on lap 17 and went on to win the Lucas Oil Late Model Dirt Series Truck Country 50 on Monday night at 300 Raceway.
Richards, Jimmy Owens and Kyle Bronson went three-wide down the main straightaway as Richards split both Owens and Bronson to take the lead heading into turn one on lap 16.
From there Richards maintained a steady pace to the checkers as he bested Owens by .872 seconds to become the sixth different winner in six appearances at the track by the Lucas Oil Late Model Dirt Series.
Tim McCreadie charged from the back after pitting for a flat tire to finish third. Kyle Bronson led the first part of the race, but faded to fourth at the finish ahead of Tyler Erb in fifth.
“Man, I was hoping the tires would hold up tonight,” Richards said. “I can’t thank everyone enough with this race car: Brad, Cody, and Big Dog; they do a phenomenal job. Thanks to my dad and Steve Baker at Rocket Chassis. We have had a lot of speed, and we just tweaked some things. We were a lot better tonight. I knew last year the track dried up pretty quick. They tilled it up quite a bit tonight, so we kind of left the car alone. The car was snug tonight. The last couple of laps the right front wouldn’t steer at all. I was fortunate enough to have a scoreboard in turn three to help with how many laps I had left.”
Owens, the series points leader, notched yet another top-five finish this year.
“Josh drove an awesome race,” Owens said. “He made a heck of a move to get the lead. It was great to come out with another podium finish. They did a great job on prepping the track before the feature. It was good racing all-night long.”
The finish:
Josh Richards, Jimmy Owens, Tim McCreadie, Kyle Bronson, Tyler Erb, Jonathan Davenport, Tanner English, Shane Clanton, Tyler Bruening, Devin Moran, Rick Eckert, Hudson O’Neal, Chad Simpson, Shanon Buckingham, Billy Moyer Jr., Spencer Diercks, David Webster, Brian Birkhofer, Earl Pearson Jr., Johnny Scott, Matthew Lux, Stormy Scott, Chris Simpson, Jeremiah Hurst.