Brownstown Speedway
O'Neal overtakes Owens, wins fourth Jackson 100
By Todd Turner
DirtonDirt.com managing editor
Don O'Neal takes the checkers at Brownstown. (Jeremey Rhoades)
BROWNSTOWN, Ind. (Sept. 21) — Sidelined nearly a month from the Lucas Oil Late Model Dirt Series because of neck and back injuries suffered in a rollover accident, Don O’Neal would’ve preferred racing on a classicly smooth Brownstown Speedway surface at the 34th annual Jackson 100. | Video | Sidebar | Slideshow
But overnight rain kept so much traction in the surface that plenty of rough patches developed, and O’Neal, a former track champion, wasn’t sure his recovering body was ready for it.
“It bothered me a little bit in the heat race, and I told (co-car owner) Tader (Masters), I said, 'Man, I don’t know if I can run 100 laps like that.' We ran faster laps in the heat race than we qualified,” the 49-year-old Martinsville, Ind., driver said. “But the racetrack had slowed down enough there in the feature. It was still rough, but it wasn’t near as treacherous as it was in those heat races.”
O’Neal summoned enough strength to manhandle his black-and-red No. 71 at the quarter-mile oval to his fourth career Jackson 100 victory and a $15,000 after outdueling series points leader and polesitter Jimmy Owens of Newport, Tenn., and stretching his lead in the late stages.
“I think it’s fair to say that I’m healed now — I’m ready to go racing. ... We’re ready to get back at it,” said O’Neal, who was hurt Aug. 22 at Volunteer Speedway in Bulls Gap, Tenn. “We won that North-South (Aug. 10 at Florence Speedway in Union, Ky.) and turned around and went to Batesville (Ark.) and had fast time and got disqualified, and then get hurt there ... Then turn around and come back here and win. I feel like the team is on the right track.”
O’Neal’s victory in Brownstown’s biggest race — he also won the race in 2000, ’04 and ’06 — was special for a driver who found his first Late Model success at the southern Indiana fairgrounds oval.
“I’m sure you can see that, because I drove the wheels off of it,” O’Neal said with a smile. “I mean, you can tell I probably wanted this pretty badly, because I was driving a little harder than Owens was, and I just wanted to win bad.”
Ninth-starting Dustin Linville of Bryantsville, Ky., outdueled Owens and World 100 winner John Blankenship of Williamson, W.Va., over the final 15 laps to get second while Blankenship, of Williamson, W.Va., settled for third, a position he held most of the race after starting fifth. Owens was fourth in failing to repeat last year’s Jackson 100 victory.
Rounding out the top five was Steve Francis of Ashland, Ky., who made a remarkable run from the tail using a provisional starting spot after spending part of the evening in a nearby hospital. He suffered a severe lower lumbar sprain when his car slammed back to the track after bicycling on two wheels at the start of his heat race.
Linville picked up a career-richest $6,500 payday for his runner-up finish. He flirted with the top five early in the race, feel back through the middle stages, then came alive late and picked up two spots in the late stages.
“This is unreal. Like I said, everybody (in the pits) thought I was freaking won. I was going through there wide open,” said Linville, who finished 2.226 seconds behind O'Neal. “The most I’ve ever won is $4,000 in a race — this is like winning. Congrats to O’Neal, this is awesome.”
Blankenship was able to hold Owens in check late in the race, but he didn’t have enough car left to keep up with O’Neal and Linville.
“I felt like in the later stages of the race the car went away a little bit,” Blankenship said. “The rough racetrack was definitely taking a toll on it. But best finish here yet, and we’ll just try to improve and hopefully get a win here one of these days.”
Owens led O’Neal, Earl Pearson Jr., Dale McDowell and Blankenship early, staying in command after Eddie Carrier Jr. slowed with a lap-seven yellow.
O’Neal got rolling thereafter and found a way to zip past Owens on the backstretch on lap 16, and the drivers swapped the top spot three consecutive laps — each leading about a half-circuit each (and O’Neal officially leading at the start-finish line) — until Owens regained control on lap 19.
Cautions on lap 23 (Billy Moyer) and lap 27 (Jared Landers) slowed the action, but Owens looked unbeatable during the race’s longest green-flag stretch, building a straightaway lead midway through the race and keeping a cushion of a lapped car or two between his No. 20 and O’Neal’s No. 71.
But when Greg Johnson slowed with the first of two flat tires on his left-rear wheel on lap 67, O’Neal got a run on the outside to take over — a move erased by a lap-68 yellow for a tangle between Landers and Wayne Chinn inside turn two (McDowell gave up the fourth spot during the caution with brake problems).
O’Neal again pounced on the restart, and this time Owens slipped over the turn-two cushion trying to keep up and fell all the way back to fifth and nearly out of contention.
“It just seemed like he never restarted (well) after that (lap-67) yellow,” O’Neal said. “I don’t know if he sealed his tires up, it was like he was never the same after we had that long green-flag run and the yellow came out.”
Before that, “I kept thinking, 'Man, we need a yellow here, we need a yellow.' Because I had trouble with some lapped traffic, and he got out there aways, then we sort of maintained,” O’Neal said. “Right before that yellow came out, I tried running the top up there in the marbles a few times — I ain’t sure if that didn’t clean my tires off good and then helped me on that restart.”
Whether it was clean tires or fresh air, O’Neal set sail and wasn’t threatened the rest of the way, matching Scott Bloomquist as a four-time Jackson 100 winner.
Notes: O’Neal MasterSbilt Race Cars house car has a Jay Dickens Racing Engine and sponsorship from Optima Batteries, Seubert Calf Ranches, Tarpy Trucking, Superior Cleaning and Independence Lumber. ... O’Neal has three Lucas Oil Series victories. ... A dozen drivers completed 100 laps and 15 were running at the finish. ... Greg Johnson of Bedford, Ind., who started 17th, had flat tires on laps 67 and 82 but rallied to finish sixth. ... Steve Shaver ran as high as fourth after starting 13th, but slipped back to eighth at the finish. ... Earl Pearson Jr. started third and ran in the top five most of the first half of the race, but he settled for 10th. ... Among drivers failing to make the feature lineup: Walker Arthur (scratched from heat), Jeremy Hines, Joe Janowski (driving Alan Magner’s No. 7), Jeff Babcock, Shelby Miles, Chris Simpson and Kentucky brothers Dustin and Brad Neat. ... The race marked the first Jackson 100 under new promoter Jim Price, who restored the race to 100 laps and boosted the purse to $15,000-to-win and $1,000-to-start after a mid-season schedule shuffle had dropped it to 50 laps and $10,000-to-win. ... Next up for the Lucas Oil Series is the Sept. 26-28 Lucas Oil Late Model Knoxville Nationals presented by Casey’s General Stores at Knoxville (Iowa) Raceway, a weekend capped by a $40,000-to-win main event.
Jackson 100: (1) Don O'Neal, (2) Dustin Linville, (3) John Blankenship, (4) Jimmy Owens, (5) Steve Francis, (6) Greg Johnson, (7) Scott Bloomquist, (8) Steve Shaver, (9) Dennis Erb Jr., (10) Earl Pearson Jr., (11) Wayne Chinn, (12) Billy Moyer Jr., (13) Chad Stapleton, (14) Michael Chilton, (15) Eddie Carrier Jr., (16) Jared Landers, (17) Dale McDowell, (18) Victor Lee, (19) Duane Chamberlain, (20) Billy Moyer, (21) Josh McGuire, (22) Tim Rivers, (23) James Rice, (24) Kent Robinson, (25) Mike Marlar. Fast qualifier (among 46 cars): Blankenship, 14.509 seconds. Heat race winners: Owens, O’Neal, Pearson, McDowell. Consolation winners: Johnson, Moyer. Provisional starters: Francis, Rice, Rivers.
