Wayne County Speedway
Teams ready for rare pre-Dream racing flurry
By Kyle McFadden
DirtonDirt staff reporter
Heat race action Thursday at Wayne County. (Emily Schwanke/woolms.com)
ORRVILLE, Ohio (May 28) — It’s not often that national Dirt Late Model tours schedule many races — if any at all — the weekend leading into the Dream at Eldora Speedway in Rossburg, Ohio.
The last time a national tour ran the weekend before the Dream was in 2023, when both the Lucas Oil Late Model Dirt Series and World of Outlaws Case Late Model Series were in action. The Lucas Oil tour staged a two-day event at West Virginia Motor Speedway, drawing 26 cars. The Outlaws, meanwhile, held a June 1-3 tripleheader at Farmer City (Ill.) Raceway, Tri-City Speedway in Granite City, Ill., and Paducah (Ky.) International Raceway;those events drew 27, 33 and 28 cars.
The only other time in recent memory a national tour attempted a tripleheader the week before the Dream came in 2011, when the Lucas Oil tour raced June 2-4 at Cleveland (Tenn.) Speedway, Tazewell (Tenn.) Speedway and Florence Speedway in Union, Ky.
That makes this four-race World of Outlaws stretch — Wednesday at Marion Center (Pa.) Raceway, Thursday at Wayne County Speedway and Friday-Saturday at Mansfield (Ohio) Speedway — in the days leading into the 32nd Dream a rare occurrence.
It’s even rarer considering the level of support: 45 cars at Wayne County and a car count expected to approach the 50s at Mansfield, including practically all of the sport’s biggest superstars planning to race with Jonathan Davenport a notable exception.
Simply put, when Matt Tifft — who's dumped more than $8 million into reviving Mansfield, which just two weeks ago reopened for its first action since 2019 — posts a $57,000-to-win, $5,700-to-start purse, drivers are going to support it.
“That’s pretty much what it is. Just a matter of a guy putting himself out there and putting a lot of money on the line, and, you know, when people do that and take a risk, we try to support them as much as we can just because we want to race for more money,” Brandon Sheppard said before the start of Wayne County's program. “When a guy puts up more money, you got to go support them or else you’re not standing behind what you want, you know?”
All told, Sheppard called the decision to race Wayne County and Mansfield before the Dream a “no-brainer,” even though it creates “a lot of work leading up to this for the guys" at Rocket1 Racing "because Eldora’s next week and we don’t really have time to go home because you have to get in line to park either late Monday or early Tuesday” in Rossburg, Ohio.
“But at the end of the day, it’s about supporting a guy who’s putting a lot of money on the line and, you know, because that’s what we want is to race for more money,” Sheppard said. “We appreciate that. We’re gonna go show them some love and go support the race.”
Bryan Liverman, a crewman for Mason Zeigler, sees it the same way. Zeigler, despite racing only nine times to begin 2026, is set to race seven times in 11 days. That includes bypassing marquee events this weekend at Bedford (Pa.) Speedway — where Zeigler won on the Outlaw tour two weeks ago — and Selinsgrove (Pa.) Speedway.
“It just gets us geared up for next week. We get in the right mind frame and get to race more,” Liverman said. “We were racing against the best guys in the country here tonight. So that gets us more mentally prepared for what we’re going to go into next week. … We wanted to come out here and shake it up with these guys and support Matt Tifft and these guys.
“How do you not go support a guy like that? It’s crazy that you wouldn’t.”
Ricky Thornton Jr. was already all-in on Mansfield. He added Wayne County to his schedule when event promoter Tye Twarog — car owner of Nick Hoffman’s No. 9 World of Outlaws entry — called and encouraged several drivers to support the race.
“He actually called a lot of us and wanted a lot of us to come support it,” Thornton said. “So we figured we’d make the extra trip, which the guys were (working) at (Lucas Oil Series director Rick) Schwallie’s shop (in Batavia, Ohio) this week anyway, so it wasn’t like it was a far drive. I went home for a few days, which is why we skipped Marion Center.”
For Lucas Oil regulars such as Thornton and Sheppard, there’s also a different mindset in play. With no Lucas Oil points to worry about, the approach can be more aggressive.
“No points on the line, man, there’s something to be said for that that makes you drive a little bit different,” Sheppard said. “At the end of the day, now we’re going for the win even more.”
Thornton echoed that.
“I feel like, you know, if you’re running second, you have a shot to win, you’ll probably drive a little harder these three nights, like I said, just because they’re not Lucas races for us,” Thornton said. “Where on the flip side, your World of Outlaws guys probably aren’t going to press the issue just because their points are all so tight right now.”
World of Outlaws regular Ryan Gustin, however, didn’t sound overly concerned about the added competition amid the tour’s points battle.
“I don’t know if it matters too much,” Gustin said. “I mean, the guy we have to beat (Bobby Pierce) just kicked all their asses" on the Lucas Oil circuit when he won Sunday's Show-Me 100.
Sheppard also argued that the sport’s loaded schedule has actually conditioned teams to prepare cars capable of racing anywhere, Eldora included. He said any car in the Rocket1 Racing stable could be readily available to contend at Eldora.
“There’s so much racing right now that, honestly, you know, a lot of guys don’t look at Eldora as far as preparation-wise any different than any other night. We don’t,” Sheppard said. “We could go race this car at Eldora tomorrow, or go race the car in front of the trailer tomorrow (at Eldora). That’s just the way we prepare. And I think that a lot of teams in the pit area are the same way.
“Obviously, they don’t want to tear each other’s stuff up or whatnot, but yeah, there’s just so many races, so much money on the line anymore. There’s a lot more preparation and time that goes into the weekend, week in and week out. Doing it for a living, that makes a big difference. You know, how much preparation you put into this.”
Hudson O’Neal is racing Kevin Rumley’s No. 6 at Wayne County before rejoining his SSI Motorsports team Friday and Saturday at Mansfield. For O’Neal, the preparation for Eldora is already largely complete.
“Yeah, I mean, obviously there’s a preparation factor, but the preparation is more so done at the shop more so than what you see at the racetrack,” O’Neal said. “We don’t have an Eldora car, but we have our car that we are racing at Eldora already. So whether we race this weekend or not, our car, our primary car that we’re going to focus on for Eldora, is ready 100 percent. And this weekend will have no bearing on that.”
The extent of O’Neal’s and SSI’s preparation ahead of the Dream is returning to Jason Durham’s Glasgow, Ky., shop to freshen the car they’ll race at Mansfield so it’s ready as a backup car at Eldora.
“I don’t think that racing this weekend is going to affect our next weekend at all, you know? We all race enough,” O’Neal said. “And we have enough crew guys and everything where we’re efficient no matter how much we race for the most part.”
But not everyone has the resources to treat the week before Eldora that way.
For every national team using Wayne County and Mansfield as a chance to perhaps pocket more money and sharpen itself one final time before Dream week, there’s a regional racer like Jerry Bowersock carefully picking his spots.
The 60-year-old Wapakoneta, Ohio, driver is racing his modified at Wayne County and Mansfield while saving his Late Model equipment for next week’s Dream. Bowersock has raced his Late Model only twice this season, including a May 9 Valvoline American Late Model Iron-Man Series victory in the Mother’s Day Shootout at Atomic Speedway — a $5,000 triumph that marked his first touring victory since 2009.
“Most of my sponsors are tied around Eldora. That’s pretty important for me to be there,” Bowersock said. “If money wasn’t an object and I had an extra car and whatnot, I’d probably do all three days of this, so it’s pretty relatively close to me. Budget-wise, we just need to pick our battles and we’ll get ready for Eldora.”
Still, Sheppard sees no reason Mansfield’s mega two-day event can’t become a fixture on the calendar, even in the days leading into the Dream. Guys like Brandon Overton, Dale McDowell, Chris Madden, Chris Ferguson, Josh Rice, Garrett Alberson and Max Blair, among others, are expected to arrive in the Buckeye State after bypassing Thursday at Wayne County.
Driver pedigree alone, the weekend is shaping to be a successful one for all those who took a chance of scheduling it just days before the Dream.
“Yeah, there’s no reason why it can’t,” Sheppard said. “Everybody’s prepared enough in this pit area, I feel like, that no matter, you know, even if somebody gets tore up at Mansfield, they’ll still go to Eldora.”
O’Neal, too, hopes Mansfield’s lucrative date is here to stay.
“And hopefully the racetrack will be good, and all the things that’s needed for it to go well. I’m sure there’s a lot more that’s gone into it and is going to go into it for years to come,” O’Neal said. “So, yeah, all in all … it’s paying big money. It pays $5,700 to start, which is very rare. We haven’t seen that since I-80 (Speedway when it hosted the Silver Dollar Nationals from 2011-22).
“And so anytime we can have an event like that, the racers need to show up and support them because they’re doing it for us. And whenever they offer that to us, it’s making it harder on them. So that’s the sacrifice they make, so we need to try and support them the best we can.”
