Eldora Speedway
J.D.'s Plan B fruitless, but he's still confident
By Kyle McFadden
DirtonDirt staff reporter
Wednesday's feature gets rolling at Eldora. (joshjamesartwork.com)
ROSSBURG, Ohio (June 3) — Brandon Sheppard stormed from 21st to fourth. Dale McDowell advanced from 11th to third. Jonathan Davenport, meanwhile, went nowhere.
The winner of the previous three Dreams and 11-time Eldora Speedway crown jewel winner never found a way forward, ending Wednesday’s FloRacing Night in America feature at the legendary half-mile right where he started in 10th. Before reading too much into the Blairsville, Ga., superstar’s uncharacteristically quiet night at his favorite track, he had an explanation — and a reminder — delivered with a grin. | Complete Dream coverage
“I learned a few things not to do. But that's what we came here to do,” the 42-year-old Davenport said. “We got to try quite a few new things. And, obviously, my old s---’s still pretty good.”
In other words, Wednesday’s setup amounted to “Plan B” for Davenport and his Double L Motorsports team in the 50-lapper won by Nick Hoffman. The package they unloaded with wasn’t necessarily the one they believe gives them the best chance to win Saturday’s Dream XXXII. With Wednesday’s event having no bearing on the rest of the week, Davenport viewed it as a chance to venture outside his comfort zone and see if there was anything worth adding to his hallmark Eldora formula.
“We wanted to come here and just try that, and then if that didn't work — or if we found something that was better — we could implement it a little bit into our normal stuff,” Davenport added. “But it was several things that we did and I didn't like none of them.”
According to Davenport, he’s stepped out his comfort zone package quite a bit during this 10-victory campaign.
“I don’t want to say we’ve changed our program, but we have been doing some different things here lately,” Davenport said. “And I wanted to see, you know — I’m always thinking about here (at Eldora), so I wanted to see if they would be good here. … I’ve been using stuff on and off all year … really, from the end of last year and then then the first of this year.
“But it showed speed everywhere else. Not everywhere, but some places it did and some places I thought it would be really good and it wasn’t.”
Wednesday served as another reminder that present-day Dirt Late Models are fickle and temperamental creatures, capable of humbling even the most accomplished teams.
“These things are, like, wild,” Davenport said through a laugh. “Like, everybody up and down through here (in the pit area), that's all we do is work on these things — day in, day out. And we still don’t know what hell they do.”
Of course, Davenport has a better idea than most at Eldora with his legendary Eldora notebook that’s carried him to more than $2 million in career earnings at the half-mile alone.
One nuance this year that’s keeping him vigilant, however, is a change in the right-rear tire. The newer version features a wider, vented cross-block design — complete with molded tread vents similar to those found on sprint car tires — that’s intended to generate more sidebite and more consistent wear than its predecessor.
Last May, Hoosier Racing Tire rolled out the updated NLMT right-rear, and Davenport has spent much of the past year exploring where it works best. Until the beginning of May, national touring teams could still compete with the older-style NLMT right-rear if they so choose.
Davenport’s Double L Motorsports team was among those that frequently leaned on the previous version. As a result, this week’s Dream marks the first Eldora crown jewel contested under a rule requiring every driver in the field to run Hoosier’s updated right-rear tire.
“I always ran the old-style. So this was the first time that I was on the new-style tire here,” Davenport said. “And all year, really, like all through last year, I ran the old-style tire as long as I could. We had just had a good grasp on it. There is a little more of a learning curve, and that’s some of the things that played into tonight that’s a little different.
“I was trying to counteract that, and I think I went the wrong way on a couple of adjustments. But we’ll put our heads together and see.”
Davenport believed his 17th-place qualifying run of 41 cars in Group B stemmed more from a miscalculation of the racetrack than a shortage of speed.
“I wasn’t expecting it to be that really smooth and slick that early. I figured it would be a little wetter tonight,” Davenport said. “So it blowed off really quick, and that's fine. I think the dirt that they moved from the bottom of the straightaways moved back out. It was a little slimier to start with, and it went really dry, really fast.
“Normally, you know, they can still have it wet in the first hot-lap session. Everybody gets a lot of mud, but it was more slime tonight. So the racetrack, I feel like, was a little bit different. Obviously, it was a lot smoother. … But I'm all right. I feel OK.”
In fact, Davenport lauded Eldora’s surface as the smoothest it has been in roughly five years.
“We had a really good track tonight. Thanks to Rob (Platfoot), the whole Eldora track crew, everybody that's here. They’ve turned this place around,” Davenport said. “It’s totally different. as far as what it has been been. Ever since 2022, it's had a trajectory of getting rougher and rougher and rougher. And tonight it was nowhere near what it has been. It was back to like ’21 and prior. So that's awesome for sure. It kind of played into my hands exactly what I wanted it to do.”
If Davenport has a biggest obstacle entering Dream weekend, it may not be anything setup- or track-related. Rather, it could be slowing the emergence of Nick Hoffman as an Eldora heavy hitter, a driver Davenport has parked alongside and mentored at the half-mile over the last few seasons — only to watch him become perhaps his most dangerous opponent.
“Right now, he’s really, really good, and he's been getting better and better at it,” Davenport said of Hoffman. “His cars are getting better. Him setting them up, and his driving … his race logic, his thinking about the racing. Like I've noticed, he just said things to me, like … he’s really catching on. He’s gonna be really, really good. Not that he's not now — but he's definitely going to get better and better.”
