Shelby County Speedway
Intriguing battle for rich runner-up spot at SDN
By Kevin Kovac
DirtonDirt senior writer
Jonathan Davenport (49) takes second from Bobby Pierce (32). (heathlawsonphotos.com)
HARLAN, Iowa (July 18) — The drivers who restarted closest to race-long leader Ricky Thornton Jr. with 10 circuits remaining in Saturday night’s 16th annual Al Belt Custom Homes Silver Dollar Nationals all wanted to win. But they had two opportunities to hit jackpot at Shelby County Speedway. | RaceWire
Indeed, the Joe Kosiski-promoted event’s unique purse structure — a $52,000 check for the victor and a richer $53,000 payoff for the runner-up — provided another option, which was a wonderful fallback considering Thornton’s clear domination of an 80-lap race contested on a surprisingly bottom-dominant track that put passing at a premium.
So as the 35-year-old superstar calmly controlled the stretch run to the finish for his first-ever Silver Dollar Nationals triumph in the crown jewel show’s inaugural edition at Shelby County, there was still intrigue over who would claim a decidedly unusual first-loser status.
It was Jonathan Davenport of Blairsville, Ga., who grabbed that victory-like bridesmaid finish thanks to some slick maneuvers through the middle of the track after the restart that carried him from fourth place to second by lap 72 with passes of Chatham, Ill.’s Brian Shirley and Oakwood, Ill.’s Bobby Pierce.
But while Davenport, 42, acknowledged that he pocketed more money than Thornton, did his postrace demeanor give off a sense that he was a co-winner? Not really. It was a nice windfall, sure, but J.D. still wore the mug of a driver who fell short of victory.
Davenport wasn’t satisfied. He wanted a fourth career Silver Dollar triumph, which spoke to the inner fire driving racers.
“I mean, in reality, it could have paid $10,000-to-win and 53 (thousand) for second,” Thornton said in regard to the mindset of him and his fellow drivers, “and think we all still wanted to win.”
Of course, having the consolation prize of a second-place check that’s fatter than the winner’s slip through your fingers is a bit discouraging. That was the case with Pierce, the 29-year-old sensation who moved into the spot behind Thornton on lap two and made repeated fruitless attempts to find a way into the lead. He even took a shot on the lap-70 restart, eschewing the safe play of defending second for a bid using the outside lane that never really had traction during the race.
“I wanted to win the race, and I thought that if I didn’t hit it good enough (running the top) I could fall back in and still get down in time (to hold second), which I did,” Pierce said, who knew the outside wasn’t going to work for him after trying it at both ends of the track for one lap. “And I’m like, ‘OK, we’re just gonna ride second.’ Next corner, J.D. goes around me in the middle and I’m like, ‘Man.’ ”
Davenport used veteran savvy to pick up the two spots necessary for a big payday. He had shuffled forward from the ninth starting to reach third by lap seven and ran there until Shirley dropped J.D. to fourth on lap 27, and without the race’s lone caution flag, on lap 70, was resigned to finishing just off the podium with the mud ring on the inside of the 3/8-mile oval continuing to make that the prime groove.
The caution period gave Davenport a chance to plot some strategy. Intuition told him that he might have a fleeting chance to bolt by a car or two on the single-file restart.
“It was pretty much just one lane around the bottom,” Davenport said. “Right before the caution come out I went to the top just to try it, and hell, (Brandon) Sheppard passed me, but luckily I was still ahead of him there at the line. I kept watching the lapped cars and they wouldn’t really going anywhere, and any time Ricky or Bobby would move anywhere they would actually lose ground, so it wasn't the greatest race or greatest track.
“Under that caution I just got to roll in that (crumbs) in the middle. I just kept rolling through it, spinning through it, and there was a little bit of grip in it.”
Davenport figured there was “only three or four laps worth of grip there” from his packing job, so he would have to work quick. He did seize the moment, going right to that middle in the first and second turns. With Pierce trying the extreme outside and Shirley staying low, Davenport had the scenario he wanted.
“Bobby’s like any of us — he wants to win — and I thought he would try (a last-ditch bid) one lap,” Davenport said. “I didn’t think Bobby would go through the middle like I was planning on, which he didn’t, and I thought once Bobby would leave the bottom then Shirley may overrun the corner a little bit and then he would hang a little bit and that would that would give me a little bit more momentum if I could hit that corner just right. And I didn't hit it perfect, but I hit it pretty good.
“Like I was telling (the crew), when I got beside of Shirley (exiting turn four heading to clock lap 71), Bobby was on the top, so I actually had to check up or we was all gonna crash right there.”
Davenport survived some contact with Shirley to run the middle past the Lucas Oil Late Model Dirt Series regular through turns one and two. He carried his moment by Pierce for second down the backstretch to grab second as lap 72 was scored and the drew close to Thornton, but by the time he got to his back bumper “the grip was gone” and he lost ground to Thornton and had to tuck to the bottom the rest of the way.
“I really wish Shirley hadn’t gotten by me earlier (for third),” Davenport said. “If I could’ve restarted in third I think I would have had a better shot at (Thornton) because there was only three or four laps worth of grip there.”
And would Davenport have gotten aggressive with Thornton if he pulled close enough even with the hefty runner-up payoff looming? He was ready to throw something at RTJ.
“I wasn’t gonna do anything crazy, but if I’d ever got a run on him,” Davenport said, his voice trailing off for a moment. “You know, we’ve had our differences and I would have given him one back, but I never did get a run to do that.
“I wasn’t gonna wreck him on purpose or anything like that,” he added, “but I wish I could have made it interesting.”
Davenport was successful using the middle-lane tactics that both Sheppard and Brandon Sheppard of New Berlin, Ill., who restarted fifth and finished there, thought could work. Sheppard, 33, didn’t go to the middle because Davenport beat him to it, while Shirley simply relinquished his chance to set the middle-running tone.
“When that caution come out, me and (Davenport) both were kind of packing that middle-top there in one and two, because there was some wet crumbs laying out there,” Sheppard said. “My thought was, if he don’t do it, I'm gonna do it, move out like a lane. For a lap or two it would probably be OK because there was grip there.
“But when he went high, I knew I had to go low to protect. Then when he got that run off of two there, I was like, ‘Yep, that was a good move.’ He made a couple laps in the middle and got to second and then he had to get back down.
“I kind of thought to myself it would be good,” he continued. “But when somebody does in front of you, you can’t do it. He did a good job.”
Shirley, 45, just didn’t feel good about his current driving prowess to take the middle-lane gamble. He’s struggled in his first season as a Lucas Oil Series regular and admittedly was more concerned about continuing a solid week — he was coming off a fourth-place finish in Tuesday’s tour stop at Adams County Speedway in Corning, Iowa, and a fifth in Thursday’s Malvern Bank Go 50 at Shelby County — to risk failing.
“Truthfully, if I would have had my confidence, I do believe I should have made the move that J.D. did,” Shirley said. “I needed to be there in the middle trying to get myself a better position, but I was like, ‘All right, I’m gonna just stay and protect where I’m at and try and get a decent finish.’ And as a racer, you shouldn’t race like that. If you’re running second or third in a crown jewel event with less than 10 laps ago, you should go for it.
“I thought Bobby would try to make a last-ditch effort to try and win the race. I thought I would hang out there on the hub because that’s obviously where we had been running. I made the mistake of just not being confident.”
Shirley praised Davenport.
“I just seen his veteran ability,” Shirley said. “Obviously J.D.’s one of the greats, so he understands the confidence in him and his race car. He is who he is for a reason.
“I’m not going to sit here and lie and say that a third-place wasn’t going to be a big confidence booster, so all in all, we need to just keep building our confidence up so … sort of like Bobby, he’s like, ‘I’m gonna go to the top and try to win.’ J.D. did the same thing. When you get confidence in your race car, and you’re confident in yourself, even when your car may not even be that good, like Bobby and J.D., they can make up for a lot of it. Great drivers do great things, and they succeed. Their mentality is a step above some of us that are just trying to get there.”
Thornton has experienced a rough season with his Koehler Motorsports team — Saturday marked just his third full-field Lucas Oil victory and sixth overall win of 2026 — but his confidence showed through on the final restart. He knew what he had to do.
“The only upside I thought for me on the restart was you could go in the bottom and there was half a lane that was slick, but then there was a little bit of moisture above it,” Thornton said. “So I actually drove in too hard to make sure (Pierce) couldn’t get under me and got into the lane off the bottom, but then I was able to stop and turn back to the berm. So then even if he had a run, he was going to either have to run into the left-rear or check up for me.
“And then I saw J.D. got to second on the board, and I’m like, ‘All right, well, I figure either J.D.’s really good around the bottom or he’s running through the middle. So then I started just kind of floating myself out, and I felt like I picked the pace up once I started floating out to the middle. Then I caught (Daniel) Hilsabeck on the last lap and I was like, ‘Man, do you follow him or do you not?’ And I decided to not follow him, but then it actually worked out and I was able to get next to him, so then I knew there was no way J.D. was going to be able to go by me.”
Thornton made all the right moves. Davenport tipped his helmet to him.
“They done a good job,” Davenport said. “I don’t know what they turned just right on that thing Thursday night, but, you know, they’ve not been very good here for a while, then all of a sudden Thursday night, they was really, really good in the feature. Then they was good all day yesterday (Friday’s dual-heat qualifying program). He was the class of the field for two days.”
