Tampa, FL — January 30, 2021

Tyler Erb became the first repeat winner this season on the Lucas Oil Late Model Dirt Series tour as he won the Saturday Night finale at East Bay Raceway Park before a packed house. The 24-year-old Texas native stormed to the lead after a lap 32 caution and held off Jonathan Davenport for the win. Davenport finished .322 seconds behind Erb at the finish line. Brandon Sheppard was third, followed by Tim McCreadie, and Hudson O’Neal in the Wrisco Industries Winternationals.

Sheppard led the first 13 laps of the race until Erb was able to get by him on lap 14. Erb held the point until a lap 19 restart when McCreadie took over the lead. McCreadie started to pull away from the field when a caution appeared with 32 laps scored. On the restart Erb went from third in the running order to the lead. A caution for debris on lap 35 halted the action one final time. Erb stretched his lead out over Davenport, but Davenport made it close at the end, coming to within one car length of the winner at the checkers.

Erb made his way to Lucas Oil Victory Lane for the 11th time in his career after starting fourth on the grid. “The top was pretty hard to run and I gave up the lead on a restart by running up there. I was like man, that could have been the race! McCreadie drove off and he was good. I really didn’t have much traction on the restarts, and I picked the top. I had a really good run on those guys, but needed a little luck. He [McCreadie] just kind of missed the bottom getting into one and I was able to get by him.”

“Randall [Edwards] was showing me that my lead was getting a little close at the end, so I just tried to hit my marks. I got real wide on that last corner and hoped for the best. I just tried not to burn my stuff up. This is the first time we ever put a different tire on here and it worked out. I am just super excited to win.”

Davenport recorded his best LOLMDS finish so far during Florida Speedweeks with his runner-up placing. “He [Erb] was pretty good. We were reeling him in at the end and I should have moved around a little bit earlier. I thought we could get by him on the last lap. I just tried to throw a Hail Mary at him, but I came up short. We’ve got something wrong with the other car, so I didn’t want to tear this one up.”

Sheppard, who ran most of the race up top came home in third. “We had a good car at the beginning of the week and then we struggled in the middle of the week. We finally got it going again here at the end. I am proud of my guys for sticking with me and working their tails off to give a fast race car. We had fun out there tonight. We got into heavy traffic when I was leading and then Terbo and McCreadie passed me. Congratulations to Terbo, he did a great job. We never got in to lapped traffic again so we could dice it up, but the cautions kept coming out.”

The winner’s Eric and Kelly Brock-owned Best Performance Motorsports Rocket Chassis is powered by a Clements Racing Engine and is sponsored by Industrial Resourcing Group, Roberts Bee Company, First Class Septic, Go Lithium, Bazell Race Fuels, Sunoco, Keyser, Lucas Oil Products, Franklin Enterprises, KBC Graphics, Boxo, and Corey Frazier State Farm Insurance.

Completing the top ten were Bobby Pierce, Boom Briggs, Brandon Overton, Josh Richards, and Ricky Thornton, Jr.

For more news visit www.lucasdirt.com