7/1/2023
Ricky Thornton Jr
Red-hot Thornton sweeps Freedom 60 at Muskingum; grabs Micro win
Another weekend and another mega win for Ricky Thornton Jr. as he pocketed the $30,000 victory in Saturday night’s Freedom 60 at Muskingum County Raceway in his SSI Motorsports / Coltman Farms / Hoker Trucking No. 20RT Dyno One Inc. / Excel Floor Covering / Sub-Surface of Indiana/ Longhorn Chassis/ Clements Racing Engine Super Late Model.
Earlier in the weekend Ricky scored a HART Stock Non-Wing Micro Sprint win at Indiana’s Circus City SpeedPlex before winning a Freedom 60 prelim to the tune of $3,000 on Friday night at Muskingum County Raceway as his season win total to swole to 20.
“This is truly a dream season. From the Micro Sprint to the Super Late Model I’m having an absolute blast. We won a prelim on Friday night at Muskingum (County Speedway), but we tore up a lot of stuff along the way. I gotta give a big shout out to D.J. (Williams), (crew chief Anthony) Burroughs and (Christopher) Jayko. They worked their butt off so we could come out and have a really good night again on Saturday,” Thornton Jr. said. “We’re going to take this momentum and head to Deer Creek (Speedway) this week. It’s a really awesome track, and I’m looking forward to going after our first Gopher 50 title.”
With his SSI Motorsports No. 20 RT Late Model sitting idle until the weekend, Ricky Thornton Jr. broke out both of his Hoker Trucking-backed Non-Wing Micros at Circus City SpeedPlex (Peru, Ind.) on Tuesday afternoon for the opening round of the Hoosier Dirt Cup.
Banking a pair of top-five finishes in the opener of the five-race tour, Thornton followed up a fifth-place run in the HART Non-Wing A-Main with a heat and feature win in his No. 20RT Stock Non-Wing. He charged from fourth-to-first in the heat before leading 24 of the 25 laps in the feature to record his 18th overall victory of the 2023 campaign.
On Wednesday at Rush County Fairgrounds (Rushville, Ind.), Ricky landed a fifth-place finish in the main event with the PureMax HART Non-Wing Micro Series.
Joining the Lucas Oil Late Model Dirt Series (LOLMDS) on Friday, Thornton invaded Muskingum County Speedway (Zanesville, OH) as a trio of $3,000-to-win prelims kicked off the Freedom 60 doubleheader. Earning the third-starting position for his preliminary via time trial results, Ricky soared ahead of pacesetter Daulton Wilson heading to the white flag en route to the 20-lap victory.
Starting on the second row for Saturday’s main event, Ricky wrestled away the lead from Brandon Overton on lap 26 and controlled the remainder of the 60-lapper to claim his second win in as many nights and 20th of the season. He banked a $30,000 payday ahead of Tim McCreadie, Max Blair, Hudson O’Neal, and Devin Moran.
Ricky now holds a 245-point advantage over Hudson O'Neal atop the LOLMDS point standings.
Full results from the events are available at www.CircusCitySpeedPlex.com and www.LucasDirt.com.
Lucas Oil Late Model Dirt Series competition takes the SSI Motorsports team to Minnesota this Thursday and Friday for the 2023 running of the NAPA Auto Parts Gopher 50 at the Queensland family-owned Deer Creek Speedway. A $5,000-to-win program is on tap for Thursday and Friday with a $50,000-to-win finale on Saturday.
Full event details are available at www.DeerCreekSpeedway.com .
Article Media
