Brandon Sheppard
Brandon Sheppard
Cole Falloway
Falloway Dominates Summit Modified Nationals
Results | Story by Spence Smithback | Pictures by Rocky Ragusa
It’s starting to feel like old times again for Rocket1 Racing and Brandon Sheppard.
The most dominant pairing in the history of the World of Outlaws Late Model Series presented by DIRTVision won 71 races and four championships in an incredible five-year stretch from 2017 to 2021. After going their separate ways for two seasons before reuniting in 2025, nights like Saturday prove that Sheppard and Mark Richards still have a lot left in the tank.
The New Berlin, IL native won the Prairie Dirt Classic for the fourth time in his career, marking his first crown jewel win in the Rocket house car since the last time he won his home state’s biggest race in 2022. Sheppard’s 90th Series win was also his 128th national-touring triumph, which broke the tie with Scott Bloomquist and made Sheppard the winningest driver in the combined history of the World of Outlaws and the Lucas Oil Late Model Dirt Series.
Sheppard’s road to the record involved getting around a driver looking for his first big league triumph. MD3 Rookie of the Year contender Trey Mills won a preliminary Showdown Feature on Friday and drew the Bilstein Pole for the big show on Saturday, and held off some of the biggest stars in Late Model racing for the first 63 laps. But as Mills’ tires started to fade in the second half of the race, the trio of Sheppard, Bobby Pierce and Hudson O’Neal saw their chance to pounce.
Sheppard found some grip on the low side while Mills continued to pound the cushion like he had been doing all race long, and one bobble up high gave Sheppard enough room to clear Mills exiting Turn 2. With slower traffic approaching on the bottom, Sheppard had no choice but to go back to the top and slide up in front of Mills in Turn 3 to seal the position.
Even after losing the lead, Mills remained in the hunt for a top-five finishing position for a few more laps until his right-rear tire finally gave out with 18 laps remaining. His night wasn’t over though, as the crew put on some fresh rubber and Mills wheeled his way back up to 11th at the checkered flag.
Up front, a rash of cautions meant Sheppard struggled to build any momentum out front. The ensuing restarts also meant Pierce and O’Neal had plenty of chances to make a bid for the top spot. Their last chance came after Ricky Thornton Jr. pounded the backstretch wall with four to go, but once again, no one could stop Sheppard from sealing the deal and earning the $50,000 top prize.
“You’ve kind of got to wait for a little while until the track starts to slow down, and then it gets to a point where there’s three lanes out there and you can run all over it,” Sheppard said. “You’ve got to make the right moves when it comes to that part of the race. Late in the race, when it gets slick and I can really run that momentum line like I do, you know, I passed those guys in basically the middle-bottom in [Turns] 1 and 2. Caution came out immediately, and I’m like, ‘Now what do I do? I don’t know where to be at.’ I just stuck to the old faithful line that I always seem to be pretty good with here, especially when I’m out front, and it definitely paid off.”
O’Neal came up one spot short of joining Jonathan Davenport and Kyle Larson as the third different driver to win the PDC in the K&L Rumley Enterprises No. 6. Pierce finished third in his first weekend with his father and crew chief, Bob Pierce, back at the track after his stroke on July 15. Trailing the podium were Nick Hoffman and Tim McCreadie in fourth and fifth, respectively.
Falloway Dominates Summit Modified Nationals
Results | Story by Jordan DeLucia | Pictures by Rocky Ragusa
Cole Falloway has already won several big races in his young career. But there was one on his bucket list that he had been eying since becoming one of the top DIRTcar UMP Modified drivers in the nation — the Prairie Dirt Classic.
On Saturday night, the 23-year-old Kentucky native punched through to Victory Lane on Fairbury Speedway’s biggest stage of the year, leading all 40 circuits around the iconic Illinois 1/4-mile racetrack to bank the $5,000 check and his fifth career DIRTcar Summit Racing Equipment Modified Nationals Feature win.
“I’ve wanted this thing. I haven’t raced it a whole lot, but I knew it would just be a cool one to win with the amount of people here, the eyes on this race and everything,” Falloway said. “It’s one that I wanted, for sure.
“Anything you win here at Fairbury — it’s always tough to win here. There’s so many good cars and everything. It’s up there with a few really big ones that I’ve won. One of the top three, for sure.”
Federated Auto Parts DIRTcar Nationals. Merrill Downey Memorial. Mega 100. Plowboy Nationals. Troutman Memorial. Falloway’s list of marquee event wins in the DIRTcar UMP Modified world is rapidly expanding and now features a trophy from one of Illinois’ most prestigious motorsports events.
From outside of the front row, Falloway jumped to the lead on the opening lap, powering around the outside of Trevor Neville through Turns 1 and 2. The race’s first caution flag with 12 laps complete restacked the field and put Neville and three-time Fairbury track champion Michael Ledford on Falloway’s rear bumper for the restart.
Ledford got a strong restart on the top side of the track and pulled ahead of Neville to take second at the flag stand to complete Lap 13. Damian Kiefer and Ricky Thornton Jr. got by Neville around the halfway point to move into positions three and four and set their sights on Ledford in second. When Ledford stumbled out of Turn 2 on Lap 28, Kiefer and Thornton both went by in Turn 3 to take the podium spots.
A second caution flag flew one lap later, restacking the field once more and erasing the lead of over two-and-a-half seconds Falloway had built.
“I got hung up in some of that lapped traffic, but I knew I still had a decent lead, so I was kind of okay either way — getting back out of lapped traffic with a yellow or just staying in it,” Falloway said. “I got through like three of them there before that yellow, and I felt like I could put a decent cushion between me and whoever was behind me.”
Falloway picked up the throttle on the restart and resumed his drive through the middle groove on the track. Kiefer gave him a challenge to the inside through Turns 1 and 2 but was unable to get close enough to make a move as Falloway began to speed away in the closing laps.
“I saw Curtis (crew member), he had the sticks opened up a decent amount, and I felt like I was making pretty good laps and pretty good speed there through the middle,” Falloway said. “I just tried to watch him, and if he moved me, I knew there were some good cars behind me that could’ve made speed either around the bottom or the top. So, I just tried to keep making speed like I was through the middle and keep an eye on him in case he did try to move me.”
Uncontested in the final circuits, Falloway crossed underneath the checkered flag to seal the victory with Ledford getting back to second, Kiefer in third, Thornton in fourth and Tyler Nicely rounding out the top five.