The final checkered flag has been thrown at the final East Bay WinterNationals, and with it, the Lucas Oil Late Model Dirt Series portion of speedweeks is in the rearview. While we’re only 12 races into a planned schedule of more than 60 nights, there are still plenty of trends from the past three weeks that can help predict what the next eight months will bring. 

One of the most significant changes to this year’s schedule comes at the end of the year with the addition of three nights at East Bay Raceway Park in October. “The Grand Finale” will not only serve as the final event in the track’s five-decade history, it will also play a critical role in determining the season champion with the expanded playoff format.

For the first time since 2021, the six nights of racing at East Bay produced six different winners, ranging from first-time winner Daulton Wilson to 81st-time winner Jimmy Owens. While that proves that anyone can find victory lane at the 1/3 mile facility, the fall East Bay trip will undoubtedly benefit some drivers more than others.

When comparing drivers who will most likely be final four contenders at the end of the year, they all have very similar results at “The Clay by the Bay.” Hudson O’Neal, Jonathan Davenport and Devin Moran all have average finishes at East Bay between 9.0 and 10.0, with Tim McCreadie and Ricky Thornton Jr. trailing them at 11.0 and 11.2 respectively.

However, the runaway leader in this category hasn’t committed to running the full Lucas tour, or at least not yet. Brandon Sheppard has an East Bay average finish of 7.4, with 10 wins in 55 starts at the track. The only driver who even comes close to that 18% win percentage is Davenport at 17%, everyone else is at or below 10%.

Sheppard has filled out the paperwork with both Lucas and the Outlaws, and will have to make a final decision in the spring. Given the fact that he is the reigning DTWC winner, can dominate at East Bay, and has won at every track in the playoffs minus Pittsburgh, will that be enough for the B5 team to chase the Lucas championship? Time will tell.

Another driver who is still making plans for the remainder of 2024 is Tyler Erb. The Texas native’s victory in the Wednesday night show at East Bay was his first Lucas win since the 2023 WinterNationals, and that night along with his second-place run at Ocala were some of the biggest stories of speedweeks. Even with Terbo’s recent drought, the victory shouldn’t come as a surprise. Six East Bay triumphs make it Erb’s best track by a long shot, nowhere else in the country does he have more than three career wins.

As a whole, Erb is in an almost identical position as he was one year ago. Through 12 Lucas races, Erb has one win, three top fives, and an 11.6 average finish. Following speedweeks one year ago, he also had one win, four top fives, and an 11.3 average finish. A weekend at East Bay in the playoffs might look like a godsend, but if the 1T can’t improve from their ninth place points position, it simply won’t matter.

The Best Performance Motorsports team has said they will make a decision after speedweeks on whether to stay on tour with Lucas or go pick-and-choose. Should they choose the former, they will need to prove that they aren’t the same team they were a year ago; as of now, they don’t look all that different.

The Georgia-Florida portion of the schedule also marked the start of season two of Hudson O’Neal’s tenure in the Rocket house car. When Sheppard’s departure was announced late in 2022, some questioned if O’Neal was the best candidate to fill the seat of one of the winningest cars in the recent history of dirt late model racing. To answer that question, it’s only fair to compare O’Neal’s record to that of Sheppard at this point in his time at Rocket1 Racing.

Both Sheppard and O’Neal had similar levels of experience prior to getting a call from Mark Richards. Sheppard’s first year in the house car in 2017 was his sixth year as a full-time super late model driver on the national tours, while 2023 was year number seven for O’Neal. Their first seasons in the 1 car were also remarkably similar. Year one for Sheppard resulted in 29 wins, 62 top fives, a 5.2 average finish, and a World of Outlaws championship. Last season, O’Neal scored 15 wins, 58 top fives, an average finish of 5.7, and the Lucas title. While the major difference between the two is obviously their respective win totals, that can be attributed to the increase in parity over the last six years above anything else.

That brings us to the start of year two. In the Lucas portion of speedweeks in 2018, Sheppard grabbed two wins and a 5.8 average finish in nine races. In the same period this season, O’Neal has scored three wins and a 5.5 average finish. If you’re in the Rocket camp, you have to hope that the trend of Sheppard and O’Neal having identical careers continues. If it does, O’Neal has 19 more wins to look forward to this season. But if you’re Thornton, Davenport, Moran, or any other Lucas contender, you also hope the trend continues; the one thing Sheppard didn’t win in season two was a championship.

So now, the only thing left until the end of this story is eight months of racing. If Mother Nature is a bit more cooperative than last year, maybe we won’t have to wait until May for the next chapter.