TULSA, Okla. — Tanner Thorson served notice that he’ll be one to reckon with during Saturday night’s 37thannual Lucas Oil Chili Bowl Nationals feature with a dominant performance during Thursday’s John Christner Trucking Qualifying Night program.
What looked like a rocky start to the defending champion’s night started with a spin in his OERB Heat Race, Thorson immediately bounced back to win his opening laps of competition. Sixth to second in his Team Toyota Qualifier, from there, it was lights out for the Maestro Classic/Bob Hurley RV No. 88
“I thought my prelim night was over at the start of that heat race. I was just kind of waiting to get hit, luckily enough I didn’t and was able to keep going,” Thorson said.
Working the top of the Tulsa Expo Raceway at all ends, the No. 88 went unchallenged through four cautions, with each one keeping the leaders from contending with traffic. Slowing down for the final time on lap 24, the gap over second grew to 1.376 seconds at the finish.
Chasing Thorson the entire 30 laps, Emerson Axsom and the AME Electric No. 19t finished second. A battle through several restarts for the show position, the spot finally went to fifth, starting Brady Bacon, who made the pass on lap 24. Tim Buckwalter made it to fourth from ninth, with Tanner Carrick rolling from 11th to fifth.
Racing third from the start, the race with Bacon slipped Sarff out of his groove and slipped him back to sixth. Chase Johnson, in seventh, was pursued by California’s Ryan Bernal, who came from 17th to eighth. Dominic Gorden and Joe B. Miller made the top 10.
John Christner Trucking Qualifying night included 72 drivers, bringing the event count to 289 for the week.
The finish:
Feature (30 Laps): 1. 88-Tanner Thorson[1]; 2. 19T-Emerson Axsom[2]; 3. 21H-Brady Bacon[5]; 4. 29-Tim Buckwalter[9]; 5. 98-Tanner Carrick[11]; 6. 21S-Karter Sarff[3]; 7. 86-Chase Johnson[7]; 8. 87W-Ryan Bernal[17]; 9. 71K-Dominic Gorden[6]; 10. 51B-Joe B Miller[12]; 11. 4C-Cody Jessop[18]; 12. 82-Landon Crawley[10]; 13. 2G-JJ Yeley[22]; 14. 2D-Matt Sherrell[16]; 15. 51J-RJ Johnson[13]; 16. 00-Anton Hernandez[15]; 17. 77W-Joe Wirth[14]; 18. 47W-Dylan Westbrook[21]; 19. 7MF-Chance Morton[8]; 20. 40-Max Adams[23]; 21. 57R-Daniel Robinson[24]; 22. (DNF) 32W-Casey Shuman[20]; 23. (DNF) 3N-Jake Neuman[4]; 24. (DNF) 15D-Andrew Deal[19]