FARGO, N.D. (August 20, 2024) – Donny Schatz picked up a $25,000 payday on Saturday night at Jackson Motorplex and scored his second career Jackson Nationals victory after leading wire-to-wire in the 35-lap main event.
The win was Schatz’s first Jackson Nationals win since 2018, his eighth overall at the speedway, and fourth at the track with the Outlaws.
Schatz was the class of the field on Saturday night after running 10th in Friday’s program.
“You’ve got to take a look at stats and a look back at things, and I think we’ve taken these two-day shows and used the first night to try something different,” said Schatz. “On the second day, Scuba, Todd and Dauson all come back and it’s game on. Tonight was another one of those nights. We took what we learned from the first night and came to the second night. Obviously, tonight we got some help with that pill draw, but you could run anywhere on the race track.”
Instead of the traditional dash, a King of the Hill was run to determine the top eight spots of Saturday’s feature. Drawing the one pill, Schatz was the last car to go out. Schatz was matched up against David Gravel and beat the current Outlaw point leader by 0.025 seconds to earn the pole position for the feature.
Schatz carried that speed into the main event as he was never seriously challenged.
David Gravel ran close to Schatz early on, but the 10-time series champion eventually pulled away to a comfortable lead. Late in the going, Sheldon Haudenschild was making gains on Schatz, especially on the last lap where he took out nine-tenths of a second out of Schatz’s lead, but Schatz hung on to win by four car lengths at the line.
“All I can say is if you’re a fan, it’s a good time to be alive. These kids – I’ve criticized them a lot, there’s no question – but it makes me damn proud to race with guys like Sheldon (Haudenschild) and Carson (Macedo) and see what’s happening,” said Schatz in victory lane “Not only are they awesome, but they make the old guys like me even better. I’m happy to steal one from them tonight, that’s for sure.”
Schatz returns to his home turf this weekend as the World of Outlaws make their final trip of the season to North Dakota. River Cities Speedway in Grand Forks is up first on Friday night, followed by Red River Valley Speedway on Saturday.
Schatz enters the weekend second in the point standings, 106 behind Gravel.
On Saturday at Red River Valley Speedway, Donny and his nieces Amelia and Laela will be hosting a Meet N Greet from 3:00pm to 5:00pm.
Schatz and the entire Tony Stewart/Curb-Agajanian Racing team would like to thank all of their great partners for their continued support – Carquest Auto Parts, Advance Auto Parts, Curb Records, Ford Performance, Sage Fruit, Mobil 1, Absolute Automation & Security, J&J Auto Racing, Elliott’s Custom Trailers & Carts
2024 Stats:
Races: 51
Wins: 5
Top Fives: 27
Top Tens: 44