Robbie Buchanan Jr earns first career World of Outlaws Pro Series victory at Fairbury Speedway

The theme of the 2024-25 World of Outlaws Pro Series has been split between an influx of new winners against the incredible consistency of both Logan Rumsey and Kendal Tucker atop the points standings thus far. Both of those were seen again on Monday night in the eighth race of the season at Fairbury Speedway, where Robbie Buchanan Jr scored his maiden victory in the series while Rumsey and Tucker both took home top-10 finishes.

Buchanan Jr, who started second, had to maneuver his way around Tucker Elkins to take the victory, holding off many of the greats of the series past for his first ever win. “I’m super excited,” Buchanan Jr said post-race. “Winning on one of the biggest stages there is, is a big accomplishment of mine. It’s been a big thing for me for a long time. I was in the series last year, and didn’t have the best of luck. This year has turned around a bit.”

Buchanan Jr becomes the sixth different winner in eight races this season, and of those six winners, the fifth one to win their first career race.

QUALIFYING

Every week, the new wrinkle to the points format this season, which includes both Championship points and automatic transfers to the Feature from qualifying, plays a big part in how the Features stack up with track position as important as ever. As it will be all season long, the top-eight qualifying times every race will forgo all other pre-feature activities, including Heats and Last Chance races, and line up in reverse order at the front of the field of the Feature.

Taking the quick time lap on Monday night was Mike Augustine, who collected 25 points and was then inverted to start from the eighth position. Evan Seay just missed out on taking the eighth position, and was sent to race in the Heats. Grabbing eighth and the invert to the pole was Tucker Elkins.

FAIRBURY SPEEDWAY Qualifying Top 8:

1. Mike Augustine
2. Ethan Johnson
3. Hayden Tollison
4. Dylan Yeager
5. Jordan Casey
6. Logan Rumsey
7. Robbie Buchanan Jr
8. Tucker Elkins

HEATS

Everyone from ninth on back in qualifying were sorted into three Heat races of up to nine cars each. This season, only the top-three transfer to the Feature from the Heats, and everyone else is sent to fend for themselves in the Last Chance races.

Evan Seay was able to walk the field in the first Heat while his teammate Blake Matjoulis struggled, falling into a Last Chance Race. The second Heat had all the elbows out, with Kendal Tucker failing to advance out and falling into a Last Chance Race as well. In the third and final Heat, James Edens was untouchable.

Heat 1 Transfers:

1. Evan Seay
2. Conner New
3. Talan Willis

Heat 2 Transfers:

1. Jesse Enterkin
2. Matthew Watts
3. Deisel Jones

Heat 3 Transfers:

1. James Edens
2. Riley Hutchison
3. Caleb Durgan

LAST CHANCE RACES

The final four spots are set through the Last Chance races. Many big names found themselves on the verge of not advancing to the Feature, including two of the points contenders in Tucker and Matjoulis.

Matjoulis found himself in the first Last Chance Race with other hopefuls such as Tanner Pettit. Both would fail to advance as Loic Bernier and Aiden Forster took the spots. In the second and final Last Chance Race, last week’s winner at Huset’s, Ryan Avila, was the big name left on the sidelines by the end, as Kendal Tucker and Gabe Elkins took the final two tickets to the Feature.

Last Chance 1 Transfers:

1. Loic Bernier
2. Aiden Forster

Last Chance 2 Transfers:

1. Kendal Tucker
2. Gabe Elkins

FEATURE RACE

Tucker Elkins led the field to the green and maintained an early lead over Buchanan Jr and the rest of the field. Things stayed relatively clean as Kendal Tucker marched his way through the pack from the back after falling into a Last Chance Race.

The caution flew just before halfway in the 50-lap event as Conner New, a previous winner this season, broke the right front and came to a stop on the straightaway. This bunched the field back up and set up one of the best battles of the day on the ensuing restart.

Elkins led, but Buchanan, Jordan Casey, Dylan Yeager, and Evan Seay were all hunting for the top spot. Buchanan finally started to send it with about 15 laps to go, and the slidejobs became aplenty from there on out. Casey and Yeager fell down the order as Ethan Johnson worked into position. Logan Rumsey maintained in the top-five as Kendal Tucker moved inside the top-10.

It was wild, but eventually, Buchanan Jr established himself the leader. The laps ran out and the second-year competitor, apparently racing on a mobile hotspot, claimed his first career series win.

Feature Race results from WORLD OF OUTLAWS PRO SERIES, Race 8 at FAIRBURY SPEEDWAY were as follows:

WORLD OF OUTLAWS PRO SERIES Points following Race 8 at FAIRBURY SPEEDWAY are as follows:

1. Logan Rumsey, 845
2. Kendal Tucker, 793
3. Dylan Yeager, 699
4. JD Brown, 651
5. Ethan Johnson, 636
6. Ryan Avila, 596
7. Blake Matjoulis, 569
8. Mike Augustine, 569
9. Evan Seay, 548
10. James Edens, 437

Kendal Tucker avoided a catastrophe, making the field on a Last Chance Race and then moving through the field to stop the bleeding of points to Logan Rumsey. Rumsey, who started up in the top-five, had a relatively quiet night, finishing in fifth and extending his points lead to over 50 with two races to go.

Next up is a trip to “The World’s Greatest Dirt Track”, Eldora Speedway. Race #9’s broadcast at Eldora will once again be live at 8:00 pm ET on that Monday night, live on DIRTVision and all of iRacing’s social channels.

The driver roster will be set each week through qualifying races that are open to all members with a Class A Dirt Oval license. These races will run on Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and Thursdays at 8PM ET, and the top 35 point scorers will be invited to the iRacing World of Outlaws Pro Series league each week for the Monday night main event. After the Monday show, the league is cleared out, and the process begins again. Points will be tracked as normal across those 10 main events to crown the series champion.

For details on how to qualify, visit www.iracing.com/woo-pro-series/qualifying.

For more information on the series, visit www.iracing.com/woo-pro-series. For more information on the World of Outlaws, visit www.worldofoutlaws.com. For more information on iRacing and for special offers, visit www.iracing.com.

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