OXFORD — Jeff Taylor has many times mastered Oxford Plains Speedway — just not on the track’s grandest day.

That changed for the Farmington driver Sunday, when he claimed his first Oxford 250 win with a late push in the 51st running of the race. Taylor overtook D.J. Shaw on Lap 224 and held off a push from Bubba Pollard to earn his the elusive 250 title.

“It just doesn’t seem real because you’ve tried so hard for so many years, and you never could do it,” Taylor said. “I don’t even know how to explain it. I’ve had cars that could’ve won and probably should’ve won, but they just didn’t. Today, everything just went our way, even with the rain.”

The rain delayed the race for exactly three hours, forcing a red flag on Lap 117 at 6:52 p.m. that finally turned green again at 9:52.

Joey Doiron led the race through that point and another 21 laps before giving way to Derek Griffith. Then Shaw, who finished third, went to the front and Pollard led for less than a lap before Taylor took the lead for good.

Doiron dominated the first half of the race. He made his move early from the No. 2 starting position, quickly maneuvering past pole winner Ryan Kuhn to take the lead. Doiron lapped Rusty Poland on Lap 22 and then began overtaking the rest of the field while holding off Griffith and Pollard through cautions on Lap 52, Lap 58, Lap 72 and Lap 75.

Doiron continued to lead through cautions on consecutive laps (97 and 98) and was still in first on Lap 117 when lightning and heavy rain forced the delay. The race track remained inactive for approximately an hour and a half before street vehicles began driving around the 3/8th-mile oval to faster dry the asphalt.

Taylor has had several close calls in the Oxford 250, but he might have finally caught a break with Sunday’s weather delay.

“Before the rain, it just wasn’t that good, and honestly, I don’t know if I’d be here if not for the rain,” Taylor said. “Obviously, it did, and after that, it was pretty good. … I’m not 20 years old, either, so a break — I call it a halfway break — in the middle of the race probably did me wonders.”

When racing resumed, it was soon stalled by a caution. That began a long stretch of starts and stops due to crashes. Soon after one of the restarts, D.J. Shaw’s car lost power, which resulted in a multi-car pileup. 

Shaw, who had been in third, left the track on a flatbed truck, and it appeared his race was over. But his engine started back up and he rejoined the race and quickly moved into the top five.

Doiron gave up the lead when he went to pit road during the 11th caution on Lap 138. Griffith took moved into first, but soon after he did, Shaw pushed his way to the front and built a large lead ahead of the rest of the field.

“I was super fortunate to come out of (that wreck) unscathed,” said Shaw, the current PASS points leader. “I killed the battery trying to get it going; it’s got a reset button on top there. … It fired up, and it never bothered us again. Credit to Jones Alternators, I guess, because they kept me going tonight.”

At the 210-lap mark, Taylor moved into second and pulled neck-and-neck with Shaw, with Pollard close behind in third. Taylor passed Shaw on Lap 224, and although Pollard briefly overtook him on Lap 239, Taylor grabbed the lead right back and never relinquished it to earn the win of a lifetime.

“When I knew I was around Joey (Doiron) — he got by me, then I got by him and kind of lost a little touch with him, and he’s one of the best cars — it was like, ‘I’ve got to be pretty good,’” Taylor said. “Everybody pits, and then you’re fifth, and then you’re third, and then it’s just, ‘Try not to screw up where you are.’”

Taylor first qualified for the Oxford 250 in 1993. He won five consecutive Oxford Plains Speedway championships from 1993-97, three straight from 2000-02 and another in 2006, but entering Sunday, his best results were three second-place finishes in 1995, 2012 and 2020.

Shaw, a five-time PASS champion, was also seeking his first win in the Oxford 250. A third-place finish might be viewed as a disappointment after leading for so much of the race, but considering his mid-race wreck and struggles in practice earlier in the day, he wasn’t about to see it that way.

“(I was) 22nd in the first practice this morning, so it’s pretty relieving to be able to turn the car around,” Shaw said. “Given the circumstances of what happened, I’m very relieved to come away with this kind of result. I wouldn’t say pleased, because you always want to win, but relieved at what I could have been looking at in the grand scheme of things.”

Pollard, the 2018 Oxford 250 winner, also had to claw his way back into contention after falling to 25th early in the race. Rather than trying an aggressive move to go for the lead in the final laps, the Georgia native instead chose to race Taylor straight up, setting the stage for an exciting finish.

“I didn’t want to rough him up,” Pollard said. “I wanted to race it out like two grown men and professional race car drivers. … I have a lot of respect for him, and when you’ve got respect for people, you don’t want to race them like that.”

Sylas Ripley, who recently turned 15 years old, beat out another young gun, Austin Teras of Gray, in a tight race for fourth place. Doiron, Griffith, three-time 250 champ Mike Rowe, Gabe Brown and two-time winner Eddie MacDonald rounded out the top 10.