Nick Hoffman believed without a shred of doubt that he had a winning car in Thursday’s first 25-lap World 100 weekend semifeature in Eldora Speedway.

“It felt really good,” the 33-year-old driver from Mooresville, N.C., said of his Tye Twarog-owned Longhorn Chassis. “It’s probably the best I ever felt here. Clean air makes a big difference and I knew as long as I got off in front of Dale (McDowell) there on that (initial) start I could make good laps. And that was the way it was all panning out.”

But as Hoffman was cruising out front on lap 10 after vaulting off the pole position to assume command when the race commenced, his seemingly inevitable march to a $12,000 triumph suddenly went awry. Racing into lapped traffic, his car pushed as he slid along the inside of turns one and two and intersected between the corners with the slower Ethan Dotson of Bakersfield, Calif., coming down the track.

The result? Hoffman’s right-front fender was ripped completely off from the contact with Dotson — and with it, his hopes for a first-ever preliminary win at an Eldora crown jewel.

Hoffman actually remained in the lead for a lap-10 restart that followed a caution flag for debris — Hoffman’s own piece of bodywork — lying on the track. But without a fender he simply couldn’t continue circling the half-mile oval at the elite level he had been, and when the green flag returned he immediately was overtaken for the top spot by Devin Moran of Dresden, Ohio.

Somewhat surprisingly, Hoffman managed to manhandle his car over the remaining distance to salvage a very respectable fifth-place finish in a race that saw Dale McDowell of Chickamauga, Ga., steal the victory with a last-turn pass of Moran. But that was only a slight consolation for the third-year World of Outlaws Real American Beer Late Model Series regular who couldn’t look past the run-in with Dotson that cost him so dearly.

“I was on hard tires,” Hoffman said, noting that he had the same tire choice as the victorious McDowell. “So as long as it stays green — which if I don’t cause a caution with (the tangle and) debris and stuff, it probably goes green to checker — we’d have been in real good shape.”

Hoffman showed no outward anger over the race-changing scrape. He calmly discussed the situation while standing alongside his car in the upper pit area after changing into street clothes.

“There was nothing really Ethan did wrong there,” Hoffman said. “We just met in the middle is all it came down to. I hit the ground and bottomed out and come across (pushed up the track), and he was headed the other direction (from the top). So we just basically met right there.

“Oh, I seen him coming at a high rate of speed. I was closing on him fast either way … I hit the brakes, but there wasn’t much I could do. So, yeah, it sucks.”

Hoffman realized the right-front of his sleek blue-and-orange NOS Energy Drink machine was missing, but he wasn’t entirely sure about other residual damage.

“I was really worried that the fender was under the tire and I was going to end up hitting the fence or causing more of a problem,” Hoffman said. “That’s why I stopped in one (under caution) to see if I had other issues, and (an official) came over and looked at it and they’re like, ‘You’re good.’”

Well, Hoffman’s status was only good in relative terms. As in, at least he could attempt to finish the race. That wasn’t a certainty considering he led the field to the restart wondering how he would negotiate the first corner at speed.

“You don’t know what’s rubbing or anything at this point,” Hoffman said. “You don’t know what to expect when you get to turn one, so it’s really hairy.

That Hoffman was able to hold on to finish fifth “shows how good our car is,” he asserted. “But basically I was having to try and drive it like a midget where I would get to the end of the straightaway and literally just floor it to, like, turn the ass end of the car around. I couldn’t drive around there like I could before, just turning the wheels, you know, running in, because the front end ain’t working much anymore.

“I’d get to the end of the straightaway, just floor it and get me sideways, and then try and regain my composure once I got into the corner. Some laps I would hit it really nice and make pretty good speed, I felt like, and then a couple laps, I’d miss it, and then them guys would drive by me.”

Hoffman lost second to Brandon Sheppard of New Berlin, Ill., on lap 12, ceded third to McDowell on lap 16 and watched a charging Bobby Pierce of Oakwood, Ill., glide by on lap 22. His fade ended there, though, allowing him to grab an unlikely fifth-place finish that, combined with his fast-time in qualifying and a win in his group’s first 12-lap showdown qualifier, made him the night’s highest points earner.

“I figured on that restart, I was like, ‘Man, I’m gonna be lucky to like finish 10th here,’” Hoffman said. “So to still run fifth, I was fine with that.

“We got very lucky all in all to finish the way we did and not have any more damage really. It’s basically all cosmetic — just ripped the fender flopper off and bent the front T-bar, which was getting into the tire just a little bit but not enough to cut the tire down, because then that’s catastrophic.”

Hoffman would have preferred to end his night standing on the winner’s stage, but he proved to himself that he still has the strength he flashed in rallying from the back of the pack to finish third in June’s 100-lap Dream at Eldora. It was his career-best run in six Dream feature starts, and now he’s hoping to make his sixth appearance in the World 100 finale and better his career-high 12th-place finish in the first of 2021’s double events when he drove for the late Scott Bloomquist.

“I just came with pretty much the same package (as in June),” Hoffman said. “Especially with the way the racetrack was for the feature there, it was like exactly what we had from like lap 60 to 100 at the Dream. I just went with the same kind of baseline as I did at the Dream and it’s obviously really good.

“So we’ll see. Tomorrow’s a whole different story because I pill-drew terrible (for the second preliminary night). I’m going to have to fight for it. Hopefully I hit the invert and my night gets better from there, but I don’t expect to go out and go a quick time tomorrow, that’s for sure.”