Fairbury Speedway
Even-keeled Mills proves potential with PDC run
By Kevin Kovac
DirtonDirt senior writer
Trey Mills led 63 laps and finished 11th. (Rocky Ragusa)
FAIRBURY, Ill. (July 25) — One night Trey Mills experienced the thrill of winning a 25-lap Prairie Dirt Classic semifeature at Fairbury Speedway. The next he suffered the heartbreak — as an 18-year-old, first-time starter in the event’s 100-lap finale — of leading the race’s first 63 laps but settling for an 11th-place finish after a flat tire knocked him from contention. | RaceWire
His demeanor following each instance? Exactly the same, which is to say the teenager from St. Augustine, Fla., was cool, calm and collected. Mills always seems even-keeled — at least when he’s tackling the task of racing.
Standing in street clothes alongside his family-owned No. 14 Longhorn Chassis after Saturday’s World of Outlaws Late Model Series-sanctioned PDC, Mills leisurely greeted fans, posed for some photos and signed autographs. There was no dejection in him, just like there was sense of elation in him after he scored a $5,000 victory in front of the packed Fairbury stands.
Don’t get too high or too low. Mills lives that racing maxim.
“I’m not hanging my head about it,” Mills said of his ultimately disappointing PDC result. “They knew we were here and we had a really good car, so we’ll just build on this momentum and go to Cedar Lake next week.”
Mills certainly made his presence known — and further stamped himself as a top prospect in the Dirt Late Model division — on Fairbury’s grand stage a week ahead of the $100,000-to-win USA Nationals at Cedar Lake Speedway in New Richmond, Wis. It’s nothing entirely new, though, because he’s been building his reputation significantly over the past two years, from winning last year’s DIRTcar Summer Nationals Herald & Review 100 at Macon (Ill.) Speedway and the Comp Cams Super Dirt Series-sanctioned Cotton Pickin’ finale at Whynot Motorsports Park in Meridian, Miss., to impressing repeatedly on a national level this season as a WoO rookie.
Remember March 7’s Lucas Oil Late Model Dirt Series Speedweeks closer at Golden Isles Speedway near Brunswick, Ga.? Mills led much of the distance and was dueling Hudson O’Neal of Martinsville, Ind., up front in search of a monumental upset win when he dramatically flipped out of the ballpark in what will certainly be one of 2026’s most memorable moments.
And remember last month when Mills won a heat race, started from the pole position and led the first 24 laps of the 100-lap Dream at Eldora Speedway in Rossburg, Ohio? He faded and finished a quiet 17th, but he left town with everybody knowing his name.
The PDC was the next step in his maturation process. Mills put forth a remarkable drive, showing no timidity facing off with some of the country’s top-ranked drivers — including eventual winner Brandon Sheppard of New Berlin, Ill., Bobby Pierce and O’Neal — on a challenging quarter-mile bullring in his first-ever PDC start.
In fact, starting on the pole of a crown jewel event for the second time this summer didn’t faze Mills.
“You would have swore he was going out there for a local 602 race at Volusia (Speedway Park in Barberville, Fla.) that paid $200-to-win,” said 27-year-old crewman Colbey Richman, who has been working Dirt Late Model racing for 10 seasons. “Same thing happened at Eldora. He wasn't amped, wasn’t pumped, showed no emotion, which is crazy, but that’s who he is. Like, last night when we won, he was on the roof, but just gave the crowd a two-finger wave.”
Mills received pre-race advice from a few of his more experienced rivals, including the 25-year-old O’Neal.
“I tried to give him a little words of encouragement before he started out,” said O’Neal, who advanced from the 18th starting spot to finish second. “I was like, ‘Hey, man, it’s $500 a lap (to the leader). You know, even if you run fourth or fifth or whatever, if you lead a bunch of laps, you’re going to get paid.’ I know he’s points racing, but it’s still fun to get paid, too.”
Mills took O’Neal’s words to heart. He had the lap money on his mind when the green flag flew, though he also kept in mind the bigger picture.
“(O’Neal) told me, ‘Go at least 75 percent right off the start, because, you know, all the lap money they got. Plus, you know, you don’t want to let Sheppy (the outside polesitter) get out front because it’s gonna be really hard to get back by him,’” Mills said. “I was pretty aggressive about the first three laps just to make sure I got by Sheppy, and then I kind of rode from about lap five all the way until I seen that he was right on me. I started driving pretty hard again, and then he got by me” for the lead on lap 64.
“I rode behind him for a while, and then we kept having caution after caution after caution, and Hudson beat me on a (lap-72) restart and then the tire went flat.”
His demise came on lap 81 when Mills slowed abruptly on the backstretch and fell from third to sixth and then pulled up lame for a caution flag. He sensed the right-rear tire problem developing several laps earlier.
“I could feel the tire going down even whenever I was still in the lead,” Mills said. “The board said 49 (laps to go) whenever I really started feeling it. Then I just couldn’t really enter the corner like I needed to. The car was getting really, really tight on entry, and then I kind of opened the door. I made one mistake in (turns) one and two and opened the door for Sheppard.
“I thought it was going to be able to hold on in second, and then Hudson got by me and then eventually (the tire) just went down.”
While some observers might have thought the upstart Mills — a driver who’s run only a handful of 100-lap races — had burned off his right-rear skin by running too hard, too early, Richman disputed that. He believed the tire was in great shape to go the distance but was done in by a small cut in the tread likely caused by a piece of debris.
Mills didn’t think he overheated his tires either. Even though he was well aware of the heavy-hitters chasing him, he was satisfied with the pace he set.
“You just gotta stay calm really,” Mills said. “I mean, it’s tough for sure, you know, and it’s a little nerve-wracking also when them guys are pressuring you like that. I just tried to keep my composure and not make any mistakes, and I feel like I did a pretty good job of that. I slipped up one time in one and two to open the door where Sheppard got by me, but other than that, I feel like I drove a pretty good race. I just had some bad luck.”
Mills said his biggest takeaway from the night was he “learned that racing can be good or racing can be bad,” but he certainly showed that he has plenty of the good nights coming in his future. He’s aware that a driver is going to lose some — well, lose a lot — before achieving the success they desire.
“I was leading (the Dream) and Shepp was running second and he was pressuring me, and then he ended up getting by me,” Mills said. “But one of these times we'll hold them off for all 100 and we’ll beat him.”
Mills could, of course, take some solace in collecting the richest paycheck of his career, a total of $35,400 including the $31,500 in lap money he accumulated. That surpassed his previous personal high of $20,000 for winning last year’s Cotton Pickin’ event.
“It’ll help us out a ton,” said Mills, whose parents, Stanton and Amanda, weren't able to attend. “You know, family owned and operated team, so $35,000, that’ll get us through the next couple races.”
Mills’s burgeoning stature in the sport will take him even further.
“I’m really happy for him,” O’Neal said of Mills, who sits ninth in the WoO points standings and trails Daulton Wilson of Fayetteville, N.C. — a first-year WoO regular but four-year Lucas Oil Series traveler — by 53 points in the Rookie of the Year battle. “He’s a really, really good kid and he’s going to have a bright future. He’ll be one of the big names one day. He does a good job.”
