KNOXVILLE, Iowa – Rico Abreu “parked it for B.C.” on Friday night during FVP ‘Hard Knox’ Qualifying Night at Knoxville Raceway, taking the lead off the initial green flag and never looking back en route to victory and a guaranteed starting spot in the 56th annual 5-hour Energy Knoxville Nationals championship finale.

Abreu led all 25 laps and dashed away from Pennsylvania Posse kingpin Greg Hodnett on a four-lap sprint to the checkered flag to pick up his first-career Knoxville Nationals qualifying night win and first-ever win at the historic half-mile.

“I was just trying to pick and choose my way through traffic,” Abreu said after climbing from his No. 24 Abreu Vineyards entry. “My wing about broke … the wing kept going back down the straightaways and then it would set right again going into the corners, but we hung onto it pretty well.”

“Paul Silva put together a heck of a car tonight, and I know that we have a really good car for tomorrow. It’ll just be about whether or not I mess it all up or not. Tonight was a real confidence booster, though, because we have struggled here so much in the past. The car was bad-ass in turn one and two tonight. This one’s for Bryan.”

With the top four finishers getting guaranteed starting spots in Saturday’s ‘Big Dance’, fast qualifier Lucas Wolfe and Hodnett led the field to the green flag for the 25-lap A-main, but it was Abreu who charged to the inside from third to take the lead off turn two on the opening lap.

While Abreu found clean air and ran away from the pack in a hurry, a torrid three-car scramble for the second position highlighted the early going, as Hodnett charged back from fifth after falling back in the early going.

By lap eight, Hodnett was third ahead of three-time Nationals runner-up Brian Brown and two laps later, he was second and chasing Abreu for the top spot.

The leaders entered heavy traffic at the halfway point, with Abreu weaving in and out of traffic and maintaining a second lead over Hodnett as further back, Logan Schuchart began to apply heated pressure to Brown’s tail tank for the final transfer spot.

Schuchart got there with nine laps to go, and it took him just three more laps to really set up a move for the fourth position. Working lap 20, Schuchart took a charge to the inside into turn one, but Brown cleared the No. 1S on the outside at the exit of the corner.

The next time by, Schuchart got a huge run to clear Brown for the fourth spot, but as Brown came back on him in turn four he ran headlong into the stalled car of Trey Starks and sustained heavy damage to the No. 21 FVP/Casey’s General Stores entry.

Brown pulled pitside, his night done with four laps to go as Schuchart inherited the transfer spot coming to the night’s one and only restart. However, Schuchart would be unable to hang onto the spot as Wolfe powered back around the Shark Racing entry coming to two laps to go.

From there, Schuchart faded to sixth as Wolfe held off Tim Shaffer for the final transfer spot, while Abreu rode home unchallenged to the win.

In order, Abreu, Hodnett, four-time Nationals winner Danny Lasoski and Wolfe will fill out positions 17-20 in the Saturday A-main.

Hodnett said he simply didn’t have enough to close down on Abreu over the final four-lap dash.

“After the yellow I lost air in the bleeders and the car wasn’t handling the same,” Hodnett said. “I thought if we kept running there, we might have a shot, but Rico did a hell of a job. He is a hell of a race car driver. We are in the show, so we’ll take it.”

Lasoski’s third-place finish, after starting from sixth, puts him in the show for his 26th Nationals A-main.

“However you have to get in this race is how you have to get in this race,” Lasoski said. “I’ve seen the 15 (Donny Schatz) win from the back and I’ve gone to the front from the back, so we’re going to see what we can do. Anything’s possible here on any given night.”

Lucas Wolfe rounded out the four transfers to the ‘Big Dance’, saying that while he didn’t have one of the best cars, it doesn’t matter when you finish where you need to and qualify into the Nationals.

“I barely made it in, but we got in,” Wolfe said. “Obviously, I got fortunate with that late-race restart after Brown got caught up. I got a decent enough lin to get around Logan, and it’s just a big relief to make it in. It’s not about how you get in, just that you’re racing in the big one on Saturday night.”

Shaffer completed the top five, followed by Schuchart, Joey Saldana, Stevie Smith, Sheldon Haudenschild and Brady Bacon.

In preliminary action earlier in the night, Wolfe set quick time in flight A of qualifying with a lap of 15.096 seconds, while Jacob Allen was fastest in flight B with a time of 15.294 seconds.

Haudenschild, Bill Balog, Bacon, Dakota Hendrickson, Willie Croft and Brown won their respective heat races to lead the transfers into the main event.

Parker Price-Miller wired the field to win the night’s C-main, despite three cautions inside the final four laps setting up a myriad of late-race restarts. Dustin Selvage and Allen split the checkers in the two 12-lap Last Chance Showdowns, with Allen’s win completing a huge rebound after a flip in his heat race.

The 56th annual 5-hour Energy Knoxville Nationals concludes Saturday night, with E, D, C and B-mains leading up to the $150,000-to-win, 50-lap championship A-main that closes the night.