RACING RESULTS RACING RESULTS

Ty Majeski Scores First Career ARCA Menards Series Win in General Tire 150 at Charlotte Motor Speedway

Ty Majeski (No. 22 Crestliner Ford) scored a surprise victory in Thursday night’s ARCA Menards Series General Tire 150 at Charlotte Motor Speedway, taking the lead on a late restart and holding off Sheldon Creed (No. 21 Chevy Accessories Chevrolet) and Gus Dean (No. 32 Icebox Helmet Coolers Chevrolet) in a two-lap dash to the checkered.

Majeski benefitted when the race’s dominant driver Michael Self (No. 25 Sinclair Lubricants Toyota) tapped the outside wall on lap 85. ARCA officials displayed the caution, but Self stayed out as the rest of the lead lap cars came to pit road for tires. Self restarted as the leader but drifted back through the field as Bret Holmes (No. 23 Holmes II Excavation Chevrolet) took over the lead. Holmes led through lap 95 when Majeski took the lead.

It wasn’t all smooth sailing for Majeski, however, as the caution came out on lap 99, just as the field had taken the white flag for a crash involving Riley Herbst (No. 18 Monster Energy/ORCA Coolers/Terrible Herbst/Advance Auto Parts Toyota) entering turn three. Majeski had to endure another restart when Codie Rohrbaugh (No. 7 Grant County Mulch Chevrolet) made contact with the wall in turn two.

Despite the late race excitement, Majeski drove to a quarter-second advantage on the final lap over Creed.

“Restarts were crazy tonight,” Majeski said. “Clean air is king. The 23 (Holmes) had two new tires and was able to hold off the 18 (Herbst) who had four tires because he had clean air. I worked the top and worked the top and was able to make up some ground and get around him.”

Creed was penalized for speeding on his last stop at lap 92, but was able to quickly knife his way through the field.

“I knew I didn’t want to speed and I watched the tach the whole way down pit road,” Creed said. “I looked up to find my pit stall and and I looked back down and knew it was going to be close. ARCA called me for it and it was all on me. We had a great car and got through the field pretty quick. I hate what happened with the 18 down the backstretch. He gave me the bottom the lap before and then threw a block pretty hard on the top side the next lap. I am not the kind of guy to just turn someone into the fence, but I am not the kind of guy that wants to get blocked like that either.”

Dean was happy with a third-place result after spending much of the race at the back half of the top ten.

“We started eleventh and moved up to eighth in the first five laps,” he said, “but that’s all we could get until lap 90. Those last ten laps seemed like a totally different race. We went from eighth to second and eventually finished third. The restarts were wild. We had about six or eight cars there going for it. It was really intense. These cars race totally different than the (NASCAR Gander Outdoors) Truck I am used to. It was a lot of fun to be back.”

Majeski was relieved to pick up his first career ARCA Menards Series win after a disappointing 2018 season.

“Last year was really tough,” he said. “It’s great to come back with Chad Bryant Racing and run well every time. I don’t bring a lot of money, I got here on talent and results and when you have a bad year like we did last year there’s a chance people won’t want to work with you. Thankfully I have some great people behind me. It’s great to get Chad and Paul Andrews into victory lane. They haven’t had the results they’ve wanted this year either so it’s a big night for all of us.”

Self led 91 of the race’s 109 laps before fading after he tapped the outside wall. He was disappointed with how his night ended up.

“I just made a mistake and got greedy,” Self said. “I just pushed it a little too hard and made a mistake. I wish they didn’t throw the caution. We still salvaged a top five which is good, I guess.”

There were two lead changes among three drivers and seven cautions for a total of 38 laps. Majeski’s winning average speed was 109.426 miles per hour. Christian Eckes (No. 15 JBL Audio Toyota) was involved in the first caution of the night and was transported to a local hospital after the race for evaluation after the crush panels were knocked out allowing exhaust fumes into the car.

Unofficially, Self leads the ARCA Menards Serie standings by 25 points over Travis Braden (No. 27 MatrixCare/Consonus Health Care/Liberty Village Ford) and 35 points over Holmes.

Next up for the ARCA Menards Series is the General Tire 150 at Pocono Raceway on Friday, May 31. Practice starts at 9 am ET, followed by General Tire Pole Qualifying at 12 noon. The race is scheduled to start at 5:45 pm ET and will be televised live on FS2 with a same day replay on FS1 at 8 pm ET. ARCA for Me members can access live timing & scoring, live track updates, and live chat for free at ARCARacing.com. Now users may join for free with a valid email address at ARCARacing.com/login. For tickets, log on to PoconoRaceway.com or call 800-RACEWAY.

Riley Herbst Leads ARCA Menards Series General Tire 150 Practice at Charlotte Motor Speedway

Riley Herbst (No. 18 Monster Energy/ORCA Coolers/Terrible Herbst/Advance Auto Parts Toyota) led the way in practice for the ARCA Menards Series General Tire 150 at Charlotte Motor Speedway on Thursday afternoon. Herbst, driving for Joe Gibbs Racing, turned a fast lap of 29.784 seconds/181.305 miles per hour to sit atop the leaderboard after the two-hour session.

Herbst led a Toyota sweep of the top three as Daytona winner Harrison Burton (No. 20 Fields-Sports Force Parks Toyota) and two-time 2019 winner and current series championship leader Michael Self (No. 25 Sinclair Lubricants Toyota) were second and third. Burton’s fast lap was 29.876 seconds/180.747 miles per hour, while Self timed in at 29.879 seconds/180.729 miles per hour. Bret Holmes (No. 23 Holmes II Excavation Chevrolet), currently third in the series championship, was fourth at 30.015 seconds/179.910 miles per hour and Codie Rohrbaugh (No. 7 Grant County Mulch Chevrolet) rounded out the top five at 30.018 seconds/179.892 miles per hour.

Nashville winner Christian Eckes (No. 15 JBL Audio Toyota), currently fourth in the series championship, was sixth, Ty Majeski (No. 22 Chad Bryant Racing Ford) was seventh, 2018 NHRA Mello Yello Drag Racing Series Pro Stock champion Tanner Gray was eighth, current NASCAR Gander Outdoors Truck Series rookie contender Gus Dean (No. 32 Win-Tron Racing Chevrolet) was ninth, and defending ARCA Menards Series champion Sheldon Creed (No. 21 Chevy Accessories Chevrolet) rounded out the top ten.

Travis Braden (No. 27 MatrixCare/Consonus Health Care/Liberty Village Ford), currently second in the series championship, was twelfth fastest while Joe Graf, Jr. (No. 77 EAT SLEEP RACE Ford) was eleventh.

The session was slowed several times for minor incidents. Thad Moffitt (No. 46 Performance Plus Motor Oil Chevrolet) spun in the opening moments of practice without contact, and rookie Devin Dodson (No. 35 Vizion Motorsports Toyota) spun twice, making contact with the inside wall the second time and damaged the nose of the car. The car is being repaired with hopes of being ready in time for General Tire Pole Qualifying coming up at 5 pm ET.

General Tire Pole Qualifying is next, coming up at 5 pm ET, with the green flag on the race expected shortly after 9 pm ET. The race will be live on FS1, while ARCARacing.com will have live timing & scoring, live track updates, and live chat throughout all on-track activity free for ARCA for Me members. New users can register for free with a valid email address at ARCARacing.com/login.

FIN STR NO DRIVER/HOMETOWN TEAM & CAR LAPS STATUS 1 8 22 Ty Majeski/Seymour WI Chad Bryant Racing Ford 109 Running 2 7 21 Sheldon Creed/Alpine CA Chevy Accessories Chevrolet 109 Running 3 11 32 Gus Dean/Bluffton SC Win Tron Racing Chevrolet 109 Running 4 3 20 Harrison Burton/Huntersville NC Fields-Sports Force Parks Toyota 109 Running 5 1 25 Michael Self/Salt Lake City UT Sinclair Lubricants Toyota 109 Running 6 2 54 Tanner Gray/Mooresville NC Gray Motorsports-Valvoline-Durst Inc. Toyota 109 Running 7 5 15 Christian Eckes/Middletown NY JBL Audio Toyota 109 Running 8 6 23 Bret Holmes/Munford AL Holmes II Excavation Chevrolet 109 Running 9 14 27 Travis Braden/Wheeling WV MatrixCare-Consonus Healthcare-Liberty Vlg Ford 109 Running 10 12 46 Thad Moffitt/Trinity NC Transportation Impact Chevrolet 109 Running 11 15 02 Andy Seuss/Statesville NC Canto Paving-Robert B. Our Company Ford 107 Running 12 10 77 Joe Graf Jr./Mahwah NJ Eat Sleep Race Ford 106 Running 13 17 57 Bryan Dauzat/Concord NC Brother In Law Motorsports Chevrolet 106 Running 14 16 69 Scott Melton/Rockford MI Melton McFadden Insurance Agency Toyota 104 Running 15 18 10 Tommy Vigh Jr./Parsippany NJ Extreme Kleaner-Menards Ford 104 Running 16 4 7 Codie Rohrbaugh/Petersburg WV Grant County Mulch Chevrolet 102 Accident 17 25 3 Willie Mullins/Fredericksburg VA Crow Wing Recycling-CW Metals Ford 102 Running 18 21 11 Jason Miles/Indian Trail NC Gearheadz Unlimited-Jack & Aces Events Ford 99 Running 19 9 18 Riley Herbst/Las Vegas NV Monster-Terrible Herbst-Orca-Advance Auto Toyota 98 Accident 20 13 28 Brandon McReynolds/Mooresville NC KBR Development Chevrolet 81 Axel 21 20 35 Devin Dodson/Bishopville MD Vizion Motorsports Toyota 72 Running 22 22 06 Con Nicolopoulos/Columbus MI GreatRailing.com Chevrolet 42 Accident 23 23 48 Brad Smith/Shelby Township MI Copraya.com Chevrolet 10 Electrical 24 24 1 Dick Doheny/Ballston Spa NY Doheny Racing Toyota 9 Overheating 25 19 09 C.J. McLaughlin/Bellingham MA Sci Aps Chevrolet DNS General Tire Pole Award: Michael Self - 29.686 (181.904 mph) Margin of Victory: 0.269 seconds Cautions: 7 for 38 laps Time of Race: 1:29:39 Average Speed: 109.426 mph Lap Leaders: Michael Self 1-91 (91); Bret Holmes 92-95 (4); Ty Majeski 96-109 (14) Richmond Water Heaters Halfway Leader: Michael Self Fastest Lap of the Race: Michael Self 30.065 (179.611 mph)

Chandler Smith (No. 20 Craftsman/828 Logistics Toyota) won the rain shortened ARCA Menards Series Sioux Chief PowerPEX 200 presented by Federated Car Care at Toledo Speedway, leading 140 of the race’s 152 laps.

Michael Self Wins Pole for ARCA Menards Series General Tire 150 at Charlotte

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Krall, Charles <ckrall@arcaracing.com>

To:Krall, Charles

May 23 at 6:26 PM

Michael Self (No. 25 Sinclair Lubricants Toyota) will start from the pole in tonight’s ARCA Menards Series General Tire 150 at Charlotte Motor Speedway after turning a lap of 29.686 seconds/181.904 miles per hour in General Tire Pole Qualifying. Self also won the GT Pole Award at the last series race at Toledo Speedway.

“I have won four poles in something like 100 career stock car starts and two of them have been the last two weeks so maybe I am figuring this qualifying thing out,” Self said. “I actually thought I left a lot on the table on that lap. I came on the radio and apologized to my guys and they came back and said ‘why are you saying you’re sorry you’re the fastest one so far’.”

Self is a two-time winner so far in 2019, with wins at Five Flags and Salem, and leads the series standings by 30 points over Travis Braden (No. 27 MatrixCare/Consonus Health Care/Liberty Village Ford). Braden will start from the 14^th position after a lap of 31.176 seconds/173.21 miles per hour.

Defending NHRA Mello Yello NHRA Drag Racing Series Pro Stock champion Tanner Gray (No. 54 Durst/Valvoline Toyota) will start alongside Self on the front row after a lap of 29.802 seconds/181.196 miles per hour. Gray scored his first career NASCAR K&N Pro Series East win two weeks ago at South Boston Speedway.

Daytona winner Harrison Burton (No. 20 Fields/Sports Force Parks Toyota) qualified third at 29.855 seconds/180.874 miles per hour, Codie Rohrbaugh (No. 7 Grant County Mulch Chevrolet) qualified a career-best fourth at 29.864 seconds/180.820 miles per hour, and Nashville winner Christian Eckes (No. 15 JBL Audio Toyota) qualified fifth at 29.916 seconds/180.505 miles per hour.

Bret Holmes (No. 23 Holmes II Excavation Chevrolet), defending series champion Sheldon Creed (No. 21 Chevy Accessories Chevrolet), Ty Majeski (No. 22 Crestline Ford), Riley Herbst (No. 18 Monster Energy/ORCA Coolers/Terrible Herbst/Advance Auto Parts Toyota), and Joe Graf, Jr. (No. 77 EAT SLEEP RACE Ford) rounded out the top ten qualifiers.

The twenty-minute timed session was interrupted twice by accidents, first involving Willie Mullins (No. 3 Crow Wing Recycling Ford) and then moments after the session resumed by C.J. McLaughlin (No. 09 SciAps Chevrolet). Both teams are attempting to make repairs in time for the start of the race.

The green flag will wave over the General Tire 150 field tonight at 9 pm ET. The race will be live on FS1, while ARCARacing.com will have live timing & scoring, live track updates, and live chat throughout all on-track activity free for ARCA for Me members. New users can register for free with a valid email address at ARCARacing.com/login.

Rain threatened throughout the day, but the race started on time. Smith started second, alongside Venturini Motorsports teammate Michael Self (No. 25 Sinclair Lubricants Toyota), who earned the General Tire Pole Award in qualifying on Saturday.

Self would lead the first ten laps but faced pressure from Smith the entire time. Eventually, Smith would dip to the inside and work his way by and drove off to a full straightaway advantage over the battle for second.

Smith could see the rain was coming as the race ran to its ultimate conclusion, and even hoped it would come sooner than later.

“Whenever you’re the leader and you can see rain coming and the race is past halfway you want it to hurry up and get there,” Smith said. “I knew as soon as it started raining it wasn’t going to stop so we needed to get out front and stay out front. That’s what we did. These Venturini Motorsports guys do a great job giving me racecars that can dominate these races. I drive them the same way I drive my late model cars and that’s where we were able to beat them all today. We had more drive off the corners and that’s what it took.”

Ty Gibbs (No. 18 Monster Energy/ORCA Coolers/Terrible Herbst/Advance Auto Parts Toyota) finished second, his third runner-up finish in four career ARCA Menards Series races.

“I don’t know what the record is for most second-place finishes before someone gets their first win,” Gibbs asked, “but I think we’re in the hunt for it. We’re getting a little tired of finishing second at this point. We just ran out of time before the rain came. I think we needed another ten laps and we could have had something for them at the end.”

Christian Eckes (No. 15 JBL Audio Toyota) finished third, Self was fourth, and Sam Mayer (No. 21 Chevy Accessories Chevrolet) was fifth.

The race was slowed a total of four times by caution flags, two for incidents and two for rain, one of which ultimately ended the race. The first incident happened on lap 30 involving Joe Graf, Jr. (No. 77 EAT SLEEP RACE Ford) and Hailie Deegan (No. 55 Toyota Racing Development 40th Anniversary Toyota), both of whom made heavy contact with the foam blocks lining the outside wall in turn three. Graf would finish 17th and Deegan with finish 18th, and last, in her series debut.

The second incident of the day involved the championship leader going into the race Travis Braden (No. 27 MatrixCare/Consonus Health Care/Liberty Village Ford), who hit the blocks in turn one on lap 79. Braden would finish 13th, falling back to second in the standings 25 points behind Self.

There were two leaders on the day, Self from the pole and Smith, who led from lap 13 through the checkered at lap 152. The race was slowed four times for 23 laps and was ultimately shortened by 48 laps due to rain. Along with the race at Salem Speedway, it’s the second time in six races in 2019 that a race has been shortened by rain. The race took 59 minutes and 22 seconds and was completed at an average speed of 76.811 miles per hour.

The next event on the ARCA Menards Series schedule is the General Tire 150 at Charlotte Motor Speedway coming up on Thursday, May 23. Practice is set for 11:30 am ET, General Tire Pole Qualifying will follow at 5 pm ET, and the race will go green at 9 pm ET live on FS1. ARCA for Me members can access free live timing & scoring, live track updates, and live chat at ARCARacing.com. New users can register for free at ARCARacing.com/login. For ticket information call (800) 455-FANS or log on to CharlotteMotorSpeedway.com.

FIN	STR	NO	DRIVER/HOMETOWN	TEAM & CAR	LAPS	STATUS
1	2	20	Chandler Smith/Talking Rock GA	Craftsman Toyota	152	Running
2	4	18	Ty Gibbs/Huntersville NC	Monster-Terrible Herbst-Orca-Advance Auto Toyota	152	Running
3	3	15	Christian Eckes/Middletown NY	JBL Audio Toyota	152	Running
4	1	25	Michael Self/Salt Lake City UT	Sinclair Lubricants Toyota	152	Running
5	9	21	Sam Mayer/Franklin WI	Chevy Accessories Chevrolet	152	Running
6	7	28	Carson Hocevar/Portage MI	Scotts-KBR Development Chevrolet	152	Running
7	5	23	Bret Holmes/Munford AL	Holmes II Excavation Chevrolet	152	Running
8	10	54	Tanner Gray/Mooresville NC	Gray Motorsports-Valvoline-Durst Inc. Toyota	152	Running
9	13	10	Tommy Vigh Jr./Parsippany NJ	Extreme Kleaner Ford	150	Running
10	6	22	Corey Heim/Marietta GA	Speedway Children's Charities Ford	146	Running
11	17	06	Tim Richmond/Aurora IL	GreatRailing.com Dodge	139	Running
12	14	03	Alex Clubb/Morris IL	A. Clubb Lawn Care Ford	95	Radiator
13	8	27	Travis Braden/Wheeling WV	MatrixCare-Consonus Healthcare-Liberty Vlg Ford	77	Accident
14	18	11	Rick Clifton/Circleville OH	Ohio AG Equipment-Ashville Propane Ford	47	Brakes
15	15	1	Dick Doheny/Ballston Spa NY	Doheny Racing Chevrolet	38	Overheating
16	16	69	Mike Basham/Henryville IN	Kimmel Racing Ford	34	Suspension
17	11	77	Joe Graf Jr./Mahwah NJ	Eat Sleep Race Ford	29	Accident
18	12	55	Hailie Deegan/Temecula CA	Toyota Racing Development 40th Anniversary Toyota	29	Accident


			General Tire Pole Award: Michael Self - 15.777 (114.090 mph)
			Margin of Victory: Caution	Cautions: 4 for 23 laps
			Time of Race: :59:22	Average Speed: 76.811 mph
			Lap Leaders: Michael Self 1-12 (12); Chandler Smith 13-152 (140)
			Richmond Water Heaters Halfway Leader: Chandler Smith
			Fastest Lap of the Race: Chandler Smith - 16.416 (109.416 mph)

Michael Self Wins General Tire Pole Award for ARCA Menards Series Sioux Chief PowerPEX 200 presented by Federated Car Care at Toledo Speedway

Two-time 2019 winner Michael Self (No. 25 Sinclair Lubricants Toyota) stormed to the pole for Sunday’s ARCA Menards Series Sioux Chief PowerPEX200 presented by Federated Car Care at Toledo Speedway. Self, who won earlier in the season at Five Flags Speedway and Salem Speedway turned a quick lap of 15.777 seconds/114.090 miles per hour to earn his second career General Tire Pole Award and his first on a short track.

“This is my third career pole in something like one hundred career races,” Self joked afterwards. “We definitely can credit the driver, I am not the greatest qualifier by any means. All the credit goes to my Venturini Motorsports guys. They bust their butts to get these cars right. I wasn’t comfortable here when we tested and they got to work and made the changes we needed and got us the pole.”

Chandler Smith (No. 20 Craftsman/828 Logistics Toyota) qualified second after being fastest in practice earlier in the afternoon. Last year’s General Tire Pole Award winner at Toledo will start alongside Self on the front row after turning a lap at 15.781 seconds/114.061 miles per hour. Christian Eckes (No. 15 JBL Audio Toyota) gave Venturini Motorsports a top-three sweep with a lap of 15.826 seconds/113.737 miles per hour.

Ty Gibbs (No. 18 Monster Energy/ORCA Coolers/Terrible Herbst/Advance Auto Parts Toyota) qualified fourth at 15.864 seconds/113.536 miles per hour. The grandson of NFL Hall of Fame coach and legendary NASCAR team owner Joe Gibbs has started his ARCA career with two runner-up finishes at Five Flags and Nashville and a sixth-place run at Salem, Bret Holmes (No. 23 Holmes II Excavation/Toledo Mud Hens Chevrolet) rounded out the top five at 15.873 seconds/113.400 miles per hour.

Fifteen-year-old Corey Heim (No. 22 Speedway Children’s Charities Ford), Carson Hocevar (No. 28 Scott’s/KBR Development Chevrolet), Travis Braden (No. 27 MatrixCare/Consonus Health Care/Liberty Village Ford), Sam Mayer (No. 21 Chevy Accessories Chevrolet) and Tanner Gray (No. 54 Durst/Gray Motorsports/Valvoline Toyota) rounded out the top ten.

The Sioux Chief PowerPEX 200, round four of the Sioux Chief Short Track Challenge for ARCA Menards Series races held on tracks one mile in length and under, will go green tomorrow at 2 pm ET. The race will be shown live on MAVTV. Tickets are available at the gate or by calling (419) 727-1100. ARCA for Me members can access free live timing & scoring, live track updates, and live chat at ARCARacing.com. New users can register for free with a valid email address at ARCARacing.com/login.

Chandler Smith Leads ARCA Menards Series Practice at Toledo Speedway

Chandler Smith (No. 29 Craftsman/828 Logistics Toyota), one of four Venturini Motorsports entries, led the way in practice for tomorrow’s ARCA Menards Series Sioux Chief PowerPEX 200 presented by Federated Car Care at Toledo Speedway. Smith turned a lap at 15.811 seconds/113.845 miles per hour to lead the way in the incident-free 90-minute session.

Ty Gibbs (No. 18 Monster Energy/ORCA Coolers/Terrible Herbst/Advance Auto Parts Toyota), grandson of legendary NFL coach and NASCAR team owner Joe Gibbs, was second quick, just nine one-thousandths of a second behind Smith’s pace. Gibbs turned a fast lap at 15.820 seconds/113.780 miles per hour. Christian Eckes (No. 15 JBL Audio Toyota), the winner last time out at Nashville, was third quick at 15.929 seconds/113.001 miles per hour.

Bret Holmes (No. 23 Holmes II Excavation/Toledo Mud Hens Chevrolet) was fourth at 15.988 seconds/112.584 miles per hour. Holmes threw out the first pitch at last night’s Mud Hens game and is carrying their logo on his car this weekend. Fifteen-year-old Corey Heim (No. 22 Speedway Children’s Charities Ford) rounded out the top five at 16.010 seconds/112.430 miles per hour.

Michael Self (No. 25 Sinclair Lubricants Toyota), a two-time winner so far in 2019, was sixth, Sam Mayer (No. 21 Chevy Accessories Chevrolet) was seventh, Carson Hocevar (No. 28 GM Parts Now/KBR Performance Chevrolet) was ninth, and current championship leader Travis Braden (No. 27 MatrixCare/Consonus Health Care/Liberty Village Ford) was tenth.

Next up for the ARCA Menards Series at Toledo Speedway is General Tire Pole Qualifying coming up at 4 pm ET. The Sioux Chief PowerPEX 200 presented by Federated Car Care is set for tomorrow at 2 pm ET and will be televised live on MAVTV. Tickets are available by calling (419) 727-1100 or at the gate. ARCA for Me members can follow free live timing & scoring, live track updated and live chat at ARCARacing.com throughout all on-track activity. New users can register for free with a valid email address at ARCARacing.com/login.

Christian Eckes Rebounds with Dominant Win at Nashville

Christian Eckes (No. 15 JBL Audio Toyota) rebounded from two disastrous weeks to win Sunday’s rain-delayed ARCA Menards Series General Tire Music City 200 presented by Inspectra Thermal Solutions at Fairgrounds Speedway Nashville. Eckes took the lead on a restart at lap 81 and led the final 120 laps to earn his first series victory of the season and the fourth of his career.

Eckes led the ARCA Menards Series standings entering the third event of the season at Salem Speedway but was forced to the sidelines with food poisoning on race day. After missing that race, Eckes returned to action at Talladega Superspeedway but was swept into a crash at the race’s midway point and he finished last in the 26-car field.

Eckes was visibly relieved in victory lane.

“It’s been a really rough couple of weeks,” Eckes said. “That was about the longest 80 laps of my life. We pitted early and I figured there would be a caution and there would be one guy with four tires in the pits. But that never happened. We still need to be a little better but we took some strides in the right direction for when we go to Toledo for our next short track race.

“I had a feeling in my stomach that we had a car that could win. I knew it was going to be a good day. We weren’t really happy with it yesterday. We were okay with it. We got it closer but it wasn’t where we wanted it completely. We got it close enough but we have room to get better.”

Ty Gibbs (No. 18 Monster Energy/ORCA Coolers/Terrible Herbst/Advance Auto Parts Toyota) finished second for the second time in his career. He also finished in the runner-up position in his debut at Five Flags Speedway in March. Gibbs had a close call at lap 73 when he and Tommy Vigh, Jr. (No. 10 Extreme Kleaner Ford) came together on the frontstretch. Vigh eventually lost control going into turn one and collected series championship leader Michael Self (No. 25 Sinclair Lubricants Toyota).

“My car was pretty good, we just a little drive off,” Gibbs said. “We just needed a little drive off. We had good pit stops and good execution. The lapped cars are supposed to stay on the bottom and he just pulled up in front of me. I tried to get away from him but he was just a slower than I was so it just sucks for him and it sucks for the 25.”

Self finished 15th, and dropped to second in the series standings behind eighth-place finisher Travis Braden (No. 27 MatrixCare/Consonus Health Care/Liberty Village Ford).

Chandler Smith (No. 20 Craftsman/828 Logistics Toyota) was third after starting from the General Tire Pole. Smith was fastest in practice and started from the pole when qualifying was washed out by rain.

“He just had better turnability than I did,” Smith said. “We overloaded the right front tire today. They rolled the center better than we did and that’s where they got us. We learned some things today that should help us at Toledo.”

Carson Hocevar (No. 28 KBR Development/Scott’s/GM Parts Now Chevrolet) finished fourth and Bret Holmes (No. 23 Holmes II Excavation/Southern States Bank Chevrolet) rounded out the top five.

Smith led the first 47 laps before he lost the top spot on an exchange of pit stops. Corey Heim stayed out and led four laps, the first time he has led an ARCA Menards Series race in his career. Smith retook the lead for the next 29 circuits before Eckes took over at lap 81 to lead the rest of the way.

The race was slowed three times by caution, first at lap 45 for possible fluid on the track, the second at lap 73 for the Vigh/Self incident, and the final time for debris at lap 122. The average speed was 95.893 miles per hour.

The ARCA Menards Series returns to action Sunday, May 19 in the Sioux Chief PowerPEX 200 at Toledo Speedway. The race will be televised live on MAVTV starting at 2 pm ET and ARCA for Me members can access live timing & scoring, live track updates, and live chat at ARCARacing.com. New users may register for free with a valid email address at ARCAracing.com/login.

Chandler Smith Fastest in ARCA Menards Series Practice at Nashville, Will Start from the General Tire Pole in Music City 200

FAST FACTS: General Tire 150 at Charlotte Motor Speedway

Where: Charlotte Motor Speedway, Concord, North Carolina

When: Thursday, May 23, 9 pm ET

Television: FS1, Live

Track Length: 1.500 miles

Banking: 24 degrees

Most Recent Winner: Brandon Jones, May 24, 2018, 108.630 mph

Most Recent Pole Winner: Todd Gilliland, May 24, 2018, 183.805 mph

Track Qualifying Record: Ryan Newman, October 4, 2000, 186.780 mph

The ARCA Menards Series returns to Charlotte Motor Speedway for the 22nd time in the General Tire 150.

The first ARCA race at Charlotte was held on October 25, 1964. It was a 200-mile event and won by Curtis Turner in a Ford.

Fourteen drivers have won the previous 21 ARCA Menards Series races at Charlotte Motor Speedway. Tim Steele is the leader with four, Frank Kimmel has three, Kirk Shelmerdine has two, and Mark Thompson, Gary Laton, Adam Petty, Mario Gosselin, Lyndon Amick, Ryan Newman, Kerry Earnhardt, Jeff Fultz, Chad Blount, Ryan Hemphill, and Brandon Jones each have one.

Six drivers earned their first career ARCA Menards Series victory at Charlotte: Mark Thompson (May 17, 1997), Gary Laton (May 21, 1997), Adam Petty (September 20, 1998), Mario Gosselin (May 22, 1999), Lyndon Amick (May 20, 2000), and Jeff Fultz (May 18, 2002). For Amick, Fultz, Laton, and Petty, it would be their only career victory.

Three drivers who have earned multiple ARCA Menards Series wins have earned their last or more recent victory at Charlotte Motor Speedway: Curtis Turner in 1964, Kirk Shelmerdine in 2003, and Brandon Jones in 2018.

Tim Steele is the only driver to win consecutive races at Charlotte Motor Speedway. Steele earned three of his four Charlotte wins consecutively, winning all three series races held at the track in 1996.

There was a 14-year break between Ryan Hemphill’s win in 2004 and Brandon Jones’ win in 2018.

There have been ten races at Charlotte Motor Speedway without a repeat winner. The last driver to win multiple races at Charlotte was Kirk Shelmerdine, who won in 1999 and again in 2003.

Fourteen races at Charlotte were scheduled to be 100 miles, four races were scheduled to be 150 miles, one was scheduled for 250 miles, and two have been scheduled for the current 150-mile race distance.

Three ARCA races at Charlotte were shortened, the May 1999 race won by Mario Gosselin was shortened by four laps due to a time limit, the October 2001 race won by Kerry Earnhardt was shortened by four laps by a crash, and the October 2003 race won by Kirk Shelmerdine was shortened by 66 laps due to rain.

Only one ARCA race at Charlotte has been extended into overtime. The May 2004 race won by Ryan Hemphill was extended by six laps.

The record for most caution flags in an ARCA Menards Series race at Charlotte Motor Speedway is 10, twice, in October 1996 in a race won by Tim Steele, and in May 1997 in a race won by Gary Laton. The record for laps run under caution is 61 in that October 1996 race won by Tim Steele.

The record for fewest caution flags in an ARCA Menards Series race at Charlotte Motor Speedway is two, in the October 2001 race won by Kerry Earnhardt. The record for fewest laps run under caution is 13 in the May 1997 in a race won by Mark Thompson.

Daytona ARCA Winner Harrison Burton Back for More in General Tire 150 at Charlotte Motor Speedway

The last time eighteen-year-old Harrison Burton (No. 20 DEX Imaging Toyota) was scheduled to compete in an ARCA Menards Series race, the season-opening Lucas Oil 200 at Daytona, he ended his night celebrating in victory lane. Following the tire tracks of his father Jeff, who won at Daytona in July 2000, Burton had won on the sport’s biggest stage just as he was to kick off his first full-time season driving for Kyle Busch Motorsports in the NASCAR Gander Outdoors Truck Series.

Burton dominated at Daytona, leading the final 48 laps on his way to his third career series win.

It was a night that Burton won’t soon forget.

“It was really cool to win Daytona, it’s something everyone dreams of,” Burton said. “I used to pretend I would win there when I was in grade school with my friends, so to come out and win there was really amazing. I haven’t won as many more after that as I would have liked, hopefully we’ll changed that this week.”

Heading into the May 23 General Tire 150 at Charlotte Motor Speedway, Burton looks to again join his father as a winner at the 1.5-mile quad-oval. The elder Burton won three times at Charlotte, including his final Cup Series victory in October 2008.

Although he’s just 18 years old, Burton has been traveling all across the country driving racecars since he was in middle school. Racing close to home two weekends in a row is almost like an extended vacation. Not only is Burton preparing to race in front of him home crowd, his friends, and family, he is also graduating from nearby Cannon School on Friday.

“It’s a big week for me,” Burton said. “Racing at home and graduating from high school the next day makes it a big weekend. It would be great to get a win on Thursday and graduate the next day. Not many guys get to race on Thursday and graduated on Friday, and to win would make it even better. It would work out really good.”

There’s also another reason Burton wants to perform well on Thursday night. Running just a partial schedule in the ARCA Menards Series, he’s out to win races just like every other driver in the field. He’s also out to gain as much experience and build his knowledge base as much as possible as he chases the Truck Series title.

“

It's a great bridge between late models and trucks,” he said. “It exposes you to different tracks, aero, a similar grip level. The level of perfection you need to win on a big track is high. Every mistake you pay for greatly because the high speeds magnifies everything. The level of competition in ARCA is really high right now too. If you win, you have to beat a dozen really good drivers and teams. It’s not easy by any means.”

Practice for the General Tire 150 at Charlotte Motor Speedway is at 11:30 am ET, with General Tire Pole Qualifying scheduled for 5 pm ET. The 100-lap, 150-mile race is set to follow at 9 pm ET and will be televised live on FS1. Tickets are available by visiting the track website at CharlotteMotorSpeedway.com or by calling the ticket office at 800-455-3267. ARCA for Me members can access free live timing & scoring, live track updates, and live chat at ARCARacing.com. New users can register for free with a valid email address at ARCARacing.com/login.

General Tire 150 at Charlotte Motor Speedway a Home Game for Many ARCA Menards Series Teams

Everyone loves playing in front of their home crowd, whether it’s a high school baseball game at your school’s home field or a professional golfer teeing off on the hometown links. Hometown advantage matters so much that certain professional sports leagues schedule their championship games in a neutral stadium as often as possible.

Professional racecar drivers very rarely get the opportunity to race at the track where their careers began, because few professional racing sanctioning bodies schedule races at local short tracks. But once you make it up the stock car racing ladder you get to race in front of the home of the entire industry.

Whenever they open the gates at Charlotte Motor Speedway, those who strap into the cars that take to the speedway’s 24-degree banked turns are racing in front of their families, their friends, the people who build and maintain their racecars, and thousands of other industry insiders.

It can mean a lot of pressure, especially for young drivers.

With the entire industry paying attention, everyone wants to perform. The edge between a great day and a bad day can be razor thin, and that can mean a stressful day for those behind the wheel.

Last year, it was a great night for Brandon Jones as he earned his fifth career series victory. He took advantage of the misfortunes of Todd Gilliland, who had a great night going until the final round of pit stops changed the handling of his car and he was forced to settle for fourth at the finish. Jones, who will be in the booth as a driver analyst for the FS1 broadcast of the General Tire 150, believes racing in the ARCA series gives drivers like himself plenty of relevant experience to succeed in the upper levels of NASCAR. He currently drives the No. 19 Menards Toyota for Joe Gibbs Racing in the NASCAR XFINITY Series.

"I give the ARCA Menards Series a lot of credit for my success over the years and helping me get to the NASCAR Xfinity Series today,” Jones said. “I’ve gained so much confidence in that series, winning with multiple teams and at different tracks; it really helped build me up as I prepared to take the next step in my racing career. I’ve always felt that getting track time in the ARCA Series helps a lot when preparing for my Xfinity Series races."

A couple of drivers that are prospects to join Jones as ARCA graduates who have gone on to success in the upper levels of NASCAR include Travis Braden (No. 27 MatrixCare/Consonus Health Care/Liberty Village Ford) and Christian Eckes (No. 15 JBL Audio Toyota).

Braden won in his ARCA Menards Series debut at Lucas Oil Raceway in 2015 and was included in ESPN’s list of “drivers to watch” for 2019. He is from Wheeling, West Virginia, and a graduate of West Virginia University with dual degrees in aerospace and mechanical engineering. His team is located in Brownsburg, Indiana, just outside of Indianapolis, so the Charlotte race isn’t necessarily a home game for him but he does see the value of a strong performance in the sport’s epicenter.

“Charlotte is still the capital of stock car racing and probably always will be,” Braden said. “To win at this venue is arguably as sought-after as an event like Daytona or Homestead, but for a little different reason. Obviously the opportunity to perform, and hopefully win, in front of the eyes of the majority of the sport's leadership is of similar value to each of us. For myself and RFMS Racing, and any other non-southeastern-based team, I think you have an extra piece of motivation here. To go down there and beat those guys means a ton. It's impressive in the eyes of any. You definitely won't hear the typical "well he's in the highest-budget ride and got all of the backing, he should have won" response if we were able to pull it off.”

Eckes is making his first run at the series title in 2019. Racing a part-time schedule in 2018, he won three times and has already collected one win so far in 2019 at Fairgrounds Speedway Nashville. Eckes, a native of Middletown, New York, races for Venturini Motorsports which is located near the racetrack in Concord, North Carolina. He will be making his first appearance at Charlotte and knows a good run will impress his other boss, Kyle Busch, who he drives for in the NASCAR Gander Outdoors Truck Series.

“It’s going to be really cool to race at Charlotte for the first time,” Eckes said. “It's going to be my first mile and a half race as well, so I’m really looking forward to it. We tested a few weeks ago and our No. 15 JBL Camry showed a lot of speed. My Venturini team is based about five minutes from the track so it’s important for us to go have a good run. We will be ready.”

ARCA Menards Series Championship Battle Heats Up Headed to Charlotte

The battle for the ARCA Menards Series championship moves from the quick half-mile of Toledo Speedway to the sweeping, ultra-fast high banks of Charlotte Motor Speedway in Thursday night’s General Tire 150. The race, the seventh race of the season, will be the second race in five days for the ARCA Menards Series teams and the second race of a seven-races-in-six-weeks stretch that carries the tour into the summer.

No one has been able to hold on to the series championship lead for more than one race throughout the series’ first six races of the year. Harrison Burton (No. 20 DEX Imaging Toyota) led after winning the season opener at Daytona, but he is racing full time in the NASCAR Gander Outdoors Truck Series and not competing for the ARCA title. Christian Eckes (No. 15 JBL Audio Toyota) took over the top spot after finishing third at Five Flags Speedway in March, but fell ill the night before the third race of the season and did not compete, losing the lead to Travis Braden (No. 27 MatrixCare/Consonus Health Care/Liberty Village Ford). Braden lost the lead to Michael Self (No. 25 Sinclair Lubricants Toyota) after the fourth race of the year at Talladega but regained the lead after the fifth race of the year at Nashville when Self was caught up in an accident and finished 15th.

Braden held the lead going into the race at Toledo, but now faces a 25-point deficit to Self after a crash at Toledo left him 13th at the finish. Heading into Thursday night’s 100-lap clash on the 1.5-mile quad-oval at Charlotte third-place Bret Holmes (No. 23 Holmes II Excavation/Southern States Bank Chevrolet) is just 35 points out of the lead. Eckes jumped to fourth with a third-place finish at Toledo, now just 65 points out of the lead, and Joe Graf, Jr. (No. 77 EAT SLEEP RACE Ford) dropped to fifth but is just 100 points out of the lead. The tightness at the top of the standings means anyone could come out on top after the race.

"This points battle has already been very intense," Braden said. "No one's even been racing head-to-head for it yet on track. We've also just passed the one quarter mark of the season. Now, the intensity of the schedule is about to ramp up, and things will get even trickier. Mistakes will be made, and I feel that some frustrations will start to set in. A championship battle like this is as much a mental fight as it is physical."

Although he missed the race at Salem due to illness, Eckes is fourth in the standings. Missing the race at Salem certainly hurt his chances, but a 26th-place finish at Talladega the following week almost ruined them. Eckes stayed focused and went on to win at Nashville, reigniting his championship hopes.

“The month of April wasn’t very kind to us,” Eckes said. “But we can’t look back. We’re going to go out and do what we need to do and that’s go try to win as many races as we can. We’re going to look ahead and whatever happens will happen.”

If he’s going to get back into the title fight, Eckes will have to deal not only with Braden, but his Venturini Motorsports teammate Self as well. Self, who is also running the full ARCA Menards Series season for the first time in his career, was a pre-season favorite to win the championship. He was swept into a crash early at Daytona and finished 31st, leaving him in a deep points hole heading into the second race of the season. He won the next time out at Five Flags and went back-to-back with a win at Salem. Self has been one of the strongest cars on the track every week but has been involved in two accidents not of his doing. He avoided the trouble that shortened Braden’s day at Toledo and retook the points lead for the third time this season.

“If you look at my stats it’s crazy,” Self said. “It’s up and down. When I finish, I am in the top five. We need to get over the bad luck and find consistency. We’ve had great cars all season long and we’ve been fast. If we can keep out of those situations like Daytona and Nashville and still keep our performance where it’s been we’ll have a shot at it.”

While he might have flown under the radar the first quarter of the season, Holmes is not one that should be overlooked. After a difficult 2018 season that saw he and his father Stacy decide to park their racecar several races short of the full season to restructure the team, Holmes has been quietly strong to start 2019. Crew chief Shane Huffman, himself a former driver, has rebuilt the racecars and given Holmes confidence he can go compete for his elusive first career ARCA win.

“We decided we needed to regroup and figure out what we needed to be successful for this season,” said Holmes. “We worked hard over the off season to put together a strong team. We knew where we wanted to be and the resources we needed to get there. Racing is a family sport. You travel a lot with your team and get to know everyone really well. It’s important to have a strong leader and hardworking crew members. I’m proud of the team that we’ve put together. We take steps forward after each race and build on what we learned to make the next race stronger. We have the cars and guys to be a competitive team this season. One of our main goals for the rest of this season is to be consistent and finish within the top five every week. I feel like we’re achieving that goal right now. We just have to continue to work through the little kinks that come with each race. We’re still a fairly new team, so there’s always things we can work on to be better. If we can continue to be consistent, I know we will have a chance at the championship.”

Graf made a splash in his rookie season last year when he finished second in the closest finish in series history at Talladega, a statistical dead heat that was only broken by reviewing the photo finish camera. He followed with his first career win in a fender-banging duel with Zane Smith – the driver he lost to at Talladega – to win at Berlin. In cars owned by crew chief-turned-car owner Chad Bryant who still prepares and calls the shots for Graf on race weekends, the New Jersey native expected to be a title contender in 2019. He’s in the mix but has fought bad luck to start the season. Graf has stayed positive and looks to make a move to the front through the next six weeks.

“We didn’t have the start to the season that we were hoping, but luckily we’ve been able to build some consistency as the season marches on and our finishes are showing that,” offered Graf. “We’re not exactly where were wanted to be at the moment, but we’re improving and heading in the right direction with a lot of effort by everyone. We’ll get there. This team is too good. We know that consistency during this upcoming summer stretch will lead us back to victory lane and hopefully keep us within reach of the championship fight.”

Two hours of practice for the General Tire 150 is scheduled for 11:30 am ET, followed by General Tire Pole Qualifying at 5 pm ET, and the race is set to go green shortly after 9 pm ET. The race will be televised live on FS1; ARCA for Me members can access free live timing & scoring, live track updates, and live chat at ARCARacing.com. New users can register for free with a valid email address at ARCARacing.com/login. For ticket information, log on to CharlotteMotorSpeedway.com or call the track ticket office at (800) 455-3267.

fAST FACTS: Sioux Chief PowerPEX 200 presented by Federated Care Care

Where: Toledo Speedway, Toledo, Ohio

When: Sunday, May 19, 2019, 2 pm ET

Television: MAVTV, Live

Track Length: 0.500 miles

Banking: 18 degrees

Most Recent Winner: Zane Smith, May 20, 2018, 75.472 mph

Most Recent Pole Winner: Chandler Smith, May 19, 2018, 113.586 mph

Track Qualifying Record: Mason Mitchell, May 17, 2014, 114.781 mph

The ARCA Menards Series returns to Toledo Speedway for the 78th time its first race at the high-banked half-mile oval in 1963, won by Iggy Katona.

Fifteen drivers have earned their first ARCA Menards Series win at Toledo Speedway: Tom Bowsher (08-07-1970), Joy Fair (08-18-1972), Larry LaMay (10-10-1976), Howard Rose (09-15-1984), Frank Kimmel (05-22-1994), Blaise Alexander (06-25-1999), Chuck Barnes, Jr. (09-01-2006), Ken Butler III (05-20-2007), Matt Carter (05-18-2008), Parker Kligerman (05-17-2009), Chris Buescher (05-23-2010), Justin Boston (05-18-2014), Todd Gilliland (05-17-2015), Myatt Snider (05-22-2017), and Harrison Burton (05-21-2017).

Six drivers registered their only career ARCA Menards Series win at Toledo Speedway: Larry LaMay, Howard Rose, Chuck Barnes, Jr., Ken Butler III, Matt Carter, and Myatt Snider.

Five drivers who have earned multiple ARCA Menards Series wins have earned their last or most recent victory at Toledo Speedway: 1968-1969 champion Benny Parsons (08-02-1969), three-time series champ Dave Dayton (08-29-1976), 1982 series titlist Scott Stovall (09-07-1986), current NASCAR Cup Series driver Michael McDowell (10-14-2007), and 2008 series champion and current NASCAR XFINITY Series championship contender Justin Allgaier (10-12-2008).

A total of 41 different drivers have won ARCA Menards Series races at Toledo

Three drivers have won four consecutive ARCA Menards Series races at Toledo Speedway: Tom Bowsher (08-07-1970, 09-07-1970, 4-25-1971, 07-07-1971), Bruce Gould (05-06-1973, 07-21-1973, 07-28-1973, 09-01-1974), and Frank Kimmel (06-23-2000, 09-16-2001, 06-23-2002, 05-04-2003).

Frank Kimmel leads all drivers with nine wins, Bobby Bowsher and Ken Schrader are tied for second with five apiece, Tom Bowsher, Bruce Gould, and Chris Buescher all have four, Iggy Katona, Benny Parsons, Dave Dayton, and Bob Strait all have three, Les Snow, and Moose Myers have two, and Jim Cushman, Jack Bowsher, Andy Hampton, Bobby Watson, Ramo Stott, Ron Hutcherson, Joy Fair, Woody Fisher, Howard Rose, Ed Hage, Scott Stovall, Bill Venturini, Bob Keselowski, Dave Weltmeyer, Blaise Alexander, Chuck Barnes, Jr., Ken Butler III, Michael McDowell, Matt Carter, Justin Allgaier, Parker Kligerman, Justin Lofton,. Ty Dillon, Justin Boston, Todd Gilliland, Myatt Snider, Harrison Burton, and Zane Smith all have one win apiece.

There was a seven-year gap between the September 11, 1977 event won by Moose Myers and the September 15, 1985 “Silver Dollar 150” won by Howard Rose. The race was named after ARCA co-founder John Marcum’s fondness for giving away silver dollars to children at the race track.

There have been seven races at Toledo Speedway without a repeat winner. Chris Buescher, Ken Schrader, Justin Boston, Todd Gilliland, Myatt Snider, Harrison Burton, and Zane Smith have all won in that span. Buescher won back-to-back races in October 2011 and May 2012 to start the streak.

Thirty races at Toledo Speedway were scheduled to be 100 laps in length, nine were scheduled for 150 laps, twenty-six were scheduled for 200 laps, which is every race since 2001. There was one race scheduled for just 50 laps, held on April 26, 1970, won by Bobby Watson.

The June 28, 1975 race was won by Dave Dayton, who had relief help from John Anderson. It is the only race in ARCA Menards Series history won by a relief driver.

The record for most caution flags in an ARCA Menards Series race at Toledo Speedway is 18 on May 18, 2008 in a race won by Matt Carter. The record for most caution laps is 114, also set on May 18, 2008.

The record for fewest caution flags in an ARCA Menards Series race at Toledo Speedway is two for a record 15 laps, set on June 28, 1998 in a race won by Frank Kimmel.

Consistency Key to ARCA Championship Leader Travis Braden’s 2019 Success

The championship battle in the ARCA Menards Series may have looked to be a runaway before the season started, but it has proven to be anything but a quarter of the way into the 2019 season.

The pre-season favorites were the powerhouse Venturini Motorsports teammates, Christian Eckes (No. 15 JBL Audio Toyota) and Michael Self (No. 25 Sinclair Lubricants Toyota). The Venturini organization can trace its roots back to the 1960s short track scene around Chicago and has been a part of the ARCA landscape since 1983 when team owner Bill Venturini won the rookie of year award as well as a pair of races. He would go on to win series championships in 1987 and 1991 and along with wife Cathy, son Billy and daughter-in-law Emily, owns and operates the family team that at times fields five entries.

It was no surprise when the Venturini team won the opening race of the season at Daytona with part-time driver Harrison Burton. Self then won the next two at Five Flags Speedway and Salem Speedway, and Eckes took the checkered flag first in the series most recent race at Fairgrounds Speedway Nashville.

One might expect Venturini team to be dominating the series championship standings. But that hasn’t been the case through the first five races of the year.

The little team that could, RFMS Racing, owned by Don Fike and led by long-time crew chief Dan Glauz finds itself in the thick of the fight for the series championship. Driver Travis Braden (No. 27 MatrixCare/Consonus Health Care/Liberty Village Ford) leads the series standings by thirty points heading into the next race, the Sioux Chief PowerPEX 200, at Toledo Speedway on Sunday, May 19.

Braden, from Wheeling, West Virginia, is a graduate of West Virginia University with dual degrees in aerospace and mechanical engineering. He’s a two-time ARCA/CRA Super Series champion and won in his ARCA Menards Series debut at Lucas Oil Raceway in Indianapolis driving for his family-owned race team. Not only does he apply his talents for the team behind the wheel, he’s also an integral part of the team that builds and maintains the racecars. In fact, he and Glauz are two of the three full-time employees the team has.

He and Glauz take a lot of pride in competing with, and beating, the bigger organizations.

“Everyone in the ARCA Menards Series takes a lot of pride in what they do. We are no different at RFMS Racing in that regard,” Braden said. “Each team, driver, crew member, you name it, everyone has a very unique background in this series. We are viewed as the “little team,” and we love to face that challenge head on. From ourselves, our sponsors, our fans, we all have that chip on our shoulders. It’s very fun working with this group. Right now we’re in the midst of a tight points battle that is going to continue for the length of the twenty race schedule it looks like, and we’re trying to apply more pressure on those bigger teams. They feel the pressure when we come in and compete with them.”

While Braden hasn’t been able to match Self and Eckes on speed just yet, he’s stayed in contention by staying out of trouble and being consistent. Meanwhile, despite winning two races, Self has been eliminated from contention in two other races due to crashes and Eckes missed the race at Salem due to illness and finished last the following race at Talladega due to a crash. Braden’s four top-ten runs aren’t enough to satisfy his desire to win but, for now, they’ve been enough to keep him in the title fight.

“We’ve by no means been satisfied with our performances,” Braden said. “The pressure to perform within our team is about as high as it could get. We’re all hungry. But as we reach that point, we’ve made sure to be as mistake-free as possible and it’s paying off right now. If our performance gets to where it’s headed and we stay mistake-free, that’s a perfect storm for us, after the solid start we’ve gotten.”

Although he will be making just his second ARCA Menards Series start at Toledo Speedway, he has had plenty of previous experience at the famed Glass City half-mile. He started from the pole and led the first half of an ARCA/CRA Super Series race there in 2013 before an electrical problem sidelined him. He was eighth last year, and his previous experience should come in handy in the Sioux Chief PowerPEX 200. Self has never raced at Toledo before, and although Eckes has raced there it’s not been kind to him in the past. He was 21st last year after an accident on lap 71.

“Toledo is a strange place,” Braden said. “It seems like everyone has inconsistent results here. Guys run good one race, then suck the next. There’s always a mishap for someone that takes them out of contention. It’s really one of the more mysterious places we go to. This is a place we have to keep up our consistency and capitalize.”

It’s not all hard work all the time for Braden and his crew. They often like to find local hot spots when they’re on the road for a little fun, such as Kid Rock’s Big Honky Tonk during their recent visit to Nashville. They are aware of the obvious go-tos in Toledo, like a Mud Hens game or a visit to Tony Packo’s but they’re looking for other fun things to do, too.

“Toledo is a pretty cool city. There’s a good bit to do, and it’s growing right now,” he said. “With this race weekend being a three-day affair, we have some downtime in the evening Friday and Saturday, and so we always make sure to get some good food and find a fun spot to hang out as a team. That’s not always easy to do in this busy schedule, so we take advantage every chance we get.”

Practice for the Sioux Chief PowerPEX 200 at Toledo Speedway is scheduled for 12:30 pm ET on Saturday, May 18, followed by General Tire Pole Qualifying at 4 pm ET. A 35-lap ARCA late model sportsman feature event will close Saturday’s activities at the track. The Sioux Chief PowerPEX 200 will go green shortly after 2 pm ET on Sunday, May 19. The race will be televised live on MAVTV. ARCA for Me members can access live timing & scoring, live track updates, and live user chat throughout all on-track sessions at ARCARacing.com. New users can register for free with a valid email address at ARCARacing.com/login. Tickets are available by calling the Toledo Speedway ticket office at (419) 727-1100. Discounted tickets are available at Northwest Ohio Menards locations for $15, a savings of $10 from the raceday ticket price.

Joe Graf, Jr. Trades NYC Skyline for Steering Wheel in Sunday’s ARCA Race at Toledo

Last year, Joe Graf, Jr. (No. 77 EAT SLEEP RACE Ford) made his Toledo Speedway debut and finished third. Impressive enough for a driver in just his fourth career ARCA Menards Series start and at one of the trickiest tracks on the schedule. It’s even more impressive when you take into account he did it with a broken foot.

Graf suffered the injury to his left foot, used for braking, while playing basketball with his younger brother Ryan last Easter. While he was hobbled outside of the racecar, it didn’t slow him at all inside it. He finished second in a statistical dead-heat only broken by a review of the photo finish camera in his third series appearance at Talladega. That track doesn’t require a lot of braking. The short tracks, like Toledo Speedway, site of the May 19 Sioux Chief PowerPEX 200, do. After last year’s race, Graf’s left foot had swollen to nearly twice its normal size.

By the time the summer rolled around, Graf was fully healed and had acclimated to the heavy, full-bodied ARCA Menards Series racecars. He scored his first series win at Berlin Raceway in August in a fender-slamming duel with Zane Smith, ironically, the driver he battled with for the win at Talladega. Despite missing the first race of the season, Graf finished eighth in the series championship standings.

Returning for a second full year in the ARCA Menards Series, Graf sits fourth in the series standings a quarter of the way through the season’s 20 race schedule. He has three top-ten finishes in those five races but has yet to fully hit his stride. He tested last week at the half-mile banked oval on the Ohio-Michigan border looking to finally get some momentum headed into the busiest stretch of the ARCA season. Starting with Toledo, the series will have a race in each of the next seven weeks.

“We ran really good last year,” Graf said. “I was just getting over my broken foot. We had a strong test last week. We’ll make a few changes to help get it dialed in and hopefully end up in victory lane. I finished third with a broken foot last year, so there aren’t any excuses for this season.”

Graf is balancing his racing career with his education. He’s a full-time student at NYU pursuing a degree in Business, Media, and Sports Management. He recently signed on as an intern with Richard Childress Racing, working in the organizations marketing and communications department. When he’s not at the racetrack, or at the Childress shop in Welcome, North Carolina, Graf lives in Manhattan where he enjoys a penthouse view of the New York City skyline.

“I’ve been an intern with RCR since March,” he said. “It’s been a lot of fun and we’ve worked on a lot of different projects. I’ve been learning a lot. I am also in the Cup driver debriefs, the XFINITY driver debriefs, I am working with the engineers on Sunday at the shop, I work on all sorts of things with the marketing department during the week. It’s been a really good learning experience. I am in a lot of meetings over there, it’s really helping me understand the business side of racing as well as being in the car.”

Teamed with veteran crew chief and now car owned Chad Bryant, Graf has 15-year-old Corey Heim as his teammate on the short tracks. Despite having two totally different styles, he and Heim work well together.

“Corey drives a lot differently than I do,” he said. “He enters the corners here at Toledo differently than me, and that means sometimes the setups are very different. But we usually end up with very similar lap times. It’s just a matter of how we get there.”

youngster Corey Heim Looking to Join List of Names Who Have Been Made at Toledo Speedway

Toledo, Ohio is the glass capital of the world, nicknamed the Glass City, due to the production of a wide range of glass products. A significant amount of window glass used in the automotive manufacturing boom of the early to mid-20th Century was produced in Toledo, and the process that produces glass bottles was perfected in Toledo as well. The Mud Hens, made famous by Toledo native Jamie Farr as Corporal Max Klinger on M*A*S*H is another claim to fame, as are Klinger’s favorite snack Tony Packo’s hot dogs.

Toledo also happens to be one of the Midwest’s epicenters for auto racing with long-defunct tracks like Toledo Raceway Park and Ft. Miami Speedway, which was located where the current Lucas County Recreation Center now sits. Those two tracks were the site of many nights of jalopy and open wheel races through the mid-1900s before racing moved to Toledo Speedway in 1960.

The then-dirt half-mile opened on June 8, 1960 with a supermodified show won by Toledo’s own Al Beale. In the intervening 59 seasons, just about every top name driver in the country has competed on Toledo’s now-paved high banks. NASCAR champions like Benny Parsons, Bobby Allison, and Darrell Waltrip all competed at Toledo, as have Indy 500 winners Gordon Johncock, Al Unser, and Tom Sneva.

That pipeline didn’t end at the end of the 20th Century. Current NASCAR stars Kyle Busch, Ty Dillon, Chris Buescher, and Michael McDowell have all raced at Toledo, and all of them but Busch – surprisingly – have won.

Toledo is also the home of ARCA, the Automobile Racing Club of America. Founded in 1953, ARCA has sanctioned thousands of races at hundreds of racetracks in the intervening 67 years.

The attention of the motorsports world will again be focused on Toledo Speedway on May 19 when the ARCA Menards Series takes to its home track for the Sioux Chief PowerPEX 200. Over the years, sixteen drivers have earned their first ARCA victory at the series’ home track. The drivers who have earned their first wins on Toledo’s ultra-fast high banks range from the prolific, to the up-and-comers, to the one-off winners who were never able to recapture the magic again.

Ten-time series champion Frank Kimmel logged his first win – the first of a record 80 ARCA wins – back in May 1994. Kimmel would go on to victory a total of nine times at Toledo, which makes it his most prolific track alongside the legendary Salem Speedway in Indiana.

“This is just a really cool racetrack,” Kimmel said. “That first win was huge for me. At some point we had to stop being the bridesmaid and be the bride. We had to beat Bob Keselowski, Bobby Bowsher, and Dave Weltmeyer that night. We ended up winning nine times at Toledo but that first one is what got it all started. It’s still a pretty special memory to me.”

Todd Gilliland, who recently earned his second series win at Talladega Superspeedway, won at Toledo in his first-ever series start. It was a record-setting win, as Gilliland was one day past his 15th birthday, making him the youngest winner in series history. And since ARCA rules stipulate you must be 15 years old to race, chances are that’s a record that will stand for years to come.

Gilliland won’t be racing at Toledo this season, as he is racing a partial ARCA schedule while chasing the NASCAR Gander Outdoors Truck Series title. He credits that Toledo win for helping establish himself as an up-and-comer worthy of a high-profile opportunity. He currently races for Kyle Busch Motorsports.

“Toledo is fun short track,” Gilliland said. “It’s really wide, and you are probably turning more than you want on the straightaway. That was new to me when I raced in the ARCA Menards Series race there a few years ago, and I had to learn as fast as I could. Keeping the car turning is really important for the long run. The fans seem like they come out from everywhere and they always have a great crowd on hand. It’s really cool to be the record holder as the youngest winner in ARCA history after my win at Toledo. Watching the guys that have won there after me like Myatt Snider, Harrison Burton and Zane Smith is really cool as well because they are bunch of my buddies. It’s a fun race track and I’ll be tuned-in cheering on my Toyota teammates.”

One driver that hopes to join Kimmel and Gilliland as ARCA winners at Toledo is Corey Heim. Heim is 16 years old, not quite as young as Gilliland was at the time of his Toledo win, and he comes with a wealth of short track experience already under his belt. Heim finished second in the CARS Tour super late model points last season, winning one of the series’ nine races.

“I’m really looking forward to Toledo,” offered Heim. “It’s a relatively flat race track, which I’m particularly good at and I know Chad Bryant Racing has been very good there in recent years, so I look forward at the chance for my first ARCA Menards Series victory.”

NHRA Champion Tanner Gray Looking for Another Big Ohio Win in ARCA Menards Series Sioux Choief PowerPEX 200 at Toledo Speedway

For most drivers rocketing up the stock car ladder system, their eventual goal is to reach the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series. Their dream is to race and win at Daytona and go on to become a champion to join the likes of Petty, Pearson, Yarborough, Gordon, Waltrip, Allison, Earnhardt and Johnson as legends of the sport. Most of them these days start when they’re young, sometimes as young as four years old, racing in quarter midgets, then go-karts, then perhaps a late model at their local short track before trying to land a ride in the ARCA Menards Series.

The ladder system has been in place for a couple of decades now, and several have taken advantage of it. The late Davey Allison, who was recently inducted into the NASCAR Hall of Fame, spent two full seasons in the ARCA Menards Series after starting his career on the dusty Alabama short tracks. An eight-time ARCA winner, he finished second in the ARCA points in 1984 before moving on to become NASCAR’s Cup Series rookie of the year in 1987. Davey would go on to win the Daytona 500 in 1992 and was part of an incredible six-way battle for the championship that season, eventually finishing third behind Alan Kulwicki and Bill Elliott.

Others have tried to follow Allison’s pathway to NASCAR stardom, including current drivers Justin Allgaier, Michael McDowell, Ty Dillon, and Chris Buescher. Allgaier, Dillon, and Buescher are former ARCA champions, while McDowell finished as high as second. Other current NASCAR drivers have raced in ARCA sporadically on their way up the ladder, but never competed for a championship, including three-time ARCA winner Kyle Busch, who is the 2015 Cup Series champion, and two-time ARCA winner Joey Logano, who won the Cup title in 2018.

Logano, who drives for Team Penske, credits the ARCA Menards Series for launching him into the national spotlight when he won at Rockingham in 2008.

“At the time I was running a lot of K&N Pro Series races and we didn’t get to run a lot of the big tracks,” Logano said. “ARCA was a great place to go to get experience on the bigger tracks. Pocono, when you go there for the first time, it’s so difficult and different. Having that experience there helped me as a driver quite a bit. It gives you the ability to learn. It’s a good learning tool to get you some experience until you get to the next step in Trucks or XFINITY.”

One driver looking to follow in Logano’s footsteps is Tanner Gray (No. 54 Gray’s Motorsports/Valvoline/Durst, Inc. Toyota). Like Logano, he comes to the ARCA Menards Series with some experience in the NASCAR K&N Pro Series. In fact, he won for the first time in his career on May 3 at the four-tenths mile South Boston Speedway in Virginia. And like Logano, who had a championship background as a youth in Legends cars, Gray also has a championship under his belt.

But that’s where the similarities end.

Rather than racing around the tight quarter-mile infield oval at Charlotte Motor Speedway or other similar short tracks up and down the east coast like Logano did, Gray earned his racing championship at 200 miles per hour going in a straight line 1000 feet at a time. And he did it on one of drag racing’s most prestigious stages, the NHRA Mello Yello Drag Racing Series Pro Stock division.

Gray became the youngest national event winner in NHRA history when he won at Las Vegas 13 days before his eighteenth birthday in 2017. He backed that up with eight national event wins in 2018, including wins at Summit Motorsports Park in Norwalk, Ohio and the famed U.S. Nationals at Lucas Oil Raceway in Indianapolis, on his way to becoming NHRA’s youngest-ever champion.

It may seem to be an odd transition to make, but for Gray it’s natural.

“The transition has definitely been tough,” Gray said. “I’ve learned a ton since the start of the year, and I feel like I’m starting to see progress in myself. I think I’m continuing to get more and more comfortable with the DGR-Crosley guys and working with them. They have done an awesome job so far, and I couldn’t ask for a better group to work and learn with."

Gray has already had success in the Buckeye state, winning in Norwalk last year. Norwalk is a little more than an hour’s drive from Toledo, where he will be racing on May 19 in the Sioux Chief PowerPEX 200. Fresh off his first career oval track win, he’s coming to Toledo Speedway with some momentum on his side. Should he win, Gray would join a list of nineteen other drivers who have scored their first ARCA Menards Series win at Toledo, joining the likes of recent first-time winners Chris Buescher, Myatt Snider, and Todd Gilliland, all of whom now race in various national NASCAR series.

“I’m confident going into Toledo,” Gray. “I think it’s going to be a fun race. We’ve struggled a little bit this year on the ARCA side of things, but I feel like if I can do my job right, then we will be up front and have a shot to win. DGR-Crosley always brings fast race cars to the track so it should be good.”

ARCA Menards Series Championship Contender Heads to Toledo for the First Time

It’s not very often that a championship contender in a racing series will visit a track that’s been on the schedule for years for the very first time. That’s exactly what’s going to happen when ARCA Menards Series contender Michael Self (No. 25 Sinclair Lubricants Toyota) visits Toledo Speedway for the May 19 Sioux Chief PowerPEX 200.

Self, who has raced in the ARCA Menards Series for the past few seasons, but only partial schedules – mainly on superspeedways – as funding would allow. But a major commitment by his sponsor has allowed him to contend for the title for the first time in his career in 2019. That means visiting racetracks he’s never been to before.

On the strength of victories at Five Flags Speedway in March and Salem Speedway in April, the Salt Lake City, Utah resident was leading the standings for the first time in his career. After bad luck at Nashville, Self is now second, 30 points behind leader Travis Braden (No. 27 Matrixcare/Consonus Health Care/Liberty Village Ford).

Self has been a superspeedway specialist in recent years, and there’s no disguising the fact it’s a style of racing that he enjoys, but he’s also out to prove he is every bit as good on the short tracks.

While he may not have a lot of experience on the short tracks that comprise the ARCA Menards Series tour, Self is no stranger to racing on the bullrings. He has plenty of short track experience in the NASCAR K&N Pro Series West, and he’s earned six of his eight career NKNPSW wins on short tracks.

But even with that experience, it takes some time to learn the way around a racetrack you’ve never been to before. Self has a wealth of experience to draw from as his team owner Bill Venturini is a two-time series champion, in 1987 and 1991, and team co-owner Billy Venturini is himself a former driver and heads up the organization’s driver development program. The team fields multiple cars at each series event, cycling through some of the most sought after talent in stock car racing’s developmental leagues. Some of those drivers, like Christian Eckes (No. 15 JBL Audio Toyota) and Chandler Smith (No. 20 Craftsman/828 Logistics Toyota) are themselves winners in the ARCA Menards Series.

Self, himself a driver coach when not racing, has no qualms on leaning on that support system to find speed.

“Over the years I’ve learned how important it is to listen to others that have experience and not be hard-headed about asking for advice,” Self said. “I’m far from knowing everything about every track on the ARCA schedule, so if I can ask guys like Frank Kimmel, Billy, or Christian questions about those tracks and get their input since they’ve been there, sometimes that really helps advance the learning curve for me.”

Self will make his first series start at Toledo Speedway, the series home track. The track has played host to 77 previous ARCA Menards Series races and has seen some of the biggest names in the series long history visit victory lane over the years. Ten-time series champion Frank Kimmel, now a crew chief and consultant at Venturini Motorsports, is a nine-time Toledo winner, including his first-ever series win in May 1994.

Kimmel won five of those races in years he won the series title, something Self hopes he can make happen this year. With two previous short track wins in 2019, his hopes could easily turn into reality.

“Without ever having been to Toledo I have no idea what to expect, but I do know that the VMS guys have been bringing fast cars to every race this year, so I can have confidence there,” he said. “People have told me Toledo is a fun, fast track, so I’m anxious to get there and get some laps under my belt and see if we can rebound from Nashville.”

History Maker Hailie Deegan Looking to Rewrite ARCA Record Book in Series Debut at Toledo

Sixteen drivers have earned their first ARCA Menards Series victory at the series’ home track, Toledo Speedway. Of those, three of them earned their way into victory lane in their series debut, including current NASCAR Gander Outdoors Truck Series championship contender and recent ARCA winner at Talladega Superspeedway Todd Gilliland.

Hailie Deegan, from Temecula, California, will be making her series debut on May 19 in the Sioux Chief PowerPEX 200 looking to become the fourth driver to win at Toledo in their first series start. Should she do it, she’d also become the first female to win an ARCA Menards Series race in the series’ 67-year history.

Deegan is the daughter of X Games superstar Brian Deegan. That alone is enough to generate buzz and excitement wherever she goes. But Deegan is also the first female driver to win in the NASCAR K&N Pro Series in more than 30 years. Deegan earned her first win last year at Meridian Speedway in Idaho and backed it up with her second victory this past February at the Dirt Track at Las Vegas Motor Speedway.

Just like virtually every other second-generation athlete, Deegan is happy to have had doors opened by a recognizable last name but also wants to build a name of her own. While she enjoys many of the same activities that made her father an X Games superstar, she’s also happy to have found success in a field that’s completely different than freestyle motocross.

“My Dad has definitely taught me a lot when it comes to my training and my determination towards my goals,” said Deegan. “He’s always reminding me how hard you have to work in order to be successful and he’s right there by my side at the gym, at the race track, at test sessions and I know I’ll be leaning on him a lot as I start this next chapter of my racing career.”

With two K&N Pro Series wins on her resume, Deegan is on the radar screen of virtually every race team and sponsor in NASCAR’s national touring series. Her future is seemingly wide open, but the next step on the ladder is a partial schedule in the ARCA Menards Series.

A part of the TRD (Toyota Racing Development) driver development program, Deegan has aligned with Venturini Motorsports for six starts in the ARCA Menards Series in 2019. The team started the season with three consecutive wins, at Daytona with Harrison Burton, and at Five Flags and Salem with Michael Self. Signing with one of the most successful teams in the series, with 53 wins since 1983, is reason enough to be excited but Deegan stands to benefit from the organization’s long record of success developing young drivers as well.

Current NASCAR drivers Alex Bowman, who replaced Dale Earnhardt, Jr. when he retired in 2018, and Erik Jones, who won his first Cup Series race at Daytona last July, got their start with Venturini Motorsports. Others like defending Cup Series champion Joey Logano and William Byron, ran limited schedules with the team but had success before moving on.

Developing young drivers and then seeing them go on to success in their career is a skill that team co-owner Billy Venturini takes tremendous pride in.

“Working alongside a group like TRD on driver development is incredible,” said Venturini. “Our team has had the opportunity to work with so many talented young drivers over the years, but to now be a part of the system to evaluate drivers in the TRD system as they move up the ranks is a great privilege for our whole team. Hailie has shown a lot of success thus far in her career and more importantly, she shows the determination and willingness to work hard that it takes to succeed in motorsports.”

Perhaps success at the ARCA level will allow Deegan to follow in the footsteps of others who have gone on to NASCAR success, like Bowman, Jones, Logano, and previous ARCA champions Chris Buescher and Ty Dillon, all of whom race on Sundays in the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series. But Deegan wants to blaze her own trail.

Evolution of Race Drivers Brings Talented Teenagers into the Sport; Carson Hocevar Ready to Tackle Toledo for the Second Time

The sport of automobile racing has evolved greatly since the 1950s, moving from dusty fairgrounds tracks carved out of unused farm land to glitzy stadiums that encircle ribbons of pavement as smooth as a billiard table. The cars have changed, from street cars driven off the showroom floor then modified for racing to purpose-built tube frame chassis that are refined for maximum aerodynamic performance in the wind tunnel.

The drivers have changed, too.

The racer of the past was a rough-and-tumble guy, upwards of middle age, who either worked his whole life to spend money racing or was lucky enough to find a way to race for living. He had grease under his fingernails because he had to build and maintain his own racecars, and a bad night at the speedway could mean he and his family had slick meat sandwiches for dinner instead of a warm meal.

Today’s drivers are refined. They are clean cut, highly specialized, well-trained athletes and spokespersons. They get their start in racing at a very young age, often sliding into a quarter midget before they start first grade. From there the progression leads them to go-karts, and then, depending on the career path they choose, a full-sized Midget or a late model.

By the time an up-and-coming driver reaches high school, for many it’s time to make the move out of short track racing. At the age of 15, a driver can seek the approval to race in the ARCA Menards Series. Per rule, drivers from the age of 15 to 17 can come to ARCA and race on tracks one mile in length and under.

ARCA provides the platform for these young drivers to gain experience before they make the move up the ladder into the NASCAR Gander Outdoors Truck Series, the NASCAR XFINITY Series, and eventually the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series. Doing so on the ARCA short tracks is a great way to do that, and in racing circles, is a relatively low-pressure environment to gain experience.

But drivers don’t just want to run in circles. They want to win. ARCA recognized that and created a championship within the overall series championship just for those tracks one mile and under that those young drivers not quite old enough to run the full season could chase after. The Sioux Chief Short Track Challenge encompasses eleven races and counts a driver’s ten best finishes meaning a driver can have a bad day and not necessarily have it impact his or her run at the short track title.

The May 19 Sioux Chief PowerPEX 200 at Toledo Speedway will be the fourth round of the 2019 Sioux Chief Short Track Challenge. Michael Self (No. 25 Sinclair Lubricants Toyota) won the first two short track races of the season at Five Flags Speedway in Pensacola, Florida and Salem Speedway in Salem, Indiana. He was sidelined by a crash in the most recent short track race at Fairgrounds Speedway Nashville, finishing 15th. His misfortune at Nashville has allowed Ty Gibbs (No. 18 Monster Energy/ORCA Coolers/Terrible Herbst/Advance Auto Parts Toyota) to assume the Short Track Challenge points lead. Gibbs finished second at Five Flags and Nashville and was eighth at Salem. Gibbs is joined in the top five in the standings by fellow 16-year-old Chandler Smith (No. 20 Craftsman/828 Logistics Toyota), who is second, and 15-year-old Corey Heim (No. 22 Speedway Children’s Charities Ford) in fourth.

Carson Hocevar (No. 28 Scott’s/KBR Development Chevrolet), from Portage, Michigan, followed that young driver template to perfection. He started in quarter midgets and earned more championships there than any driver in United States Auto Club history. He moved on to late models and became the youngest winner in the history of Berlin Raceway when he was just 14. He made his ARCA Menards Series debut at Toledo last year at the age of 15, just as he started high school.

He finished eleventh that afternoon but earned his first General Tire Pole Award later in the season at Berlin where he finished fourth. In six career ARCA Menards Series starts, he’s collected four top-five finishes including a career-best third at Salem in April. He was fourth the last time out at Nashville and is ready to get back to Toledo to improve on last year’s run.

“We’re real excited to return to Toledo. It will be the first time KBR and myself are revisiting a race track we have already been to for ARCA,” Hocevar said. “That was our debut last year and had a lot of speed, so it’s nice to have a notebook already filled up a bit going into the weekend.”

Hocevar, who drives for Mike Bursley’s Grand Rapids, Michigan-based team, is not near the front of the Short Track Challenge standings due to a faulty fuel pump at Five Flags in March. He knows he needs to be on it throughout the remaining eight events if he has any chance at taking home the championship.

“We have put together two good runs and should really be able to build on this momentum,” he said. “I think we are making strides with our new car and new package, so we should be even better come Toledo and continuing through the short track challenge season.”

ARCA Menards Series Championship Contender Heads to Toledo for the First Time

Self, himself a driver coach when not racing, has no qualms on leaning on that support system to find speed.

Toledoan Nic Moncher Returns to Hometown Looking to Lead Bret Holmes Racing to Victory

Auto racing, perhaps more than any other sport, is made up of participants who can trace their roots in the sport back generations. Some families, like the Petty family or the Andretti family, have three or four generations of drivers. Others, like the Marcum family, the founding family of the Automobile Racing Club of America, can also claim three generations of involvement in the sport.

It’s rare to find someone in the sport whose family was never around it as they were growing up.

For Nic Moncher, general manager at Bret Holmes Racing, that’s exactly what happened. Born in Toledo, Ohio and raised in Tiffin and Sandusky, Moncher and his family had no connection to racing. His family didn’t have a racer in it, in fact, they didn’t even know there were short tracks peppered throughout northwest Ohio. Yet somehow, Moncher found NASCAR racing on television and was enthralled.

“No one in my family knew anything about racing,” Moncher said. “We didn’t go to any of the short tracks around Ohio, we didn’t watch it on TV, nothing. We didn’t even know it was a thing. But somehow I found it one day when I was a kid and I couldn’t stop watching it. I became a huge Jeff Gordon fan. I went to my first race at Michigan International Speedway in 1999. From there on out it was all I wanted to do. We lived in Sandusky, and I found out there was a NASCAR team located there and I started banging on their door wanting to do anything I could to be involved.”

The team was ThorSport Racing. While the team is now one of the powerhouse organizations in the NASCAR Gander Outdoors Truck Series at the time, in 2004, it was a small team still looking for long-term sustained success. And while any and all help was appreciated, Moncher still had to start on the ground floor.

“I would pound on (ThorSport team manager) David Pepper’s door all the time asking him, begging him, to hire me,” Moncher said. “Eventually he said I could work there but I would have to do all the jobs no one else wanted to do – sweeping the floors, taking out the trash, cleaning the bathrooms – for a year before they would let me start to work on the trucks. Eventually they started giving me more and more to do. I started installing decals and doing some of the graphics on the trucks.

“Some time in 2005 I told them I wanted to start to go to the racetrack, and eventually they let me. But I had to ride to and from the race in the hauler. I really got to see a lot about how the sport works from a lot of different perspectives.”

After a couple of years with ThorSport, Moncher decided he wanted to get even more involved in the management side of the sport so he departed Ohio to attend Belmont Abbey’s motorsports management program in Belmont, North Carolina.

“It was the first motorsports management program in the country,” he said. “It was led by Humpy Wheeler, who was promoter at Charlotte Motor Speedway for years, and John Bickford, who was Jeff Gordon’s stepfather and manager during the early part of his career. I was one of the first 20 people accepted into that program.”

After school, Moncher found himself in a wide variety of jobs in the racing industry, ranging from mechanic and pit crew member to producer of a motorsports talk show on SiriusXM NASCAR Radio. He worked with legendary racing journalist Chris Economaki at National Speed Sport News and learned about the intricacies of the die cast collectible market at Motorsports Authentics. In 2009, while working with Venturini Motorsports, he started working in team management for the first time. He’s still at it a decade later.

“My first job with Venturini Motorsports I was strictly a mechanic and a crew member,” he said. “When Billy (Venturini) stepped out of the seat they started working more on driver development and I helped them get that program up and running. It was my first real foray into working in the front office of a race team.”

Moncher moved to Joey Coulter’s team in 2010 and followed Coulter to Richard Childress Racing in 2011 and 2012 before joining GMS Racing and driver Spencer Gallagher in 2013. He helped organize GMS’s efforts from a small one-car ARCA team to a championship team in both the ARCA Menards Series and the NASCAR Gander Outdoors Truck Series. When GMS wanted to focus more on the NASCAR side of things, they sold their ARCA inventory to the Holmes family. Moncher was part of the deal.

“Maury Gallagher wanted to win an ARCA championship so we signed Grant Enfinger for a full season in 2015,” he said. “We won the first three races of the year and six overall. Grant won the championship and the Holmes family came in and wanted to get involved. They bought all of GMS’s ARCA inventory. Part of the deal was they would get all of the crew and me too.”

After a year with the Holmes team, Moncher had another offer to work with another NASCAR Truck team. In his absence, Holmes was competitive but not as competitive as they’d have liked. The team took the second half of 2018 off to reorganize, hoping for better results. They made two key moves. The first was hiring long-time crew chief Shane Huffman to oversee the racecars. The second was to bring Moncher back to manage the team and be Holmes’s eyes in the sky, communicating directly with the driver via two-way radio during the race.

“I always liked the management side of the sport,” he said. “I liked the mechanical side too, but I just felt I was better suited to be on the management side. Being the spotter keeps me involved on the competition side of things too.”

With Holmes currently sitting third in the series championship standings, Moncher is looking forward to returning to his home track for the May 19 ARCA Menards Series Sioux Chief PowerPEX 200 with a chance to win.

“I never even knew Toledo Speedway existed growing up,” he said. “The first time I even heard about it was on a poster at a gas station when I was a kid. They were advertising the ARCA race and a poster was in the window. It had all of the previous race winners and champions on it. It would be pretty cool for us to add our names to that list.”

Daytona Winner Harrison Burton Leads ARCA Menards Series Open Test at Charlotte Motor Speedway

Harrison Burton, winner of the season-opening Lucas Oil 200 at Daytona, used a late day mock qualifying run to turn the fastest lap in ARCA Menards Series open testing at Charlotte Motor Speedway on Tuesday. A total of 22 teams and 27 drivers were present for the test, which ran from early afternoon to early evening.

Burton, driving for Venturini Motorsports, toured the 1.5-mile Charlotte oval at a speed of 182.242 mph, edging teammates Christian Eckes and Michael Self at the top of the speed chart. While Self was near the top of the charts all day, Eckes also used a late run to record the second fastest time of the day minutes before the session ended.

Riley Herbst, who sat at the top of the leader board for most of the day, wound up fourth quickest in one of the two Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota Camrys the team brought to the test.

“I like this place, but it’s tough,” Herbst commented. “Both of our cars were good today.”

Herbst, who finished second in ARCA’s return to Charlotte last spring, turned a fast lap at 179.587 mph.

Defending ARCA Menards Series champion Sheldon Creed rounded out the top five, at 178.247 mph in a GMS Racing Chevrolet.

“It feels different to be back in an ARCA car,” Creed stated. “This No. 21 GMS Chevrolet is a brand new car, and this place is tough. That’s probably as big a reason it feels different to me.”

Creed, who finished third behind Herbst last May at Charlotte is looking forward to his return to the series.

“I can’t wait!” Creed stated. “I hope I get to do more than just Charlotte.”

The test was slowed for a trio of incidents involving the No. 35 Toyota of Travis Millburn, the No. 32 Chevrolet of Gus Dean, and the No. 57 of Bryan Dauzat. None of the cars suffered significant damage and none of the drivers reported injury. A brief shower also delayed the session momentarily early in the afternoon.

The ARCA Menards Series returns to Charlotte Motor Speedway on May 23 for the General Tire 150. The race will be broadcast live on FS1 at 9 pm ET. ARCA for Me members can access free live timing & scoring, live track updates, and live chat at ARCARacing.com. New users can register for free at ARCARacing.com/login.

Ty Gibbs Building an Impressive Resume as He Hunts First Career ARCA Menards Series Win at Toledo Speedway

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In 1981, forty-year-old Joe Gibbs started his professional football head coaching career with five straight losses. A tough start for sure, but his Washington Redskins team would recover to win eight of their final eleven games and end the season at 8-8.

The slow start belies what would become an NFL Hall of Fame career. The team would go to the Super Bowl the next two seasons, winning in 1982. Gibbs and the Redskins were perennial playoff contenders and won the Super Bowl a second time in 1987.

In 1992, while in his final year of his first stint as head coach of the Redskins, Gibbs created a NASCAR Cup Series race team. Much like his initial season as a football coach, his first season as a car owner was trying as well. But, in his second year, just as he did as coach of the Redskins, his race team won the “super bowl” of racing when driver Dale Jarrett won the Daytona 500 in 1993.

Now, 27 years later, Gibbs is perhaps more known for his NASCAR accomplishments than he is his hall of fame football career.

JGR has won 374 races in the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series, NASCAR XFINITY Series, NASCAR Truck Series, ARCA Menards Series, AMA Pro Motocross, and in the NHRA Mello Yello Drag Racing Series. And to further prove that Gibbs is more racer than footballer at this point is the fact his sons, J.D. and Coy, both followed him into racing.

J.D., who passed away in January after a long illness, was a former driver who was groomed to take over JGR when “Coach” retired. Coy, who was also a former driver and worked with his father during his second stint as head coach of the Redskins, is now back at JGR. In addition to his duties with the team, he’s also the father of the newest member of the family to pursue a career in motorsports.

Ty Gibbs, still just 16 years of age, made his ARCA Menards Series debut at Five Flags Speedway in March. He stayed in the fight all night long and made a pass for second in the final corner of the final lap. In his second start four weeks ago at Salem Speedway he recovered from a spin to finish sixth. He finished second in the most recent ARCA Menards Series race at Fairgrounds Speedway Nashville.

Not yet old enough to be eligible to race for the overall series championship, Gibbs will compete for the Sioux Chief Short Track Challenge championship. The series within the series takes place on all tracks, paved and dirt, one mile in length and under. The Sioux Chief PowerPEX 200 at Toledo Speedway will be the fourth start of Gibbs’ brief ARCA career.

Gibbs has tested a couple of times at the Glass City half mile last year in an effort to familiarize himself with the cars raced in the ARCA series. He will test again on Monday to work on race day setups and to continue to acclimate himself with crew chief Mark McFarland.

“Last year we came to Toledo Speedway to get some seat time in the ARCA car and some laps on the track knowing that we were going to be racing here during the 2019 season,” said Gibbs. “I was really surprised at how fast the track was but feel like I was able to learn some things that will help me when we get to the race weekend. I know Mark (McFarland, crew chief) and the No. 18 team will have a fast Monster Energy Camry and we’ll be ready to battle for the win at Toledo.”

Unlike his grandfather, who lost those first five games, Gibbs has come out of the box strong. In addition to his strong performances in the ARCA Menards Series, he also won a big late model event at Myrtle Beach Speedway to start the season off on the right foot.

“The 2019 season has started out awesome with a late-model win in Myrtle Beach and second at New Smyrna for the K&N East race and at Five Flags and Nashville for my first ARCA races. I feel I did a lot of preparation during the off season to make sure my fitness and driving skill set stayed sharp and I was ready to get in the car and contend for wins each week. I had a rough time a few weeks ago at Salem and didn’t finish where we wanted to, but I’m ready to rebound at Toledo.”

With a limited number of opportunities to win in 2019, Gibbs is forced to maximize every chance he has behind the wheel. That’s not to say he feels extra pressure to perform. He places a lot of pressure on himself, just as every driver in his position would. One person that doesn’t put any added pressure on him is his grandfather.

“Coach has always supported me in racing and anything I have been involved with,” continued Gibbs. “I feel like there isn’t too much pressure on me this year, but in the years to come they will be expecting results, just as they do from all of the JGR drivers.”

FAST FACTS: General Tire 200 Music City 200 presented by Inspectra Thermal Solutions

Where: Fairgrounds Speedway Nashville, Nashville, Tennessee

When: Saturday, May 4, 2019, 9 pm ET/8 pm CT

Television: MAVTV, Live

Track Length: 0.596 miles

Banking: 18 degrees

Most Recent Winner: Zane Smith, April 7, 2018, 79.200 miles per hour

Most Recent Pole Winner: Chandler Smith, April 7, 2018, 114.322 mph

Track Qualifying Record: Chandler Smith, April 7, 2018, 114.322 mph

The ARCA Menards Series returns to Fairgrounds Speedway Nashville for the 29th time since the first series event, a 300 lapper, was held in June, 1959. Nelson Stacy won on the way to his second of three series championships.

Six drivers have earned their first ARCA Menards Series win at Fairgrounds Speedway Nashville: Charles “Red” Farmer in 1970, Clifton “Coo Coo” Marlin in 1976, David Green in 1992, Josh Williams in 2016, Chad Finley in 2017, and Zane Smith in 2018.

Three drivers, Finley, Green, and Marlin, registered their only career victories at Fairgrounds Speedway.

Keith Ploughe, who won two races in his ARCA Menards Series career, is the only driver with multiple victories to earn his final career win at Fairgrounds Speedway.

The October 1981 race at Fairgrounds Speedway won by Bob Schacht served as the season opener for the 1982 season.

Three drivers have won three consecutive ARCA Menards Series races at Fairgrounds Speedway: Jack Bowsher won in 1963, 1964, and 1965; Andy Hampton won in 1967, 1968, and 1969, Bob Schacht won in 1981, 1982, and 1983. They are all tied for the most wins at Nashville.

Harold Smith, Bruce Gould, and Marvin Smith all have two wins a piece at Fairgrounds Speedway. Since race winners include Nelson Stacy, Don White, Keith Ploughe, Red Farmer, Ramo Stott, Woody Fisher, Coo Coo Marlin, Moose Myers, David Green, Grant Enfinger, Josh Williams, Chad Finley, and Zane Smith.

Three drivers with the surname Smith have won at Fairgrounds Speedway. Harold Smith is a two-time winner in 1961 and 1962, former series champion Marvin Smith won in 1978 and 1979, and Zane Smith won in 2018.

There was a nine-year gap between the 1983 race and the next ARCA Menards Series race at Fairgrounds Speedway. That 1992 event was won by David Green, who would go on to win the 1994 NASCAR Busch Series championship.

Following the 1992 race, the series would have a 23-year hiatus between races at Fairgrounds Speedway. The ARCA Menards Series returned in 2015 and Grant Enfinger won on his way to the series championship.

There have been five ARCA Menards Series races at Fairgrounds Speedway without a repeat winner. The last driver to repeat at Fairgrounds Speedway was Bob Schacht who won in 1982 and 1983.

The last driver to win back-to-back races at Nashville was Bob Schacht, who won three consecutive races in 1981, 1982, and 1983.

The first nine races at Nashville, from 1959, through May 1967, were 300 laps in length. The races from 1968 through 1971 were 200 laps long. The 1972 race was rained out. The races from 1973 through 1983 – with the exception of 1976 and 1982 – were 100 lap sprint races. The 1976 race was 250 laps and the 1982 race was 106 laps. The races since Fairgrounds Speedway was added back to the schedule in 2015 have all been 200 laps.

The record for most caution flags in an ARCA Menards Series race at Fairgrounds Speedway Nashville is eleven for a record 95 laps, set in 2017 in a race won by Chad Finley.

The record for fewest caution flags in an ARCA Menards Series race at Fairgrounds Speedway is two for a record nine laps set in 1982 in a race won by Bob Schacht.

ARCA Menards Series Championship Battle Heats Up; Michael Self Leads Travis Braden by Five Points Headed to Nashville

The ARCA Menards Series championship battle has heated up going into Saturday’s General Tire Music City 200 presented by Inspectra Thermal Solutions at Fairgrounds Speedway Nashville. Leader Michael Self (No. 25 Sinclair Lubricants Toyota), driving for the powerhouse Venturini Motorsports organization, would seem to be the overwhelming favorite, but he has a slim five-point lead over second-place Travis Braden (No. 27 MatrixCare/Consonus Health Care/Liberty Village Ford) entering the season’s fifth race.

Self’s season got off to a rough start when he was involved in a lap three crash at Daytona. The resultant damage left him 31st at the finish and in a deep hole in the standings. He won the next time out at Five Flags but was penalized 25 points for a post-race technical violation. He won again at Salem in the season’s third race, moving within just five points of the lead heading into last Friday’s race at Talladega. Self finished fifth, two positions ahead of Braden, and heads into the Nashville event leading the ARCA standings for the first time in his career.

“It’s pretty awesome that we’ve bounced back from where we were after Daytona, to now leading the points heading in to race five, but it’s also a little stressful, because I know that everyone else can just as easily do the same thing,” said Self. “I’m definitely trying to enjoy it for now, and not overthink it, because we have a lot of racing left to do.”

Self comes to the ARCA Menards Series with eight career wins in the NASCAR K&N Pro Series West, five of which came on short tracks. When Self made the transition to ARCA through partial schedules in 2017 and 2018, he ran mainly on superspeedways – defined as tracks longer than one mile – and his success on the big tracks earned him a reputation as a superspeedway specialist. While he certainly enjoys racing on the big tracks, he’s hoping his streak of success on the bullrings gets him consideration as a well-rounded competitor that can challenge for wins on all types of tracks and contend for the series title.

“Winning at Pensacola and Salem were huge confidence builders for me,” Self says. “Those weren’t tracks that I had looked at and thought that I could capitalize at, but we were able to, which surprised me, but also gave me so much confidence in the team around me and the cars that are coming out of Venturini Motorsports. Nashville is another one of those tracks that I don’t have highlighted as a place that I really look forward to or feel like I just love, but after the success we had at Five Flags and Salem I’m definitely excited to see what we can do.”

Conversely, Braden could be seen as an unlikely contender for the series championship. It’s certainly not his credentials, he’s a two-time ARCA/CRA Super Series late model champion. And it’s not the credentials of his crew chief, Dan Glauz, who was an integral member of Tim Steele’s championship seasons in the 1990s. Braden’s Don Fike-owned team, RFMS Racing, is based in the heart of the Midwest racing scene in Brownsburg, Indiana just west of Indianapolis. Fike has built a solid core led by Glauz and Braden, but they are “the little team that could” in comparison to the Venturini organization.

Braden is one of three full-time employees. Not only does he drive the car, he works on them throughout the week putting his degrees in aerospace and mechanical engineering from West Virginia University to good use. The fact that their smaller team is able to compete with what is arguably the series’ powerhouse organization is a source of pride for the Wheeling, West Virginia native.

“Everyone looks at us a smaller team, up against the powerhouses,” Braden said. “There's always a factor in the size and budget of a race team, but I feel we're really getting close to being able to do what those teams do. A lot has grown at RFMS Racing over the past 18 months, and I don't think we've even begun to show our true capabilities yet this season. I think you'll see a lot of eyes open up here over the next few weeks of racing. It's nice to be in such great position in the standings to capitalize on it, too.”

Braden is a short track specialist. Not only did he earn those two late model championships on the short tracks of the Midwest, he earned his first ARCA Menards Series win in his first series start at Lucas Oil Raceway just outside of Indy in 2015. Braden would like to use that experience, and his previous experience at Nashville, to retake the points lead from Self with a strong run on the historic fairgrounds oval.

“I spent a lot of time at the short track level, specifically in this region, compared to most of our competition,” Braden said. “It pays big dividends when I can show up with that experience at these tracks. If we can get on a roll on the short tracks, I think it will be really hard to stop us.”

Nashville the Launching Point for Many ARCA Menards Series Careers; Bret Holmes and Joe Graf, Jr. Return to Site of Series Debut Looking for First Win of 2019

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For many drivers, they come to the ARCA Menards Series to gain experience as they attempt to move up the ladder to the upper levels of American stock car racing. A full-time career in racing in the NASCAR Gander Outdoor Truck Series, XFINITY Series, or the Monster Energy Cup Series often starts in ARCA.

The drivers these days come younger and younger. ARCA rules allow drivers as young as 15 years of age to compete on tracks one mile in length and under. And drivers that hope to get approved for the high speeds at the big tracks, places like Daytona, Talladega, Pocono, Michigan, and Charlotte, are often encouraged to enter and compete on the smaller tracks before they race door to door at 190 miles per hour.

So it’s no surprise then that many drivers have made their series debut at Fairgrounds Speedway Nashville. For the last four seasons, it served as the opening short track race of the year, meaning lots of fresh new faces have taken to the legendary Fairgrounds high banks over the years.

Munford, Alabama’s Bret Holmes (No. 23 Holmes II Excavation/Southern States Bank Chevrolet) made his ARCA Menards Series debut at the Fairgrounds in 2016. Holmes finished fifth that evening, but still feels like he left something on the table.

“I still feel like Nashville owes me something,” he said. “The first time there I feel like we lost a win. It was based on tire strategy. The guys who won gambled on tire strategy. I feel like I have something to prove there and something to make up for. We were really good there and I wish we could have gotten our first win in our first start there.”

Holmes sits third in the ARCA Menards Series standings after the most recent race at Talladega Superspeedway. He is a building sciences major at Auburn University. He recently took a day off from classes – and missed a quiz in construction safety – to test at Toledo Speedway for the May 19 event there. Holmes said much of what he and his team, led by crew chief Shane Huffman, would transfer over to Nashville.

“Every track we go to is different, but as far as the car builds go, a lot of it transfers from one track to the next,” he said. “One of my professors is pretty cool with racing so he let me off the hook for today. He just asked me to put him on our list for Talladega.”

Another driver that made his debut at Fairgrounds Speedway is Joe Graf, Jr. (No. 77 EAT SLEEP RACE Ford), who made his first series start at the five-eighths mile oval last April. Graf parlayed pit strategy in the middle stages of the race to lead nine laps but he eventually lost six laps and finished 16th.

Graf had an adventurous rookie season in the ARCA Menards Series. He finished second in a statistical dead heat at Talladega – the scoring monitors showed a margin of victory of 0.000 seconds between he and race winner Zane Smith – and he won a slam-bang last lap short track duel at Berlin in August, ironically defeating Smith, to earn his first career series win.

A student at New York University in Manhattan, Graf is looking for another short track win to get back in the thick of the ARCA Menards Series championship battle.

“I had a lot of fun at Nashville last year despite having a broken leg,” said Graf. “I’m hoping that what I learned at Nashville last year can be applied to this weekend. I feel like we have some momentum right now with some solid finishes after Salem and Talladega – but we’re looking for more. A lot more.”

Graf recently signed on to a partial scheduled with the Richard Childress Racing NASCAR XFINITY Series program. Not only will he run races for the team he will also intern in the organization’s marketing and communications department. With big future plans in place, Graf could easily lose focus but he’s kept his eye on the ball heading into Nashville.

“Nashville is one of those places that really fits my driving style. We just need to go there this week, utilize practice and qualifying to our advantage,” he said. “Then, we need to stay out of trouble and have a solid finish and keep ourselves in this championship battle.”

Practice for the General Tire Music City 200 presented by Inspectra Thermal Solutions is set for 2:15 pm ET/1:15 pm CT, with General Tire Pole Qualifying slated for 5:15 pm ET/4:15 pm CT. The green flag on the super late model feature is 6:45 pm ET/5:45 pm CT, with the ARCA Menards Series headliner going green at 9 pm ET/8 pm CT. The race will be televised live flag-to-flag on MAVTV. ARCA for Me members can follow along with live timing & scoring, live track updates, and live chat at ARCARacing.com. New users can register for free with a valid email address at ARCARacing.com/login.

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Nashville ARCA Success Paved the Way to NASCAR XFINITY Series Championship for David Green

The ARCA Menards Series returns to Fairgrounds Speedway Nashville for the fifth consecutive year for the General Tire Music City 200 presented by Inspectra Thermal Solutions on Saturday, May 4. The 200-lap main event, scheduled for a 9 pm ET/8 pm CT green flag, will be preceded by a 100-lap super late model event co-sanctioned by the ARCA/CRA Super Series, the Southern Super Series, and the CARS Tour.

The event, promoted by long-time ARCA partner Track Enterprises, will serve as the season opener for the historic five-eighths mile oval. Two previously scheduled events were canceled due to inclement weather. Should weather become an issue on Saturday, a raindate of Sunday, May 5 has been established. If needed, the first green flag would wave at 1 pm CT on Sunday.

Previous winners at Fairgrounds Speedway Nashville include former track regular and NASCAR XFINITY Series champion David Green, who won back in 1992. Green drove for the Roulo Brothers Racing team and used that win to propel himself into a competitive ride with a team owned by Bobby Labonte. Labonte won the series championship in 1991 and moved on to the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series. Green took over Labonte’s car in 1993 and in 1994 went on to win the series championship.

Green, originally from Owensboro, Kentucky, is now the Safety Manager for NASCAR. He went on to win nine times in the NASCAR XFINITY Series, including a 1995 win on the high banks at the Fairgrounds. His final win came in 2005 at Pikes Peak International Raceway. But it was that 1992 ARCA win at Nashville that got the ball rolling.

“I have really fond memories of that race,” Green said. “First, it was the first race of any kind I was in that year. I was working for Bobby Labonte and spotting for him that year and I think he could see the bigger picture and he knew I would be driving the Slim Jim car the next year. I had asked him about some opportunities, and he said, “you know, I don’t think that’s a great idea”. But when the Roulo Brothers called me he said go ahead and do it. He knew it was a good opportunity and I would be competitive. But I was almost too nervous to even ask him.

“When they rolled the car out of the trailer, I think the paint was still wet on it,” he laughed. “They had just gotten the car done. But right away everything just clicked. We qualified really well and dominated the race. We were the only car on the lead lap at the finish. That says more about the team than it does about me, though. It was just a really smooth, easy weekend from the start.”

Although he never raced weekly at Nashville, unlike his brother Jeff who raced at Nashville weekly for several seasons, Green credits his experience at Nashville on pointing him towards a pathway to success in NASCAR.

“It was very instrumental in my career,” he said. “I ran there enough to get a real appreciation for the track and its history. The medium banking and the abrasive surface really helped prepare me for places like Rockingham and Darlington. I was fortunate to have that training ground to help make the transition into the higher levels of racing much smoother. It really gave me the tools I needed. And it was great to have the support of the community there too. It’s a great racing town and all of those people coming out every week really showed me the importance of being good with people and being good with sponsors, which helped me later in my career too.”

Another former ARCA Menards Series winner at Nashville that has gone on to the top levels of the sport is 2015 series champion Grant Enfinger. Now a championship contender driving for ThorSport Racing in the NASCAR Gander Outdoors Truck Series, Enfinger won at the Fairgrounds early in his championship season to establish himself as the man to beat for the title.

“Nashville was critical to our championship because we didn’t know if we were going to get to run the full season or not,” Enfinger said. “That win gave us the boost we needed to run the full season and go for the championship. The funny thing is we broke an upper control arm on the last lap of practice. We got it fixed and went out and won the race, but if that broke on the first lap of the race instead of the last lap of practice things could have been a lot different.”

Enfinger has a lot of experience on short tracks all across the southeast, and he’s spent a lot of time at the Fairgrounds but incredibly his ARCA Menards Series win there was his first race there.

“It’s still the only time I have raced there as a driver,” Enfinger said. “I have spent a lot of time there but it was usually working as a crew member for someone else. It was great to finally get there and race, though. It’s an incredible place. I love the history of it. It’s the perfect race track. You have the right amount of tire wear, the right amount of banking to get out there and go race.”

To win at the Fairgrounds, drivers need to outrace the other drivers but they also have to deal with the race track itself, which Enfinger said can be difficult to do.

“You need speed for sure, but you need to manage your race from the time it starts until the end,” he said. “You have to know when to go, and you have to know when to pace yourself and just get to the next pit stop. It’s all about balance. The driver needs to get it right and communicate with his crew chief because if you’re off even a little it’s going to magnify itself as the race goes on. If you’re a little tight in practice, you’re going to push through the center of the corner and snap loose on corner exit. If you’re loose, you’re going to be really loose and not be able to get down the straightaways at all. It’s a driver’s track but it’s a crew chief’s track too. The best drivers and crew chiefs rise to the top at Nashville.”

Today's ARCA Menards Series Drivers Looking for Follow Darrell Waltrip's Path to Success Starting at Fairgrounds Speedway Nashville