16-year-old Colby Howard earned a ninth-place finish in Friday evenings Herr’s Potato Chips 200 at the Madison International Speedway (MMM) racing for Mason Mitchell Motorsports (MMM). Howard who drove the No. 78 Champion Power Equipment Chevrolet earned his second top-10 finish in ARCA in just his second start with the series.
“We were able to gain another top-ten finish and complete all 200-laps tonight,” Howard stated. “I gained a lot of valuable experience this evening, especially throttle control. It was quite hot inside the car during the race. I learned the outside line does not work at Madison. I can’t thank everyone at MMM enough for their hard work all day and during the race. Hopefully we can put together more ARCA races together moving forward.”
The Simpsonville, South Carolina native qualified a career best fifth in General Tire pole qualifying earlier Friday afternoon. When the green flag waved on the ninth race of the 2018 season, Howard quickly worked to get to the bottom of the track falling in line in sixth. Yellow was a common theme in the opening laps, making it hard for drivers to get into a rhythm. He brought the No. 78 down pit-road for the first time on lap 48 taking two-right side tires and a chassis adjustment. He returned to the race in the 11th position. Using patience and his fresher tires, it only took Howard 20-laps to move up to the sixth position. Howard would work his way back inside the top-five with 60-laps to go. As the laps wound down, the 78 slipped backward falling to the 10th spot. Howard was able to pass a car in the final ten laps to earn 9th place finish.
The finish marks the fifth top-10 finish for the No. 78 team during the 2018 campaign.
Next up for MMM and the ARCA Racing Series will be Papa Nicholas Coffee 150 at Gateway Motorsports Park on Friday, June 22nd. Teams will participate in an open test on Thursday, June 22nd.The race will be live on Fox Sports 1 on Friday beginning at 9:00 PM ET. Arcaracing.com will have live timing and scoring for all on-track activities from Gateway.
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