Christian Eckes (No.15 JBL Audio Toyota) returns to action traveling to the Hawkeye state this time for his fourth track appearance in Friday night’s ARCA Menards Series Fans with Benefits 150 at Iowa Speedway.
Eckes, a five-time series winner is looking to hit the reset button after a final lap spin from teammate Michael Self took away what seemingly appeared to be a fourth place finish at Elko but instead delivered a heartbreaking 11th place finish for the championship contender.
It’s been an up and down season so far for Christian Eckes and his JBL Audio Toyota race team. After leading the point driver point standings early in the season, Eckes was forced to miss the race at Salem Speedway back in April due to illness. Down but not out the talented teenage driver has kept his focus. Eckes picked up his first win of the season at Nashville and has scored four top-five finishes since.
Aiming for more Eckes looks ahead to the dog days of summer ready to turn things around during the final seven races of the season. Despite losing out on valuable points at Salem, the eighteen-year-old driver currently finds himself occupying the fourth spot in the championship standings – 115 points behind teammate Michael Self.
“It’s definitely been a rough run at it so far this year,” said Eckes. “Our #15 JBL Audio Camry has had so much speed, just things haven’t been going our way by any means. Morale is high heading into Iowa this weekend, we’re ready to turn it around! We’ve done before and we can do it again, let’s do it.”
The Middletown, NY native has tallied six top-five’s, 10 top-ten’s and two General Tire Pole Awards on the season and leads the Bounty Rookie of the Year standings.
Eckes will join VMS teammates Michael Self, Chandler Smith and Gavin Harlien in Iowa. VMS has dominated series competition thus far winning eight of the first thirteen events in 2019. Fast to start each race, VMS has claimed an unprecedented 12 General Tire Pole Awards to start the season, only missing out on the honors during the third race of the season at Salem Speedway,
Practice at Iowa Speedway is scheduled for 12:45 pm ET/11:45 am CT with General Tire Pole Qualifying to follow at 4:45 pm ET/3:45 pm CT and the Fans with Benefits 150 to close the night at 9 pm ET/8 pm CT. The race will be televised live flag to flag on MAVTV.
Venturini Motorsports PR
