The Kentuckiana Ford Dealers Fall Classic 200 at Salem Speedway, set for Saturday night at 7 pm ET, is the eighteenth of twenty races on the ARCA Menards Series schedule. With three races remaining in the season, it is positioned as an important race as the championship battle starts to wind towards its conclusion at Kansas Speedway on October 18.
But the Salem race carries added significance as it’s also the final event of ARCA’s annual CGS Four Crown championship. It’s the first of three series-within-a-series championships to be decided in 2019, followed by the Sioux Chief Short Track Challenge, which will be settled at Lucas Oil Raceway, and the General Tire Superspeedway Challenge, which will be decided at Kansas.
Dating back to 1984, when Davey Allison won the inaugural Four Crown championship, the series-within-a-series celebrates the diversity that has become the trademark of the ARCA Menards Series. With one race on each type of the four different styles of racetracks that the series competes on, the Four Crown includes a restrictor-plate superspeedway, and intermediate superspeedway, a paved short track, and a dirt track.
For 2019, the tracks included in the Four Crown were Talladega Superspeedway, won by Todd Gilliland, Michigan International Speedway and the Springfield Mile at the Illinois State Fairgrounds, both won by Michael Self.
Self (No. 25 Sinclair Lubricants Toyota) has a 35-point advantage over second-place Bret Holmes (No. 23 Holmes II Excavation Chevrolet), with Travis Braden (No. 27 MatrixCare/Consonus Health Care/Liberty Village Ford) and Joe Graf, Jr. (No. 77 EAT SLEEP RACE Ford) are tied for third 45 points behind.
Self will clinch if he finishes in the top six no matter what Holmes or Braden do. For Holmes to win the Four Crown title, he needs to win and have Self finish seventh or worse, or finish eight positions better if he doesn’t win. For Braden or Graf to win, they need to win and have Self finish eleventh or worse and Holmes to finish third or worse. If they don’t win they need to finish twelve positions ahead of Self and five positions ahead of Holmes.
Zane Smith won the 2018 CGS Imaging Four Crown championship, becoming the 24th driver to win the coveted title and joining the likes of Bob Keselowski, Bobby Bowsher, Tim Steele, Frank Kimmel, Grant Enfinger, Chase Briscoe, and Austin Theriault as winners.
The ARCA Menards Series will be joined by the Lucas Oil Great American Stocks at Salem Speedway on Saturday night, September 14. Activities will kick off with ARCA Menards Series practice at 12 noon ET, followed by General Tire Pole Qualifying at 4 pm ET. The Great American Stocks 50-lap feature will roll at 5 pm ET, with the Kentuckiana Ford Dealers Fall Classic 200 set for 7:15 pm ET. The race will be televised live flag-to-flag on MAVTV. ARCA for Me members can access live timing & scoring, live chat, and live track updates for free at ARCARacing.com. New users can register for free with a valid email address at ARCARacing.com/login. For ticket information, please visit SalemSpeedway.com.
ARCA PR
