Ty Gibbs (No. 18 Monster Energy/ORCA Coolers/Terrible Herbst/Advance Auto Parts Toyota) led this afternoon’s practice and backed it up with the General Tire Pole Award for this evening’s ARCA Menards Series Kentuckiana Ford Dealers Fall Classic 200 at Salem Speedway. It’s the first career pole award for the 16-year-old grandson of legendary NFL coach and NASCAR team owner Joe Gibbs.
Gibbs’ fast lap was 17.145 seconds/116.535 miles per hour.
“This is a really tough race track but it doesn’t intimidate me at all,” Gibbs said. “I believe if you’re intimidated by a racetrack it already has you beat.
“We were fast by ourselves for one lap but I think we have a lot left over for the race too,” he continued. “As fast as we were, we actually spent most of the time working on long run speed and I think we’re going to be pretty good.”
Sam Mayer (No. 21 Chevy Accessories Chevrolet), runner-up at Salem in the spring, qualified second at 17.255 seconds/115.793 miles per hour, Corey Heim (No. 22 Speedway Children’s Charities Ford), championship points leader Michael Self (No. 25 Sinclair Lubricants Toyota), and Bret Holmes (No. 23 Holmes II Excavation Toyota) rounded out the top five.
Christian Eckes (No. 15 JBL Audio Toyota), who sits 70 points behind Self in the battle for the series championship, qualified sixth. Travis Braden (No. 27 MatrixCare/Consonus Health Care/Liberty Village Ford), Carson Hocevar (No. 28 GMPartsNow.com/Scott’s Coins/KBR Development Chevrolet), defending race winner Chandler Smith (No. 20 Craftsman Toyota), and Joe Graf, Jr. (No. 77 EAT SLEEP RACE Ford) rounded out the top ten qualifiers.
The Kentuckiana Ford Dealers Fall Classic 200 will go green live on MAVTV at 7:15 pm ET. ARCA for Me members can follow along with live timing & scoring at ARCARacing.com.
ARCA PR
