It was all Thomas Meseraull on night one of the Shamrock Classic as the RMS Racing Toyota driver led all 40 laps in winning the USAC NOS Energy Drink National Midget special indoor event at the Southern Illinois Center, Friday.
The win is the third in a row for an RMS Racing Toyota driver to start off the USAC season as Meseraull’s teammate Justin Grant swept the season-opening double-header at Bubba Raceway Park in Ocala in February.
Meseraull earned the pole position as the high-point scorer in the night’s heat races, going fifth to first to win his heat. He followed that up by going straight to the lead in the night’s feature event and from there on out, he never faced a serious challenge on the way to the victory.
While the top spot was never really in doubt, fans were treated to a race-long battle for second, third and fourth with Brady Bacon, Cannon McIntosh and Shane Cottle all trading positions as they fought for positions on the podium.
In the end, Bacon would finish second, while Toyota drivers McIntosh and Grant would place third and fourth. Joe B. Miller came home in seventh, while Chance Crum was ninth as Toyota-powered drivers captured five of the top-10 finishing positions.
Night two of the Shamrock Classic is scheduled for Saturday with a $10,000 winner’s purse at stake in the non-points paying event with tonight’s feature race setting the starting positions in Saturday’s heat races.
Quotes:
Thomas Meseraull, RMS Racing Toyota: “I feel like my teammate (Justin Grant), nothing against him, he’s awesome, has had all the luck and he’s been picking off wins. Tonight was my night. We started up front after winning our heat race. I do think we had the best car. When we’re on, we’re on. About every third to fifth night I have the absolute fastest car on the track and tonight was our night. It’s just great to be racing in March. It’s snowing outside and here we are racing.”
Cannon McIntosh, Dave Mac Dalby Motorsports Toyota: “I felt like we’ve got some good momentum going into tomorrow. We’d get runs on the second-place car and he just did everything he could to shut us down, but that’s racing. I think we had a better car than where we finished. I’m happy to finish on the podium. I just have to thank Crescent Tools, Toyota Racing, Mobil 1, Randy Timms Drive WFX and everyone who puts in a lot of hard work to put us on the racetrack. Hopefully, we can gain a couple of spots tomorrow.”
Toyota-Powered Drivers Shamrock Classic Friday Results
Thomas Meseraull – 1st
Cannon McIntosh – 3rd
Justin Grant – 4th
Joe B. Miller – 7th
Chance Crum – 9th
Rylan Gray – 11th
Jace Park – 14th
Mitchell Moles – 18th
Dominic Gordon – 19th
Toyota racing PR
