Jordon Mallett produced a top-10 outing to highlight the ASCS National Tour’s opening weekend.
Mallett kicked off the season with the premier 360ci winged sprint car tour on Thursday at Jackson Motor Speedway in Byram, Miss. He qualified fourth quickest in his group before winning a heat race. That ranked Mallett seventh in event points and the No. 6 was drawn for the feature inversion, making him miss the front row by only one position.
“We were pretty close in hot laps,” he said. “The track was a little different than I’m used to seeing it. It was a little more narrow. We made a couple of changes and didn’t qualify as good as I felt I could have. We changed some stuff back and we were better in the heat race. Then in the feature we were okay.”
Mallett started seventh and battled his way to fifth place before a late restart cost him a trio of positions. He rallied to regain one spot to secure a seventh-place result.
“The track kept getting better and we got up to fifth,” he said. “We had a restart with about five laps to go. I thought I must have sealed a tire over because those last five laps I couldn’t get any bite and was struggling.”
The middle race of a weekend tripleheader hosted by Texarkana 67 Speedway in Texarkana, Ark., rained out on Friday.
The weekend concluded on Saturday at Boothill Speedway, where Mallett made his debut. He timed in fifth quickest in his group and placed fifth in a heat race. Mallett duked it out just outside of the top 10 throughout the feature before ending 12th.
“Boothill was pretty rough to us,” he said. “I was super frustrated after qualifying. I didn’t feel good in hot laps, which normally doesn’t scare me too bad. Then I qualified really bad. We found we had a problem on the car and that was what led to us falling back on that restart Thursday night at Jackson. That made us feel better about Thursday.
“In the heat race and the feature at Boothill we were just playing catchup. I didn’t know where the car was at or needed to be good. I didn’t have enough drive in it for the heat race. I tried to go a little further without getting carried away and still fell short in the feature. It was just a night we’re glad to move on from.”
QUICK RESULTS –
April 20 – Jackson Motor Speedway in Byram, Miss. – Qualifying: 4; Heat race: 1 (1); Feature: 7 (7).
April 22 – Boothill Speedway in Greenwood, La. – Qualifying: 5; Heat race: 5 (5); Feature: 12 (12).
SEASON STATS –
11 races, 0 wins, 1 top five, 5 top 10s, 6 top 15s, 7 top 20s
UP NEXT –
TBD
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