Chandler Smith (No. 20 Craftsman Toyota) dominated the ARCA Racing Series presented by Menards Kentuckiana Ford Dealers Fall Classic 200 at Salem Speedway, leading 199 of 200 laps en route to his second series victory of the season.
“This car was absolutely on rails tonight,” Smith said. “The guys on this team are the reason why. They busted their butts on pit road and got us out of the pits first every time. All the action was behind us. In a perfect world, they would all be like this.”
Smith held off Gus Dean (No. 32 Baker Distributing/Gree Cooling Products Chevrolet) on a one lap dash to the checkered after a slew of late race cautions bunched the field.
Chase Purdy (No. 8 Bama Buggies Toyota) finished third, ARCA Racing Series championship leader Sheldon Creed was fourth, and Travis Braden (No. 27 MatrixCare/Consonus Healthcare/Liberty Village Ford) rounded out the top five.
Creed was able to add to his championship lead over Zane Smith (No. 41 LaPaz Margarita Mix/ICON Vehicle Dynamics Toyota), who was involved in a late-race crash and finished 18th.
“It was good for us because the car is in one piece and we added some points to the point lead,” Creed said. “I was proud of my teammate Zane. He did what he needed to do. You race people the way you want to be raced.”
Smith got into the back of Michael Self (No. 55 Sinclair Lubricants Toyota) and both crashed hard in turn four. The two had been involved in an incident earlier in the race. Smith pulled his car into the garage area where his MDM Motorsports team exchanged words with Self’s Venturini Motorsports crew.
Self was less than impressed with what happened.
“I guess some drivers don’t like to be raced hard,” Self said. “I’ve worked hard for everything I have. I am racing the last two so we’ll see how it works out.”
There were six cautions for 43 laps which held the average speed to 70.380 miles per hour. The race took 1 hour, 34 minutes, 37 seconds to complete.
The next event for the ARCA Racing Series presented by Menards is the rescheduled Shore Lunch 200 at Lucas Oil Raceway in Brownsburg, Indiana on Saturday, October 6. Practice is set for 2 pm ET, General Tire Pole Qualifying is set for 4:15 pm ET, and the race will go green at 7 pm ET. ARCARacing.com will have free live timing & scoring, track updates, and scanner audio for registered users.
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