On Thursday night, 36 drivers brought their cars to the Martinsville Speedway for a 125 lap event on the paperclip. This would be the first event following last weekend’s SARA 250, and Trey Jarrell would look to see if he could carry the momentum from his big win in that race.
Heat races got underway to start things off, and Clay Snider would lead Heat #1 to the green and led every lap to pick up the win, also earning him the pole position for the feature. Todd Garren led from green to checker to win Heat #2. And James Poleske would work his way from the 4th spot in his heat to pass Jarrid Boiros in their heat, and Poleske would take the win in Heat #3. A total of 8 cars from each heat race would advance to the feature, with 4 drivers receiving provisionals to make up the 28 car starting field. 8 cars would be sent home from the event.
As they field took the green flag for the 125 lap event, Snider jumped out to the lead. But the first lap wouldn’t go quite as well for the rest of the field, and a driver towards the front got spun exiting the corner, which then collected a good portion of the field behind them as a total of 20 cars would receive some sort of contact. At the front, Poleske was able to sneak by Snider just before the caution came out and grabbed the lead for the restart.
A restart on lap 19 would set up the longest run of the night for 50 laps. Poleske would jump out front and pull away from the drivers behind him such as Boiros and Fred Moreau, but as the run continued, one driver was beginning to work his way through the field. Trey Jarrell started 12th on the night, and by lap 27 he had worked his way up into the top 3, and a couple laps later he had moved up to 2nd and began his pursuit of the lead. Lapped traffic did a good job on the long run to let the leaders race, and by lap 40 Jarrell had closed onto Poleske’s bumper, and just two laps later he was able to get underneath him to take over the lead. Once he was in control, there was no looking back for Jarrell.
A couple late cautions in the race would set up a final restart with two to go for a green-white-checker finish. Jarrell brought them around to the lead with Poleske tucking in behind him. But as they came out of turn two, Heath Smith, JayJay Day and Josh Hart would find themselves 3-wide on the backstretch for the 3rd position, but the three of them would get tangled together against the wall which collected a couple other drivers as well which brought the caution out to end the race under the yellow flag.
As they came around, Jarrell would take the checkered flag first to pick up his 3rd win of the SLM season as he carried the momentum from his big win at Oxford. Poleske would hang onto 2nd, while Stan Bragg Jr moved up to 3rd after the last wreck. Boiros had a strong run all race and came around in 4th, while James Linkiewicz came out of the last wreck in 5th. With Jarrell’s win, he increases his points lead to 90 points heading into next week’s race.
- Trey Jarrell
- James Poleske
- Stan Bragg Jr
- Jarrid Boiros
- James Linkiewicz
- Ray Farlow
- Josh Hart
- Fred Moreau
- Heath Smith
- JayJay Day
- Jacob Linkiewicz
- Clay Snider
- Todd Garren
- Anthony Celentano
- Matthew Eddy
- Ty Spearman
- Ken Belanger
- Mike Belanger
- Michael Rennebu
- Dale Owen
- Robert Matthews
- Paul Boswell
- Cody Leland
- Derek Robinson
- Matt Rolfe
- Brian Tedeschi
- Derek Holzhausen
- Jason Miller (DNS)
DNQ: Colin Allman, Chad Battle, Russell Berry, Tim Bills, Eddie McCray, David Reed, Brandon Wilkinson
Next week the series heads to Thompson for a 100 lap event. For the full results and standings, click HERE.