The NEO Racing News Legends League rolled into the foggy New Hampshire Motor Speedway tonight for their week 12 event, in what was scheduled to be the divisions championship race. But with last week’s race at IRP being postponed, tonight’s race would set up another tight points battle heading into the finale next week. 18 Legends cars would take the track during practice as they got acclimated to the tough and exciting road course, with 17 of those cars starting the event. Travis Warling set the quick time in practice, and backed it up with an even faster time of 1:14.037 seconds to pick up the pole in open qualifying.
Warling has been dominant in the couple of road course events he has entered this season, as well as being defending champion of this event last season, and he would lead the field around for the green flag. He got the jump on the start while 2nd place starter Marcus Lambert followed him into turn 1. The entire field made it through the first couple turns cleanly, and Bill Martin would move up into 3rd through the first part of the lap, before Matt Rolfe was able to get past him with Huston Hamer moving up to 5th in the opening lap.
Points leader Clay Snider started in the 10th spot and was quickly picking off a few cars in the first lap before he would have to come to a stop as the field came off the hill and down onto the backstretch, as a car in front of him and spun and was just next to the racing line. He would fall back to 11th at the end of lap 1, and would have his work cut out for him the rest of the race.
Back up front, Warling was beginning to pull away in the lead, while Rolfe chased down Lambert for the 2nd spot during the early laps. Lambert had pulled a small gap over Rolfe, before making a couple mistakes which would remove that gap. Then as the two drivers drove up the hill in the road course turn 3, Lambert would slide off track, chasing his car and saving it, but Rolfe would slide by and take over the spot. Lambert would work on chasing Rolfe back down and the two looked to have a race long battle shaping up, before Lambert would get loose in turn 11 allowing Rolfe to pull away for the spot.
Martin would remain in the 4th spot, while Patrick Hahe would work back up into the 5th spot. Meanwhile a little further back, Snider was picking his way back up through the field, passing a car a lap and by lap 6 he was already up to the 6th spot and had his sights set on Hahe for the top 5. He would narrow the gap, getting it down to about 2 seconds, but couldn’t quite pull any closer for the spot.
No one would have anything for Warling up front though, as he sailed on to extend his lead to over 9 seconds, picking up his third victory of the season. The win also puts him at the top of the SARA Legends wins category, picking up his 6th career win. Behind him, Rolfe was able to hang on for 2nd, while Lambert remained in the 3rd spot. Martin ran in 4th the entire race and finished there, while Hahe was able to hold off Snider for the 5th spot. With Snider finishing 6th, and Rolfe finishing 2nd, Snider’s points lead is now down to just 1 single point heading into the season finale next week at IRP. But with one more drop week coming into play, it could be Rolfe that sits in the drivers seat in the points, meaning Snider will have to be at the top of his game to secure the championship.
- Travis Warling
- Matt Rolfe
- Marcus Lambert
- Bill Martin
- Patrick Hahe
- Clay Snider
- Josh Kotten
- Mike Rhyno
- Jeff Hoggard
- Todd Cousins
- Forrest Gregg
- Ken Belanger
- Daniel Vining
- Stan Bragg
- Huston Hamer
- Dale Owen
- Brandon Wilkinson
Next week the division will head to IRP for their championship night, as the points battle will come down to the wire for the third season in a row.
For full results and standings, click HERE.