9/29/2014
Katlynn Leer
Mansfield Outlasts the Field to Capture First Win of 2014 at Kentucky Motor Speedway
Whitesville, KY – It was a damp and humid start to the race day at the Kentucky Motor Speedway this past Sunday. Teams and officials dodged rain drops for most of the morning and early afternoon, waiting for the clouds to break and an opportunity to get the track dried off.
Once the rain finally ceased, the Kentucky Motor Speedway track crew was able to get the track dry in no time. The time spent waiting for the rain to stop put practice time at a premium. Shortened practice sessions left teams hustling to take advantage of every minute available. Brandon Huff was the fastest truck in the first of two practice sessions, while Danny Jackson led the way in the second. Jackson would also be the fastest truck throughout both sessions combined.
Holley Performance Rookie of the Year candidate Brian Brewer took over qualifying early. He held onto the top spot until John Gearhart bumped him from the top. His time there was short lived as Levi Mansfield soon knocked him off, until he too was quickly ousted by Brandon Huff. However, no driver was a match for Danny Jackson, who set the fast time at 16.078 to take the GUNR4SR.com I-Racing pole award. Jackson then rolled the dice to determine the inversion. He rolled two fives to combine for an inversion of ten for the feature.
Fifteen year old Katlynn Leer led the field to the green alongside Holley Performance Rookie of the Year candidate Billy Strehle in heat race number one. Leer was making her first appearance in the ARCA Truck Series at Kentucky Motor Speedway, a day before making her ARCA Racing Series debut on the one mile dirt oval at DuQuoin State Fairgrounds. Strehle used a good start to jump into the lead early, followed by Brad Yunker. The two battled for the lead, but neither could hold off Cody Quarrick. He made his way around Yunker and soon after Strehle to take the lead and the win.
Brian Brewer and John Gearhart brought the field to the green in the second heat. Brewer took the lead from the start, while the field battled for second behind him. While coming up on the halfway point, Brewer began to battle a loose truck. He would soon lose the lead to John Gearhart. Gearhart would hold off the field to take the heat win, with Mansfield holding on to finish second. In both heat races drivers were battling like it was the final lap of the feature, which is odd for a heat race. However, with points on the line and ground to be made in the championship standings, ever positon is potentially that much closer a driver is to a championship.
The feature saw a familiar duo starting on the front row. Both Billy Strehle and Brad Yunker have each started on the front row at least twice, both starting together at Flat Rock. The two were mixed up in an incident during their heat race, one that sent Strehle into the turn four wall coming to the checkered flag. Regardless of a few bent parts on the number 2 Coyote Entertainment Dodge, he decided to lead the field to the green of the Kentucky Motor Speedway 100.
3-20Leading the first lap was neither Yunker nor Strehle. Instead it was Todd Gearhart, who passed the leaders from the third starting position to take the lead off turn two. Behind him it was the number 6 of Cody Quarrick making quick work of Strehle and began to challenge Yunker for second. While they battled for second, Gearhart had his hands full with a tight race truck. It soon got the best of him six laps into the affair, as he lost control and came inches from hitting the turn four wall to bring out the caution.21-6
The caution moved Yunker to the lead and Quarrick to second. Behind them in third was the GUNR4SR.com I-Racing pole winner Danny Jackson. Quarrick wasted no time taking the lead at the drop of the green flag and checked out on the field in his V8 Ford. Jackson soon got around Yunker for second and set his sights on Quarrick for the lead.
Meanwhile, Levi Mansfield and Todd Gearhart were locked in a fierce battle for the fourth place position. Behind them was the battle for sixth between Brandon Huff and Brian Brewer. Back up front the leaders were coming up on lapped traffic, a task that isn’t always easy for the leaders. Quarrick moved in and out of lapped vehicles and maintained the lead over Jackson.
6-5Once the leaders were back on open track, it was evident that Quarrick wasn’t able to continue his pace due to lack of brakes. The issue turned into an opportunity for Jackson, who took over the lead on lap 19 and began to pull away. Back in the pack the battle for fourth was won by John Gearhart, who was now making a move for third on Yunker.
Following John Gearhart on his march to the front were Huff and Mansfield. The three trucks were moving towards the front via the outside groove. Before they could advance on Quarrick, the caution flew for the second time. It appeared that the truck piloted by Strehle lost a motor entering turn three and spun. The caution packed the field back up and gave Jeff Myers Jr. the “free pass”.
On the ensuing restart, Jackson slipped out in front of Quarrick and regained a solid lead. However, he was the first to find out that the entrance and middle of turn three and four was very slick. It wasn’t long that the entire field soon understood that the turn indeed was slick from the blown engine of Strehle. However, one driver wasn’t deterred and used it to his advantage. John Gearhart showed no fear driving into the turn and made a pass on Quarrick for second.9-4
Brandon Huff would follow John Gearhart around Quarrick for third. Once there he caught up to John Gearhart and began to battle him for second. All the while Jackson was struggling to build a lead on the field. Jackson, who was beginning to deal with a tire going down, was finding it difficult to run the inside line and keep control through the turns. After moving up a groove to help tighten up the truck, he soon lost the lead to John Gearhart.
The race was almost half over and the top five were nose to tail, three rows deep. On lap 40 Jackson had his hands full and relinquished the lead to John Gearhart. He would soon give up second to Huff, then third and fourth to Quarrick and Mansfield. At this point he was almost out of control. Then on lap 46, while coming off turn 2, the truck final came out from underneath Jackson and around it came to bring out the caution.
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Jackson pitted under the caution to replace the flat left rear tire that had caused him to fall from the lead. He would line up at the rear, while John Gearhart and Huff led the field back to the green on the restart.
Up to this point two-time defending champion, and 2012 winner at Kentucky Motor Speedway, Levi Mansfield had been quiet and running in the middle of the pack. It might have been a strategy to save brakes and tires, which is something that many had used up by this point. Immediately off the restart Mansfield took second from Huff. The following lap he would make a pass on John Gearhart for the lead.
Once Mansfield was out front, the number 54 NAPA Legend Batteries-Mansfield Welding & Manufacturing Chevy became untouchable shortly after the halfway point. The race would go green for the remainder of the scheduled distance, as Mansfield held off Huff to take the win. Huff made his way to the back bumper of Mansfield as the laps wound down, but was unable to give him a challenge for the lead.
VICTORY LANE-1
It would be Mansfield’s first win of 2014, his second at Kentucky Motor Speedway. The victory helped Levi in his quest for his third consecutive championship. “We’ve won two of the three race here, it has been a great track to us,” says Mansfield about the win. The Kirsch Automotive team worked all day on their setup, trying to find the speed they needed to compete for the win. “They never gave up,” said Mansfield about his team, “they threw everything they could think at it and it was pretty close.” Their efforts paid off in the form of a victory.
Brandon Huff would finish second, the best finish of his career in the ARCA Truck Series. “That was tough… I just burned up the right front (tire) and the brakes over those last 15 laps. I tried to give it all I could.” Danny Jackson would salvage a third place finish, battling back from the back of the field with tire issues. “It’s all a part of racing,” said Jackson about his night. “I did what I could to keep up with those guys (Mansfield and Huff), but with about 25 laps to go I wasn’t making ground on them.” John Gearhart settled into the fourth place position with Holley Performance Rookie of the Year candidate Brian Brewer rounding out the top-five.
The ARCA Truck Series will be back in action on September 13th as they travel to the historic Jennerstown Speedway, located in Jennerstown, Pennsylvania along the Allegheny Mountains. It is the series’ return visit after their inaugural visit on July 12th, an event that saw Cody Quarrick capture his first career victory.
The ARCA Truck Series completed its fourth full season presented by the Phoenix Management Group of Ohio, LLC, (or PMG) of Millersport, Ohio in 2013, under a licensing agreement with the Automobile Racing Club of America (ARCA). The ARCA Truck Series (ATS) ran exhibition races late in 1998 with the first full season in 1999. Today, the series has grown into one of the most versatile in short track racing, having taken popular four cylinder, V-6 & V-8 sealed crate engine powered trucks to asphalt tracks of many sizes under one mile, road courses, and numerous dirt tracks in its history. The Automobile Racing Club of America (ARCA) is among the leading and most diverse auto racing sanctioning bodies in the country. Founded in 1953 by John and Mildred Marcum, the organization administers more than 100 events each year. Following the ARCA Truck Series has become easier than ever lately! For in-depth stories, continually log on to ARCATruckRacing.com. You can now also follow the series on Twitter at @ARCATruckRacing, there is an “ARCA Truck Series” Facebook page and “ARCA Truck Racing” is on LinkedIn.
For more information please contact:
Keith Bales, PR – Media Director
kbales@arcatruckracing.com or
Robbin Slaughter, Operations Manager
rslaughter@arcatruckracing.com
Submitted By: Katlynn Leer
