Twitchy Race Reports

(RICHMOND, VA) The Sam Maxwell Customs ASRS Truck Series returned to action for Race #5 on the 2017 season. Tonight the drivers headed to the short track of Richmond International Raceway for the Skeeber Flob’s Kettle Corn 100 a 100 lap shootout.

It would see forty-two drivers show up to attempt to qualify for the thirty-six truck starting field. After qualifying was done it was Danny Rodgers putting his #22 on the pole for the event. Michael Atkins Jr., Jamie Vaughn, Jake Douglas, and Jared Mogard rounded out the top 5 in qualifying. The quick race stats seen 8 caution flag periods for 41 laps with 10 lead changes between 7 different drivers. The race was a caution filled event that seen the race take on an average of eleven green flag laps before the yellow would fly throughout the race. Surprisingly enough though most of the yellow flag periods for single truck or at the most two truck spins.

The second yellow that came out was for the biggest wreck of the night when the leaders got loose in front of the field off turn two which left the rest of the field dodging the wrecking cars. This involved several drivers as they just had no room to avoid the spinning trucks.

The surprise of the night came when the yellow flew with roughly thirty laps to go for Danny Rodgers who appeared to have the race in his hands and was his to loose. He would get loose off turn two and hit the wall sending him spinning to the inside wall. He would escape with minimal damage however would be buried back in about the twenty-fifth position. Rodgers would struggle to rebound from this mistake with just few laps left.

When the race was all said and done it was Zac Bozanich taking his #91 Toyota to ASRS Victory Lane at Richmond. This is Zac’s second win on the Sam Maxwell Truck Series season and his 9th career ASRS Victory.  Arguably the most impressive part about this Win for Zac is that he came from his 21st starting position to get the win at the end of this relatively short race when you figure in the yellow flag periods. We caught up with Zac and he had this to say about his performance tonight “Man did it feel good to get that monkey off my back after winning Daytona and then having the next 3 finishes outside the top 20. Qualifying didn’t really show our speed that we had in the 91 Speed Vegas Toyota, but that thing was a rocket in race trim. Starting 21st limited the strategy for the night and really forced me to take my time and just miss all the carnage that was going to happen and luckily I was able to do that and found myself inside the top 5 by about lap 30. From there it was just settle in and survive tell the end and make a late race charge. I caught a couple good breaks with leaders wrecking and picking up spots that way and then on the final restart the leader started spinning off of 4 and luckily made it by with minimal contact which ended the race under yellow. I can’t thank my whole MaXXed Out Motorsports team enough for the great trucks week in and week out, Brad, Jared, Nick, John, Kris really provide good feedback and trucks so we as a team can perform and win races.”

The top 5 finishers were as followed; Zac Bozanich your Winner, Devin Serra 2nd, Sam Maxwell 3rd, Jim Foose 4th, and Allan Young rounding out the top 5. The championship standings which see the top eight in the standings go to the playoffs after race #18 took a bit of a shake up with the wrecks that took place. The current eight drivers in the playoffs after Race #5 are Jim Foose who retains the point lead, Jason Stewart 2nd, Jonathan Holstein 3rd, Danny Rodgers 4th, Brad Cross 5th, Zac Bozanich jumps up three spots to move into 6th, Dan Mathews who jumped up four spots to move into a playoff position for the first time in 2017 7th, and Sam Maxwell who jumped up four spots as well to take the final playoff spot in 8th.

The next Sam Maxwell Truck Series event is not until May 9th when the drivers will head to the Kansas Speedway for the L.A. Simsport 125 an 85 lap event for everyone there. As for next Tuesday night April 25th the ASRS Xfinity Series is in action from the Richmond International Raceway for the Richmond 125.