BARBERVILLE, Fla. - David Gravel scored the main event win at the DIRTcar Nationals Thursday night, as he took the Arctic Cat All Star Circuit of Champions Sprint Car series victory at Barberville, Florida’s Volusia Speedway Park.
It’s the third series career win for the Watertown, Connecticut driver’s career, as he held off Donny Schatz and Brad Sweet to lead all 30 laps en route to the victory.
“This is definitely awesome,” Gravel said. “I’ve never got to win in Florida and I’ve never got to win one of these gator trophies, so this is definitely cool. I have to thank all of the guys on the team, Barry, Zack, Derrick, Chad, Jen. They all did a great job preparing these race cars all winter. All of my sponsors, they make all of this possible. We are working for really good things this year, so this is a great start to that.”
Gravel, who started on the outside-front row, wasted no time getting to the front of the field, taking command during the initial drop of the green flag and stretching his early advantage to a near-three second lead. He would continue to hold his advantage, navigating forward while keeping Schatz at a distance.
“(Donny Schatz) is definitely the best, so anytime you have an opportunity to beat him is a great thing,” Gravel said. “The rubber started to come into play, so I had a little bit of an advantage at the end of the race. I was trying not to miss my marks while racing through traffic. I wanted to take my time and make sure I didn’t slip my tires. Our tires just made it, so thank goodness for that.”
With his second place performance, Schatz will end his series Florida campaign with three victories and two runner-up finishes.
“We are happy with that,” said Schatz. “The track kinda caught us off guard here tonight. I really didn’t expect it to take rubber like that, but it did, so it kinda set us up for a difficult second-half of the race. That’s the way it goes some days. This Arctic Cat team does a phenomenal job. I think we would rather have five victories during the last week, but who wouldn’t.”
The Arctic Cat All Star Circuit of Champions will enjoy a seven week hiatus before returning to competition on Saturday, April 8, at the Atomic Speedway near Chillicothe, Ohio.
For more information, visit AllStarSprint.com.
In other action, Brian Ruhlman passed former NASCAR ace Ken Schrader with two laps to go, and from there went on to score the win in DIRTcar UMP Modified action.
Schrader held on to finish in second, with Jacob Hawkins, Taylor Cook and Kenny Wallace rounding out the top five.
For more information on the DIRTcar Nationals, visit DirtcarNationals.com.
Volusia Speedway Park – Barberville, FL
DIRTcar Nationals – Feb. 15, 2017
Arctic Cat All Star Circuit of Champions
1. 5-David Gravel
2. 15-Donny Schatz
3. 49-Brad Sweet
4. 10H-Chad Kemenah
5. 7C-Caleb Armstrong
6. 2M-Kerry Madsen
7. 14-Christopher Bell
8. 9-Daryn Pittman
9. 4-Paul McMahan
10. 87-Aaron Reutzel
11. 24-Rico Abreu
12. 27-Greg Hodnett
13. 19-Brent Marks
14. 21-Brian Brown
15. 13JT-Mark Dobmeier
16. 17s-Joey Saldana
17. 59H-Justin Henderson
18. 18-Ian Madsen
19. 17-Caleb Helms
20. 11K-Kraig Kinser
21. 5W-Lucas Wolfe
22. 13D-Danny Dietrich
23. 2-Shane Stewart
24. 17B-Steve Buckwalter
DIRTcar UMP Modifieds
1. 49 – Brian Ruhlman
2. 9 – Ken Schrader
3. 13 -Jacob Hawkins
4. 21C – Taylor Cook
5. 36 – Kenny Wallace
6. 2 – Nick Hoffman
7. 7 – Justin Allgaier
8. 3E – Robbie Eilers
9. 65 – Josh Rice
10. 45J – Johnny Broking
11. K9 – Will Krup
12. 64JR -Billy Workman, Jr.
13. 22T – Tony Anderson
14. 77 – Ray Bollinger
15. 25 -Tyler Nicely
16. 58 -Devin Dixon
17. 14T – Tyler Clem
18. 98 – Shon Flanary
19. 10Y – Trent Young
20. 3L – Jeff Leka
21. 72 -Todd Neiheiser
22. 54 – Larry Burkins
23. 2X4 – Chase Collins
24. 35 – David Stremme
25. 88 – Matt Crafton
26. 11N – Gene Nicholas
27. 1 – Blake Spalding
28. 33 – Jeff Matthews
