ROUGEMONT, N.C. - Christopher Bell put on a driving clinic en route to the victory in the Super Late Model portion of the Orange Blossom 300 at Orange County Speedway in Rougemont, NC for the CARS Racing Tour Saturday night.
Cole Timm, the winner of the inaugural CARS Tour race at Southern National three weeks ago, continued his hot streak by claiming the pole. Quin Houff was second fastest, with Bell third. However, Bell missed driver introductions and would be sent to the rear of the 30-car field to start the race.
Timm chose the outside lane for the initial start. One lap in, Houff lost control while fighting with Timm for the top spot in turn one, tiggering a 10-car accident that involved several contenders including Clay Rogers, Brandon Setzer and Steve Wallace.
Recovering from his penalty, Bell quickly began to work his way through the field from the back. By lap 13 he had charged all the way to sixth. He continued to move forward, and on lap 41 he moved around Dominique Van Wieringen for the race lead.
Bell, who picked up his first career Super Late Model win at Orange County Speedway last fall, dominated the remainder of the 150 lap contest to take his first career CARS Racing Tour win. Senoia, Ga.’s Bubba Pollard crossed the finish line in second, followed by Kyle Grissom in third, Timm in fourth and Chris Davidson in fifth.
“I just got an awesome car underneath me,” Bell said. “I can just roll around at my own pace and save tires like a champ. We had a rough day yesterday after I tore up the other car and these guys fixed the power steering issue on this one.
“That was definitely everything I had on the restarts. I was going as hard as I could in order to try and get some gap in between us. (Crew Chief) Bond (Suss) would read me lap times and I would just try to match the lap times of what the guys were running behind me. Hats off to my guys and thank you to the fans for coming out here.”
In other action, Brayton Haws drove to victory in the Late Model Stock portion of the night.
Deac McCaskill won the pole for the second straight race. Haws started alongside on the front row.
McCaskill moved out to an early lead, but it would be shorter-lived as Haws took command before the one-sixth mark. Before long, Todd Gilliland, the winner of the season opener and series point leader, found himself involved in an incident with Stacy Puryear and numerous other contenders. Gilliland was done for the night, while others, including Tyler Ankrum and Michael Fose, suffered significant damage.
Back under green, the only challenge Haws would have to contend with the rest of the night was from Myatt Snider. Snider made several attempts to pass Haws, but could never finish the move, drawing even on multiple occasions. Following a late restart, Snider dropped a valve in the engine and was relegated to third at the checkered flag behind Haws and Justin Crider. R.D. Smith Jamey Caudill rounded out the top five.
The win was just the second Late Model Stock victory in Haws’ short career.
“We were saving tires a ton in the beginning of the race, and I was rolling the corners a lot faster and that allowed me to get by him (McCaskill) for the lead,” Haws said in victory lane. “My team, Hawk-McCall Motorsports, had a great piece all weekend, and this is just an awesome win for this year.”
The CARS Racing Tour returns to action on May 9 with the Catawba Valley 300 at Hickory Motor Speedway in Newton, NC. For more info, visit CARSRacingTour.com.
CARS Racing Tour
Orange County Speedway – Rougemont, NC
Orange Blossom 300 – April 18, 2015
Super Late Models
1. 51 Christopher Bell
2. 83 Bubba Pollard
3. 31 Kyle Grissom
4. 57 Cole Timm
5. 14D Chris Davidson
6. 6 Brandon Setzer
7. 2 Trevor Noles
8. 4 Brandon Lynn
9. 77 Zane Smith
10. 47 Chris Fontaine
11. 25 Stephen Leicht
12. 00 Lucas Ransone
13. 17 Quin Houff
14. 33 Roger Lee Newton
15. 24 Richard Gould
16. 8N John Hunter Nemechek
17. 51N Stephen Nasse
18. 12 Harrison Burton
19. 67 Clay Jones
20. 40 Grant Galloway
21. 16 Lucas Jones
22. 5V Dominique VanWieringen
23. 18 Kiel Spaulding
24. 56 Gus Dean
25. 2R Clay Rogers
26. 66 Steve Wallace
27. 29W Matthew Wragg
28. 71R Nick Robinson
29. 54 Matt Craig
30. 2L Robby Lyons
Late Model Stock
1. 41 Brayton Haws
2. 7 Justin Crider
3. 2 Myatt Snider
4. 16S R.D. Smith
5. 50 Jamey Caudill
6. 27 Tommy Lemons
7. 44 Justin Johnson
8. 31 Thomas Beane
9. 16 Jeff Oakley
10. 08 Deac McCaskill
11. 07 Clint King
12. 77 Blake Stallings
13. 59 Roddey Sterling
14. 88 Chris Davis
15. 88D Doug Barnes, Jr.
16. 23 Donnie Puryear, Jr.
17. 28 Chris Hudspeth
18. 88T Robert Tyler
19. 12C Garrett Campbell
20. 63 Christian PaHud
21. 1 Trent Barnes
22. 99 Mike Darne
23. 17 Stacy Puryear
24. 98 Stefan Parsons
25. 54 Michael Fose
26. 12M Austin McDaniel
27. 98G Todd Gilliland
28. 58 Tyler Ankrum
29. 34 Matt Waltz
DNS: 12 Ryan Wilson
