Last week the entire league made their first trip to the new Lucas Oil Raceway. The track’s unique line saw plenty of battles but the passing was tough. In addition to all the racing, one champion was crowned while there are still three titles up for grab.
Let’s take a look back at Week 11.
(The Legends race was postponed due to iRacing server issues in addition to a glitch, so Legends are not included in these rankings at all)
10. Mike Belanger (Prev Rank: NR (+))
Mike has had plenty of bad luck this season, usually running within the top 5 or 10 at some point during races, but ends up getting caught in a wreck or something that gives him finishes lower than how he has run. The past couple weeks though the luck has somewhat turned and Mike has had some better finishes. In the Pro Late Model event, he ran in the top 10 the entire race and ended up with a 6th place finish. Then in the Super Late Model race he again ran within the top 10, and looked to have a top 5 restart on the final restart before getting caught in a wreck and ending up with a top 10 finish. Mike’s luck has been improving, so we’ll see if he can put together some good finishes to close out the season.
9. Bill Martin (Prev Rank: NR (+))
Bill was in the rankings a couple weeks ago, but dropped out after a couple bad finishes. Now he’s put together more good runs, and kicked it up a notch by picking up his first career SARA win in the Street Stock race. Then he backed it up with another strong run in the SLM race by leading a bunch of laps and ending up with a 2nd place finish. Bill has been capable of winning a bunch of races this season, and now that he finally has on, we’ll see how many more he can pick up.
8. Kevin J Myers (Prev Rank: 9th (+1))
Kevin moves up a spot this week in the rankings, but probably didn’t get the finishes he quite wanted to. In the Pro LM race he ended up with a 7th place finish, but looked like he had a faster car throughout the race. But in the SLM race, his night would end early as he got caught up in a wreck early in the race. With his good PLM finish, he now moves up just outside the top 10 in points despite missing races at the beginning of the season and could jump up into the top 10 after next week, so we’ll look to see how KJM finishes out the season.
7. Dale Owen (Prev Rank: 8th (+1))
Dale put in another couple of good runs this past week after having a great week in week 10. He started things off with a decent 12th place finish in the Pro LM race, but picked it up in the SLM race with a strong 7th place finish. We continue to see Dale improve over the past few weeks of the season, so we’ll look for him to finish out the season on a strong note.
6. James Linkiewicz (Prev Rank: 10th (+4))
James missed last weeks races because he was out of the country on his honeymoon, but he returned this week with a couple of good finishes. In the Pro LM race he ran within the top 5 all race long and stayed in the 5th spot, then he would run well in the SLM race as well before getting collected in the final wreck and ended up in 11th spot. While he is out of contention for any championships, he still has the chance to finish top 5, or event top 3 in both the PLM and SLM divisions, so we’ll look to see how he runs next week.
5. Clay Snider (Prev Rank: 5th (+0))
Clay ran just one race this week, and it ended early with a 20th place finish in the Pro LM. But Clay is still the points leader in the Legends division with just two races to go. He’ll have to keep 2nd place within reach though cause the points are tight when drop weeks get taken out. Clay won the championship in the Street Stocks last season, and will look to see if he can claim his 2nd career SARA championship as the season winds down.
4. Matt Rolfe (Prev Rank: 4th (+0))
Matt ran into some bad luck this week as well, with both of his finishes outside of the top 15. He would get caught up in a lap 1 wreck in the PLM race, ending with him in the 15th place. Then in the SLM race, he would get caught up in a couple of wrecks, and finishing 17th. But he is still in contention for two championships as he leads the Street Stock points and only needs to finish in the 13th position or better to clinch, and he’s still within reach for the Legends title as well, and will need to beat out Clay for that. We’ll look to see if Matt can claim his 3rd, and possibly his 4th SARA championship when the season is over.
3. Stan Bragg (Prev Rank: 7th (+4))
Stan has been on a hot streak lately, rolling off good finishes and that continues last week. He had probably the 2nd place car in the Street Stock race before a long green flag run forced him to pit for gas but ended with a 6th place finish. Then in the Pro LM race he ran near the front of the field the whole race and finished 3rd. And in the SLM race, he was set up for a good finish before getting caught up in the final incident of the race, resulting in a 12th place finish. We’ll look to see if Stan can continue the roll he’s on as we wrap up the final races of the season.
2. Jacob Linkiewicz (Prev Rank: 3rd (+1))
Jacob continued his strong season this past week with a couple of strong finishes. He finished 2nd in the Pro LM race is in a good position to finish out the season in 2nd in those standings. Then in the SLM race he finished with a 4th place finish and hangs onto a wealthy points lead in those standings. All Jacob has to do in the SLM race is finish 11th or better, no matter what happens with the other contenders and he will lock up the Super Late Model Championship after a strong and consistent season. So we’ll look for Jacob to run strongly at NHMS this week, and possibly pick up his first career SARA championship/
1. Ty Majeski (Prev Rank: 1st (+0))
Ty has been on the top of these charts the past few weeks as he’s been picking off wins in the PLM division. And that roll continued last week as he picked up his 7th PLM victory of the season. That win was enough to clinch his spot at the top of the points standings, and picking up the 2014 Pro Late Model Championship, his first career championship. Then to cap it off, he came out the next night and picked up another win in the SLM race as well. Ty was the only driver to win a race in all 4 current SARA divisions, and with his SLM victory, he has now won in all 4 in just this season. While the pressure is off Ty for the PLM championship, we don’t expect him to let up this week to end the season.
New This Week: Name – Finishes
-Mike Belanger – 6th PLM, 10th SLM
-Bill Martin – 1st SS, 2nd SLM
Dropped Out: Name – Finishes
-Justin Brooks – No races
-Brian Tedeschi – No races