For the second straight night, Ty Majeski found himself in victory lane last Thursday when the RB Performance Super Late Models took on the Martinsville Speedway for race number two in their Triple Crown Series. It took nearly 100 laps for Majeski to reach the front of the field, in the 125-lap event that was plagued with cautions, but he was able to hold off the field on some late restarts to claim his 6th Super Late Model win of the season.
Majeski started his night off with a 2nd place qualifying effort, just 0.011 seconds off of the pole sitter Casey Kelley. A 10-car invert for the feature dropped Majeski back to a 9th place starting spot, and in the opening laps of the race he was able to quickly work his way into the top five by lap 17. From there however, his progress to the front slowed down a bit as he looked to ride and save tires for a while.
A lap 72 restart set up a 33 lap green flag run, and Majeski had been able to move up into the top three for the restart. As the leaders approached lap 100, Majeski made his move under Jim Caudill for the 2nd spot, and Camaron Hamilton who had led up until that point slid up on the exit of turn two which also allowed Majeski to get the run to his inside as well. As they exited turn four, Majeski had taken over the lead on lap 98 while Hamilton had to fall back as he looked for a spot on the bottom.
The final 25 laps of the race saw three cautions which allowed Majeski to hold onto the top spot, leading up to one final restart with just one laps to go. Majeski got the quick jump on the restart, and went uncontested on the final lap as he came around to pick up the checkered flag. He would lead 28 laps on the night on the way to his 64th career SARA victory.
Behind the winner, James Linkiewicz picked up a 2nd place finish on the night. He started from the 2nd position where he ran for the first 80 laps of the race before falling back a few spots, but was able to gain them back late to take 2nd.
Jim Caudill had a top ten run going early before a little bit of contact sent him around and to the back of the field. He spent the rest of his night playing catch up, and took advantage of his extra set of tires to charge back up to the front of the field, and challenged for the lead lap before dropping a spot on the final restart to finish in 3rd.
Camaron Hamilton needed a good night to make up some ground on the points leaders, and he spent the first 97 laps of the race out in front leading the race, doing just what he needed to do. Once he lost the lead, he fell back a few spots on the outside groove but was able to fall back in line and picked up a 4th place finish.
Bill Martin had a quiet night overall, spending most of his race in the back half of the top ten. After taking his set of tires at half way, he was able to work back up into the top ten, and finally cracked the top five with less than 20 to go, and ended up finishing in the 5th position.
After a 23rd place qualifying effort, Tyler Breeding picked up a 6th place finish, recovering from a pit road speeding penalty during his stop to charge up through the field. Cody Kelley ran in the 3rd spot for most of the race before deciding to take tires late in the race, but could only work his way back up to finish 7th. The top two points drivers, David Krikorian and Ty Spearman, were both caught up in wrecks during the course of the race, but were able to salvage top ten finishes in 8th and 9th respectively. Tim Bills also recovered from an early incident, and rounded out the top ten with a 10th place finish.
With David Krikorian and Ty Spearman both being involved in incidents during the race, they would both loose ground to 3rd place points driver Camaron Hamilton in the championship standings.
Leaving Martinsville, the gap among the top three can’t get any closer as Krikorian narrowly hangs onto the points lead by a single point over Spearman, with Hamilton closing his gap down to just two points in 3rd.
The top three will battle it out this coming Thursday, at what has been a tough track for drivers this season in other divisions, as the Super Late Models will take on the Langley Speedway for 150 laps.
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