TULARE, Calif. — Front row starter Justyn Cox put together a near flawless performance and pocketed $18,383.00 for winning the final night of the Dennis Roth Classic with the NARC 410 Sprint Series.
Racing the Bates-Hamilton Racing/Benefit RFP/Lippert Construction No. 42X Kistler/Maxim, Cox lead wire-to-wire in the 30-lap NAPA Auto Parts feature at Thunderbowl Raceway to score his first career series victory.
Cox took command of the race from the initial green flag running high up on the cushion, inches from the wall. On the eighth-circuit he was presented with his first dose of lapped traffic, something he had to deal with on throughout the headliner. However, he managed to stay calm, cool, and collected as he zigged and zagged through slower cars, while banging the outer wall as he let it all hang out. Four total stoppages occurred, but Cox mastered all the restarts to hold off his competition.
Corey Day, running for car owner Jason Meyers and piloting the Meyers Constructors/Four C’s Construction/Autry Plumbing No. 14 Kistler/KPC, challenged Cox numerous times but couldn’t make it stick. Day had two opportunities with just five laps remaining to overtake Cox, but Cox answered the call.
“I’m in disbelief!” stated the very excited and emotional winner. “I forgot to believe in myself last year, and I can’t believe I’m up here! I’ve worked my entire life to do something cool, and we did it tonight. To win at Tulare is awesome, and anyone who knows me knows this track scares me, so to do that is simply amazing.”
Day finished in a respectable runner-up and pocketed $9,000 for his efforts. He was chased to the checkered by tenth starter Justin Sander, racing for Demo Mittry in his Farmer’s Brewing/North County Plastering/MittryConstruction.
Feature Finish (30 Laps)
1. 42X-Justyn Cox[2]; 2. 14-Corey Day[3]; 3. 2X-Justin Sanders[10]; 4. 57W-Shane Golobic[9]; 5. 24-Chase Johnson[4]; 6. 4R-Trey Starks[8]; 7. 69-Bud Kaeding[12]; 8. 83-Cory Eliason[16]; 9. 0-Tim Kaeding[6]; 10. 41-Dominic Scelzi[1]; 11. 18T-Tanner Holmes[20]; 12. 88A-Joey Ancona[18]; 13. 16A-Colby Copeland[17]; 14. 88N-DJ Netto[15]; 15. 22-Ryan Bernal[14]; 16. 21-Cole Macedo[5]; 17. 83T-Tanner Carrick[19]; 18. 83V-Dylan Bloomfield[21]; 19. 36-Craig Stidham[22]; 20. 12B-Dawson Faria[24]; 21. 37-Michael Pombo[23]; 22. 83JR-Kraig Kinser[13]; 23. 21S-Jesse Schlotfeldt[11]; 24. 2K-Kaleb Montgomery[7]