By Bryan Hulbert
MESQUITE, Texas (October 14, 2023) Fastest in Qualifying, won his Heat Race, earned the Pole in the A-Feature, and never looked back. That’s the way it went Saturday night for Sam Hafertepe, Jr., who etched his name in the record books as the winner of the final A-Feature with the American Sprint Car Series presented by RacinDirt.com at the Devil’s Bowl Speedway.
“We had an awesome racecar tonight,” said Hafertepe. “I was amazed at how good we were, and honestly, on the restarts, I kind of wasn’t going as hard because we’d catch lapped traffic so fast.”
Hafertepe’s ninth win at the half-mile with the American Sprint Car Series presented by RacinDirt.com, the victory is his 65th with the tour.
Giving a tip of the cap to the track crew on getting the surface ironed out and providing multiple grooves of racing, Sam then stated, “It’s sad to see this place go. I’ve spent a lot of my life racing here. I started when I was sixteen years old, and that was 20 years ago, but it’s neat to be a part of this place. It’s impressive for a facility like this to last as long as it has, and it takes people like the Edwards running to make it last all these years.”
Never a challenge over the course of 30 laps, Hafertepe was quick into lapped traffic several times. Slowed for the final time with nine laps to run, Traffic over the final two laps at one point looked like it was going to give Matt Covington a chance at the Hills Racin No. 15h with Hafertepe nearly brought to a standstill in the first and second turns.
Stripping nearly two seconds off of his advantage at the wave of the white flag, Sam found smoothing sailing through the final sets of turns and captured the win by 2.542-seconds.
Matt Covington crossed second, with Howard Moore third.
Trading fourth with Harli White during the feature, Jace Park was able to retake the spot, with White able to go tenth to fifth. Blake Hahn, from ninth, made it to sixth, followed by Saturday’s KSE Hard Charger, Channin Tankersley, who picked up ten positions to finish eighth. Chase Randall was ninth with Tucker Doughty, who won the BMRS B-Feature, climbing to a top-ten finish.
The final running of the Devil’s Bowl Winter Nationals included 29 drivers for the tour’s 107th event.
The final full points race of the season, Jason Martin secured his first career ASCS National Tour Championship and the $50,000 that goes with it. Jason’s record included Nine wins on the season, 18 top-five, and 24 top-ten finishes. He secured the title by 46 over Matt Covington.
One weekend of racing remains for the American Sprint Car Series presented by RacinDirt.com at the COMP Cams Short Track Nationals, happening October 26-28 at Texarkana 67 Speedway. The rescheduled event is show-up points event. That event will be shown on http://www.floracing.com.
The 2023 season will mark the 32nd year of competition for the American Sprint Car Series. Spearheaded by the American Sprint Car Series National Tour, the ASCS Nation includes Regional Tours that encompass both wing and non-wing competition.
For other news, notes, and information on any of the tours under the ASCS banner, log onto http://www.ascsracing.com, follow on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter (@ascsracing).
Race Results:
ASCS National
Devil’s Bowl Speedway (Mesquite, Texas)
Saturday, October 14, 2023
Car Count: 29
The Driver’s Project Group Qualifying
The Drivers Project Qualifying 1 (3 Laps): 1. 3-Howard Moore, 00:16.079[6]; 2. 52-Blake Hahn, 00:16.114[10]; 3. 8M-Kade Morton, 00:16.136[7]; 4. 55B-Brandon Anderson, 00:16.380[9]; 5. 2-Brekton Crouch, 00:16.393[1]; 6. 0-Eric Baldaccini, 00:16.714[5]; 7. 71-Channin Tankersley, 00:16.721[4]; 8. 2J-Zach Blurton, 00:16.810[2]; 9. 10-Landon Britt, 00:16.872[3]; 10. 16-Blake Baccus, 00:17.128[8]
The Drivers Project Qualifying 2 (3 Laps): 1. 95-Matt Covington, 00:15.718[7]; 2. 36-Jason Martin, 00:15.916[8]; 3. 87J-Jace Park, 00:15.997[4]; 4. 9-Chase Randall, 00:16.033[6]; 5. 7M-Chance Morton, 00:16.154[1]; 6. 4C-Tuesday Calderwood, 00:16.393[10]; 7. 1J-Danny Jennings, 00:16.449[3]; 8. 45-Martin Edwards, 00:16.548[9]; 9. 2X-Tucker Doughty, 00:16.714[5]; 10. 33C-Casey Carter, 00:18.411[2]
The Drivers Project Qualifying 3 (3 Laps): 1. 15H-Sam Hafertepe Jr, 00:15.442[9]; 2. 14-Jordon Mallett, 00:15.634[5]; 3. 2C-Wayne Johnson, 00:15.648[8]; 4. 45X-Kyler Johnson, 00:15.785[6]; 5. 12H-Harli White, 00:15.793[2]; 6. 6-Christopher Townsend, 00:16.029[4]; 7. 91-Michael Day, 00:16.066[7]; 8. 4-Austin Mundie, 00:16.370[1]; 9. 15-Michael Colaluca, 00:16.996[3]
AR Dyno Specialty Heat Races (Top 16 in combined Qualifying and Heat Points advance to the A-Feature)
AR Dyno Specialty Heat 1 (8 Laps): 1. 8M-Kade Morton[2]; 2. 55B-Brandon Anderson[1]; 3. 3-Howard Moore[4]; 4. 52-Blake Hahn[3]; 5. 0-Eric Baldaccini[6]; 6. 10-Landon Britt[9]; 7. 71-Channin Tankersley[7]; 8. 2J-Zach Blurton[8]; 9. 2-Brekton Crouch[5]; 10. 16-Blake Baccus[10]
AR Dyno Specialty Heat 2 (8 Laps): 1. 87J-Jace Park[2]; 2. 9-Chase Randall[1]; 3. 95-Matt Covington[4]; 4. 36-Jason Martin[3]; 5. 7M-Chance Morton[5]; 6. 45-Martin Edwards[8]; 7. 2X-Tucker Doughty[9]; 8. 1J-Danny Jennings[7]; 9. 4C-Tuesday Calderwood[6]; 10. 33C-Casey Carter[10]
AR Dyno Specialty Heat 3 (8 Laps): 1. 15H-Sam Hafertepe Jr[4]; 2. 2C-Wayne Johnson[2]; 3. 14-Jordon Mallett[3]; 4. 12H-Harli White[5]; 5. 45X-Kyler Johnson[1]; 6. 6-Christopher Townsend[6]; 7. 91-Michael Day[7]; 8. 4-Austin Mundie[8]; 9. 15-Michael Colaluca[9]
BMRS B-Feature (Top 6 advance)
B-Main (12 Laps): 1. 2X-Tucker Doughty[2]; 2. 71-Channin Tankersley[4]; 3. 6-Christopher Townsend[1]; 4. 2J-Zach Blurton[7]; 5. 4-Austin Mundie[6]; 6. 1J-Danny Jennings[8]; 7. 2-Brekton Crouch[11]; 8. 4C-Tuesday Calderwood[10]; 9. 15-Michael Colaluca[9]; 10. 45X-Kyler Johnson[5]; 11. 16-Blake Baccus[12]; 12. 91-Michael Day[3]; 13. (DNS) 33C-Casey Carter
A-Feature
A-Main (30 Laps): 1. 15H-Sam Hafertepe Jr[1]; 2. 95-Matt Covington[2]; 3. 3-Howard Moore[3]; 4. 87J-Jace Park[4]; 5. 12H-Harli White[10]; 6. 52-Blake Hahn[9]; 7. 14-Jordon Mallett[6]; 8. 71-Channin Tankersley[18]; 9. 9-Chase Randall[11]; 10. 55B-Brandon Anderson[16]; 11. 2X-Tucker Doughty[17]; 12. 0-Eric Baldaccini[12]; 13. 36-Jason Martin[8]; 14. 7M-Chance Morton[13]; 15. 2J-Zach Blurton[20]; 16. 6-Christopher Townsend[19]; 17. 45-Martin Edwards[15]; 18. 1J-Danny Jennings[22]; 19. 10-Landon Britt[14]; 20. 8M-Kade Morton[5]; 21. 2C-Wayne Johnson[7]; 22. 4-Austin Mundie[21]; 23. 45X-Kyler Johnson[23]; 24. 91-Michael Day[24]
Lap Leader(s): Sam Hafertepe, Jr. 1-30
Hard Charger: Channin Tankersley +10
Quick Time: Sam Hafertepe, Jr. – 15.442-seconds
High Point Driver: Sam Hafertepe, Jr.
Provisional(s): Kyler Johnson (Points) / Michael Day (Points)
ASCS Online:
American Sprint Car Series: http://www.ascsracing.com
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/americansprintcarseries
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/ascsracing [@ascsracing]
Broadcast: http://www.racindirt.com
Live-Scoring: My Race Pass App