By T.J. Buffenbarger
CASA GRANDE, AZ (February 21, 2026) – Justin Peck does not make frequent starts with the American Sprint Car Series National Tour, but when he does compete with the series the visit seemingly results in a visit to victory lane. Peck, from Monrovia, Indiana, continued that trend by winning the opening night of the Sonoran Clash Saturday night at Central Arizona Raceway.
The victory was Peck’s fourth win in as many starts with ASCS dating back to last February in Volusia Speedway Park. Peck was quick to credit his Rudeen Racing team and crew chief Brandon Hickman for work put in over the off season.
“It just goes to show how stout our 26 program is,” said peck. “Brandon and I just took the wintertime and tried to get everything down to the tee. Going over the finer details and stuff, really trying to understand our race car and kind of where our setups are at and try to make educated decisions throughout the night.”
Peck was able to take the lead from Matt Covington going into turn three while in heavy lapped traffic on lap 12 going into turn three and held on during a restart with five laps to go for the feature victory.
“I knew with the track being kind of narrow early, we were going to catch traffic, and it was just going to be kind of a free for all who could, make runs without breaking any momentum and I felt like we did a pretty good job of that,” said Peck of the conditions after the track was reworked. “There was one time going on the back stretch, I didn’t set my gaps right. There was lap car on the bottom and lap car on the top and the car on the top got a bad run off of four, but then was able to make it all back up off of two, and I was just kind of caught in the middle there. Luckily, I kind of saw it early enough where I could kind of set the gap a little bit so I could make that run and kind of split them there going into three. I’m happy, I’m happy with getting a W tonight, but, you know, tomorrow pays a little bit more. Money. So hopefully, hopefully we get that one done.”
After the race Covington felt being in clear air for a majority of the night could have been a disadvantage in setting up his car for the feature when he had to overtake slower cars.
“I think the bottom line is we were out front all night. The dash and the heat race for the most part, and our car really wasn’t that great and dirty air,” said Covington. “I’d get pretty balled up on the right side and struggled a little bit with that. Maybe tomorrow, and we have really good speed, we just try to maybe be a little bit more maneuverable in traffic.”
Defending ASCS National Tour champion Sam Hafertepe Jr. charged from seventh starting spot to land the final podium position after being under the weather for a majority of the day leading into the race.
“I’m definitely not disappointed,” said Hafertepe after the feature. “There’s definitely things we could be better on, and we’ll just keep on trying to make a few things better here and there. We’re not far off. Obviously, we’re in the hunt. I feel like if you put us out front, we probably win this race, but that’s how it goes.”
Hank Davis and Peck’s teammate Levi Hillier rounded out the top five.
ASCS National Tour
Sonoran Clash
Central Arizona Raceway
Casa Grande, Arizona
Saturday, February 21, 2026
Qualifying Flight A (2 Laps)
1. 26R-Levi Hillier, 13.924[8]
2. 15H-Sam Hafertepe Jr, 13.941[3]
3. 17GP-Hank Davis, 13.974[6]
4. 11J-Wyatt Miller, 14.040[9]
5. 88N-DJ Netto, 14.078[5]
6. 16G-Austyn Gossel, 14.251[2]
7. 88-Terry Easum, 14.256[7]
8. 88R-Ryder Laplante, 14.267[1]
9. 88C-Brogan Carder, 14.527[4]
Qualifying Flight B (2 Laps)
1. 45X-Kyler Johnson, 13.978[2]
2. 22-Garen Linder, 14.202[1]
3. 34-Sterling Cling, 14.225[8]
4. 23-Seth Bergman, 14.236[9]
5. 77X-Alex Hill, 14.321[4]
6. 7-Brock Zearfoss, 14.334[5]
7. 2-Whit Gastineau, 14.399[6]
8. 23N-Skylar Gee, 14.408[3]
9. 42-Caleb Saiz, 14.525[7]
Qualifying Flight C (2 Laps)
1. 95-Matt Covington, 14.247[8]
2. 4-Tuesday Scearce, 14.400[7]
3. 7C-Colby Copeland, 14.487[6]
4. 01-Carson McCarl, 14.604[1]
5. 31-Kyle Beilman, 14.648[5]
6. 17W-Elijah Gile, 14.694[4]
7. 2J-Zach Blurton, 14.701[2]
8. 29K-Levi Kuntz, 15.034[3]
Qualifying Flight D (2 Laps)
1. 26-Justin Peck, 14.206[2]
2. 15-Nick Parker, 14.468[5]
3. 31BW-Braxton Weger, 14.607[1]
4. 2B-Garrett Benson, 14.673[3]
5. 3-Cole Schroeder, 14.751[7]
6. 8-Jake Helsel, 14.760[8]
7. 12J-John Clark, 14.771[6]
DNS: 34S-Joshua Shipley,
Heat Race #1 (8 Laps)
1. 15H-Sam Hafertepe Jr[1]
2. 17GP-Hank Davis[2]
3. 11J-Wyatt Miller[3]
4. 26R-Levi Hillier[4]
5. 88N-DJ Netto[5]
6. 16G-Austyn Gossel[6]
7. 88-Terry Easum[7]
8. 88C-Brogan Carder[9]
9. 88R-Ryder Laplante[8]
Heat Race #2 (8 Laps)
1. 22-Garen Linder[1]
2. 23-Seth Bergman[3]
3. 45X-Kyler Johnson[4]
4. 34-Sterling Cling[2]
5. 7-Brock Zearfoss[6]
6. 2-Whit Gastineau[7]
7. 23N-Skylar Gee[8]
8. 77X-Alex Hill[5]
9. 42-Caleb Saiz[9]
Heat Race #3 (8 Laps)
1. 7C-Colby Copeland[2]
2. 01-Carson McCarl[3]
3. 95-Matt Covington[4]
4. 4-Tuesday Scearce[1]
5. 17W-Elijah Gile[6]
6. 2J-Zach Blurton[7]
7. 29K-Levi Kuntz[8]
8. 31-Kyle Beilman[5]
Heat Race #4 (8 Laps)
1. 26-Justin Peck[4]
2. 15-Nick Parker[1]
3. 2B-Garrett Benson[3]
4. 31BW-Braxton Weger[2]
5. 8-Jake Helsel[6]
6. 12J-John Clark[7]
7. 3-Cole Schroeder[5]
DNS: 34S-Joshua Shipley
Dash (5 Laps)
1. 95-Matt Covington[1]
2. 7C-Colby Copeland[2]
3. 26-Justin Peck[5]
4. 45X-Kyler Johnson[3]
5. 26R-Levi Hillier[7]
6. 22-Garen Linder[4]
7. 15H-Sam Hafertepe Jr[6]
Last Chance Showdown (12 Laps)
1. 2-Whit Gastineau[6]
2. 88N-DJ Netto[1]
3. 7-Brock Zearfoss[3]
4. 16G-Austyn Gossel[2]
5. 17W-Elijah Gile[4]
6. 12J-John Clark[8]
7. 23N-Skylar Gee[10]
8. 88-Terry Easum[9]
9. 2J-Zach Blurton[7]
10. 29K-Levi Kuntz[12]
11. 88R-Ryder Laplante[16]
12. 8-Jake Helsel[5]
13. 31-Kyle Beilman[15]
14. 3-Cole Schroeder[11]
15. 77X-Alex Hill[13]
16. 42-Caleb Saiz[17]
17. 88C-Brogan Carder[14]
DNS: 34S-Joshua Shipley
Feature (25 Laps)
1. 26-Justin Peck[3]
2. 95-Matt Covington[1]
3. 15H-Sam Hafertepe Jr[7]
4. 17GP-Hank Davis[8]
5. 26R-Levi Hillier[5]
6. 23-Seth Bergman[9]
7. 45X-Kyler Johnson[4]
8. 34-Sterling Cling[14]
9. 88N-DJ Netto[18]
10. 11J-Wyatt Miller[12]
11. 2-Whit Gastineau[17]
12. 22-Garen Linder[6]
13. 01-Carson McCarl[11]
14. 7-Brock Zearfoss[19]
15. 15-Nick Parker[10]
16. 17W-Elijah Gile[21]
17. 31BW-Braxton Weger[16]
18. 88R-Ryder Laplante[23]
19. 88-Terry Easum[24]
20. 88C-Brogan Carder[25]
21. 16G-Austyn Gossel[20]
22. 2J-Zach Blurton[26]
23. 12J-John Clark[22]
24. 4-Tuesday Scearce[15]
25. 2B-Garrett Benson[13]
26. 7C-Colby Copeland[2]