Exclusive: Jeff Lapcevich pleased with Barrie performance, looking forward to Kawartha

Barrie Speedway has become known as the action track on the NASCAR Canadian Tire Series tour and it certainly delivered last Saturday night. One of the drivers who found himself in the middle of the action was Jeff Lapcevich. Despite getting into the wall when Steven Mathews blew up at lap 92 and going for a spin on lap 120, the veteran would battle hard all night en route to finishing fifth.

“It was a busy race,” Lapcevich said. “There was a lot of action going on. Right off the get go, someone up front didn’t go and it sort of became a train in there. Then it sort of straightened out and it looked like pretty clean race. Somebody blew up and I got in their oil and hit the wall pretty hard. I really thought our night was done then because it hit the right front really hard – it bent it up. Got going under caution and the wheels were still straight, which surprised me, so we kept going.

“All in all, a good night. We got turned around early and burnt our tires and had to take right sides early and think that hurt us. There’s 200 laps on the right side by the end of the race, but all in all, got down a lap and got it back. The guys on pit road made good adjustments.

“Looking at the car, I’m happy to have a top-five because it doesn’t look like it’d finish that high.”

The fifth place finish for Lapcevich sixth top-six finish in his sixth start of the 2014 season as he has ran a part-time schedule this year, focusing on son Cayden Lapcevich’s Super Stock effort at Sunset Speedway. Currently at Sunset Speedway, Cayden leads the Sunset Speedway Super Stock Championship Points Standings by one point over Randy Rusnell with four feature victories on the season.

With this weekend marking the final event of the season at Sunset Speedway and the final NASCAR Canadian Tire Series race in two weeks at Kawartha Speedway, Lapcevich noted post-race that the next couple of weeks will be busy as the team works on Cayden’s car while getting the NCAT car ready for Kawartha. Though all efforts are being put on being ready after posting a third place finish in last year’s event.

“Looking forward to getting back to Kawartha,” he commented. “We ran well there last year – think we were third. Still looking for a win and I’m running out of time so we’re going to work hard at it and get this thing better. We’re not that far off, but need to be a little bit better. We’ll go back, hit our notes and see how it goes.”

Lapcevich has noted on a couple occasions this year that time is running out for him as Cayden will be turning 15 next year and be eligible to run in the Canadian Tire Series. With that said, Cayden may be in as part of the Fast Line Motorsports’ plan for 2015.

“I may dabble at it here and there, but definitely Cayden is going to make a few starts next year as he’s doing a really great job at Sunset,” Jeff said two weeks ago at CTMP.