Photo Credit: Ashley McCubbin
Each day of the week, the column will highlight a division, highlighting five drivers and mentioning things that you should know going into the next week of racing.
On Monday, Five Things You Need To Know – APC United Late Models of Ontario Tour Presented by Grisdales Race Products was released for reading, highlighting the performances by Dwayne Baker, Jamie Cox, Matt Box, Billy Schwartzenburg and Andrew Gresel. Though as noted in that article, the 100 lap inaugural event for the tour was full of excitement from top to bottom, with many highs and lows for drivers. For that reason, this is now part two of the precious list.
Cayden Lapcevich impressed in the 100 lapper, driving Terry Baker’s late model. Lapcevich started in the 16th spot and carefully carved his way through the field, making his way up to the sixth spot by the 25th lap. He continued his solid run, running as high as third in the event. Unfortunately, Dwayne Baker would make contact with the rear of Lapcevich, causing the young stud to scoot up the hill. Thankfully, he’d get the car stopped before hitting the turn two wall. Restarting in the back of the field, he looked to be set to make his way back through, but got caught up in a wreck on the backstretch, resulting in heavy damage to his ride. As a result, he would fail to finish the feature.
Still, without finishing the feature, he impressed many of the fans in attendance with how well he can drive, and the poise that he shows behind the wheel at a young age. Oh, and after the issues during the late model feature, he went out in his Super Stock and drove through the field, passing Randy Rusnell in the closing laps to score the victory. If you combine that with a 17th place finish in his NASCAR Canadian Tire Series debut at Canadian Tire Motorsports Park, there’s a lot of talent here. He’ll be one to keep an eye on for a long time.
Mike Bentley was also poised to have a strong run, after winning the track’s division championship in 2013. Debuting a brand new car for the event, Bentley started the feature from the sixth spot, getting as high as fourth in the running order, before falling back into the back half of the top-10. He would then make contact with Dan McHattie, restarting at the rear of field, and then got caught up in the same wreck that took Lapcevich out of contention.
As one of the early championship favourites for the full time, it’ll be interesting to see how Bentley rebounds next weekend at Flamboro Speedway and whether he can quickly start earning back the valuable lost points. If he isn’t able to place well at Flamboro, he may watch his championship goal slip away into the sunset.
Brandon Watson focused solely on racing in the United States last season, but made the decision to return to Ontario to be part of the new series. As a past Dickies OSCAAR Outlaws presented by London Recreational Racing Champion and past pro late model race winner, Watson was pinned as a early championship favourite.
He started off the afternoon on a strong note, posting the quickest time in time trials; he would then pull a three in the top-eight redraw to start from the eighth spot. He ran up front throughout the feature, but ultimately fell out of the race due to the car not running right mechanically.
This is something that plagued Watson last year as part of a partial Limited Late Model effort with Smooth Racing. He’ll certainly be looking to get those issues corrected before next weekend.
While the aforementioned three drivers ran into issues, Shawn Chenoweth and Jason Parker left the speedway on a happy note. Chenoweth ran up front throughout the feature, leading on a couple different occasions, before finishing fourth. Meanwhile, Parker made his way up through the field, carefully and slowly as he conserved his tires, to post a solid fifth place finish.
The performances aren’t a surprise by either driver, in reality. Chenoweth is known as one of the best pro late model drivers in the province, having picked up numerous wins across the different speedways. He also has spent a lot of time at Sunset Speedway in other vehicles, posting a top-five in a super stock while posting a top-five in an OSCAAR Outlaw super late event. Meanwhile, Parker found his true nitch around Sunset Speedway last year, winning two of the Limited Late Model invitationals over the course of the season. He won the summer event after a thrilling duel with Watson, before dominating the Velocity 250 in the fall.
Given their strong starts to the season, they both will look to carry their momentum forward to Flamboro Speedway. Chenoweth has a lot of experience there via weekly competition, while Parker hasn’t ran many, if any, races on the Hamilton, Ontario based oval.
