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WINCHESTER, IN :: The entire complexion of the Winchester 400 on Sunday changed when the battle for the win turned into a crash between Stephen Nasse, Raphael Lessard and Dalton Sargeant.

The incident began with seven laps to go when second-place Nasse made contact with Lessard in Turns 3 and 4 to take the top spot. Lessard returned the favor in Turns 1 and 2. But when the trio got to Turns 3 and 4 Sargeant went to the bottom and took the lead — making contact with Nasse who shot up into the wall and into Lessard’s path.

Both cars were trashed.

“Yeah, I’m okay,” Lessard said after the wreck. “I just didn’t have time to pull my hands off the wheel when I hit the wall. So it jammed my wrist up a little bit. I’ll be fine. Someone got into me in Turn 1 (Nasse) and I got back into him just to let him know I can do the same thing right back. But then someone got into the 55 (Sargeant) and it put us into the wall. That ended our day.”

Nasse, who finished seventh, was less politically correct about the matter.

“Dalton Sargeant is a dumbass,” Nasse said. “The guys ran good for the whole race and everybody did what they were supposed to do,” Nasse said. “We came in on strategy, had them covered. We got by the 99 (Lessard) at the end and were going to win the race. Sargeant wasn’t going to catch us.

“He wanted to get back at me for last week (Nashville). Okay, that’s fine. I’ll do it to him every single week.”

The field was frozen at Lap 395 and CRA officials penalized Sargeant two spots. The race restarted with five laps to go and just four cars remaining on the lead lap – Eddie Van Meter, Dalton Armstrong, Sargeant and Braden.

Braden went to the inside of VanMeter in turns one and two on the white flag lap and the two made contact. Braden took the lead for the first time of the day and earned his first Winchester rifle. Sargeant was unable to recover from the penalty and finished third.

“They (Nasse and Lessard) got into it on the backstretch and I went real low and going into turn three I was all the way on the bottom on the apron and there was nowhere for me to go when the 51 (Nasse) came down. It is what it is. It was a good result for us today,” Sargeant said.

“We got penalized for some reason and I’m not really sure why. I don’t feel like the wreck was my fault at all. I really think it was a bullshit call by CRA. That ruined our chance to win. Really disappointed with the call but at the end of the day it is what it is.”

When asked about Nasse’s comments regarding payback for Nashville, Sargeant was succint.

“No, I feel like we’re all even.”

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