Chuck Hossfeld held off hard-charging Mike Leaty to win the fourth annual Ol’ Boy Cup 60 for the Race of Champions Asphalt Modified on Thursday night at Lancaster National Speedway.
Leaty made two separate attempts to get around Hossfeld, but just couldn’t find a way to get under or around him. On the last lap, Leaty used lapped traffic as a pick to get to the outside of Leaty, but couldn’t find the grip needed to complete the pass on the frontstretch.
In the end, Hossfeld won in a .019-second photo finish.
“I’ll tell you what, racing Mike Leaty is great because he’s one the gentleman in our series and he’s like his dad,” Hossfeld said.
“We should have won four of these, I’ve got to toot my horn a little, but we broke once, and something happened last year. I just want to thank everyone on my team and that’s the reason I say this.”
A pole redraw gave Daryl Lewis Jr. the pole and he held it until Hossfeld took the lead on Lap 21. Hossfeld wasn’t sure he had a race-winning drive until that moment.
“I didn’t like how our car was handling so to get out of front and figure out how our car needed to be, and hold Mike off, that’s we needed,” Hossfeld said. “I think I let off right before the line and I would have been so mad at myself if that’s what had cost me.”
Despite his initial race pace, Hossfeld showed plenty of speed right off the trailer as he topped Race of Champions Modified qualifying with a fast lap of 16.932 seconds. He went on to win his heat race and then drew second for his starting position in the 60-lap main event.
But Lewis drew one better, allowing him to dictate the early pace of the race.
Leaty was just as fast Hossfeld to start the night, but his luck wasn’t as good. Leaty was second fastest in qualifying and he also won his heat race. His luck ran out during the redraw and had to start 11th for the feature. The short distance of the race forced him to move to the front quickly. It took Leaty 14 laps to work his way up to fifth place.
From there his luck started to change as the caution flag waved for the first time on lap 20 when Tommy Catalano stopped on the track with a mechanical issue. This bunched the field back up and gave Leaty a chance to challenge the leaders.
The restart also benefitted Hossfeld as he took the lead from Lewis when the race resumed.
Two more cautions just past the halfway portion of the race allowed Leaty to move his way through the top five. Leaty took over second from Lewis with 25 laps to go. He ran into the grass under Hossfeld, nearly spinning out with eight laps to go and nearly spun on the high side on the final lap.
But time just ran out.
“If it were anyone else in front of me, I would have had a much easier time getting around them,” Leaty said. “But Chuckie knows this place like the back of his hand. I messed up real bad with eight to go, nearly spun out, but that wasn’t the killer. I tried to go to the outside two laps later and just couldn’t get it rotate.”
For Hossfeld, it was his second straight win at Lancaster after winning the Joe Reilly Sportsman Summer Slam on June 16. It was his tenth career Race of Champions Modified Series win at Lancaster, and his first RoC Series win since July 2016.
Lewis finished third for his second-straight top three finish at Lancaster. Patrick Emerling and Daren Scherer rounded out the top five.
The complete results can be found below.
- Chuck Hossfeld
- Mike Leaty
- Daryl Lewis, Jr.
- Patrick Emerling
- Daren Scherer
- Andy Jankowiak
- George Skora
- Karl Hehr
- Amy Catalano
- Eric Beers
- Scott Wylie
- Zack Knowlden
- Timmy Catalano
- Kreig Heroth
- Tyler Rypkema
- Alan Bookmiller
- Jack Ely
- Danny Knoll Jr
- Kevin Miller
- Tommy Catalano
- John Barber
- Camden Barber
- Chris Ridsdale
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