For Andrew Ranger, it was weekend of dominance.
The NASCAR Pinty’s Series winningest driver scored his 25th
career pole Saturday before dominating the rain-delayed APC 200 at Jukasa Motor
Speedway. The 32-year-old driver from Roxton Pond, Quebec led a race-high 82
laps, extending his series-leading win total to 25.
Ranger took his No.27 MOPAR/ Pennzoil Dodge to the lead on
Lap 122, passing Pete Shepherd III. After surviving two late restarts, Ranger
held off a hard charging Kevin Lacroix in NASCAR Overtime to claim his first
win since Toronto in 2018.
“You know, we were a top 10 driver that could win here so I
was definitely nervous,” Ranger said. “But again, we decided to do the restart
on the inside and it worked pretty good for us and we exit here with a nice
win.”
Last year’s race winner Kevin Lacroix used the late restart
to his advantage to claim the runner-up spot. The finishing order was reversed
from the season-opening race at Canadian Tire Motorsport Park, where Lacroix
held off Ranger.
“The car is always good on long runs and we were hoping for
the same today and that’s what happened,” Lacroix said. “We were able to have a
good race and put the Bumper to Bumper car in second place and that’s good.”
Shepherd ran a solid race leading 25 laps and scoring his
second podium finish since his return to the series last year.
LP Dumoulin and Alex Tagliani rounded out the top five.
Marc-Antoine Camirand and Mark Dilley both pulled off last
race charges to the front, coming home sixth and seventh, respectively.
After leading 68 laps, and despite blowing a tire late in
the race, D.J. Kennington was able to fight back and finish eighth. Jason White
and Donald Theetge completed the top-10.
Lap 72 will go down in NASCAR Pinty’s Series history as the
race leader upon completion was Julia Landauer. She becomes the first women to
ever lead a lap in the NASCAR Pinty’s Series. She ran up front throughout the
race before a late-race incident left her 15th.
With his win, Ranger takes over the lead in the standings,
leading Lacroix by one point.. ] LP Dumoulin is in third, 10 points back, and
Alex Tagliani and D.J Kennington are tied for fourth, 18 points out of the
lead.
The NASCAR Pinty’s Series will take a few weeks off before
returning to action Saturday, June 29 for the Budweiser 300 at Autodrome
Chaudiere in Vallee-Jonction, Quebec.
The complete results can be found below.
- Andrew Ranger
- Kevin Lacroix
- Peter Shepherd III
- L.P. Dumoulin
- Alex Tagliani
- Marc-Antoine Camirand
- Mark Dilley
- D.J. Kennington
- Jason White
- Donald Theetge
- Brett Taylor
- Shantel Kalika *
- Alex Labbe
- Jason Hathaway
- Julia Landauer
- Anthony Simone
- Brandon White
- T.J. Rinomato *
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