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CARS Late Model Stock Tour

Brenden Queen breaks through with Tri-County CARS Tour win

That's five wins in 25 career starts

The Bean finally broke through.

Brenden Queen earned his first CARS Tour victory of 2024 in winning the Sound Gear 125 on Saturday night at Tri County Motor Speedway but a mechanical gremlin and Chase Burrow nearly conspired to take it away from him.

On two restarts over the final 25 laps, Queen could not drive away from Burrow and in real time it made no sense because the Lee Pulliam Performance No. 03 had surged away from the field on every restart prior.

In hindsight, in Victory Lane, it started to make more sense.

“Something broke on the brakes; I lose the brake pedal halfway through and realized on that next to lap caution because on the restart, the pedel went straight to the floor,” Queen said. “About 20 laps before that, I heard a bunch of metal clanking and I think a safety wire broke on the bolt and a caliper came off.

“On them restarts, I had no brake pedal and I had to get gone so I could back the corner up. Chase was good enough where, me not having to use my pedal, he made me really work for it.

“It goes to show you how good this car was with no pedal on it.”

https://twitter.com/FloRacing/status/1794557385605881912

Standings Flipped

Another race produced another drastic shift in the CARS Tour championship standings.

Connor Hall was unable to keep off Carson Kvapil with 24 laps to go and was sent to the rear for contact. They finished 19th and 22nd respectively.

Bobby McCarty ‘never raced so hard just to finish 20th.’ Treyten Lapcevich battled similar issues as McCarty with consistency from the new Hoosier ST tires. Mini Tyrrell grinded his way to a 10th place while Queen won. That’s a big time points shake up in a first half full of them so far.

“I hated to see them fall to the back after that incident,” Tyrrell said of Hall and Kvapil, “but okay, we probably gained some points on Kvapil but Brenden has probably passed us.

“I’m excited that we’re still in the mix going to Langley and Dominion, tracks that I feel really confident in.”

McCarty summed the championship dynamic up after the race:

“This is going to be the worst average finish of a champion in the history of the series.”

It typically takes around a 4.0 average but that seems out of reach for everyone right now.

Kvapil missed a race to make his Xfinity Series debut and now this additional mulligan. Queen already has three finishes outside the top-10 but also two seconds, a fourth and a win.

“I’m excited to see where we stack up,” Queen said. “We had to have moved up some spots. We were that close to second with the bonus points. Hopefully we’ve got Connor sweating now that we’re back to our form from last year but also a good track for both us, our home track in Langley.”

Good news, Butterbean, because you’re actually the points leader now.

  1. Brenden Queen
  2. Connor Hall -5
  3. Brent Crews -11
  4. Mini Tyrrell -12
  5. Bobby McCarty -20
  6. Treyten Lapcevich -22
  7. Ryan Millington -22
  8. Carson Kvapil -23
  9. Chad McCumbee -28
  10. Deac McCaskill -48

Hall apologetic to Kvapil

As soon as the race ended, Hall made his way over to the JR Motorsports pit area to apologize to Kvapil for the contact that cost both of them any sort of chance at an alright result.

“We were both pretty junk tonight,” Hall said. “I don’t want to say junk but we were not our normal selves. I just … I really, really really am trying to, in my old age, try not to be 105 percent when I don’t have a car that can handle it.

“I just thought I could drive it in and maintain position under him, I jammed the brakes turned the wheel and my right front barely touched his left rear wheel. It’s not like a normal bump when that occurs. It sends the other car wrecking. Fortunate that he was able to keep it off everything.”

Hall was sent to the rear for contact.

“I wasn’t trying to move him,” he said. “I didn’t try to touch him. I was trying to turn in with him and drive up off the bottom and it didn’t want to turn.”

Hall and Kvapil had a bit of a rivalry in 2022 when they raced for the championship. It got bitter at times. They have both worked hard to improve their relationship and have since raced hard but clean.

That’s part of what made Hall feel so bad.

“When that happened, I just wanted to park it,” he said. “I don’t want to race like that. I don’t want to beat and bang a little bit. I don’t know. I just needed to tell him I’m sorry and that’s not what I wanted to happen.”

Next week is the CARS Tour race at Langley where Hall is the defending winner and also where he’s run every race he’s entered dating back to last summer in NASCAR Weekly Series competition.

Is it good to be going back to Langley?

“It’s good to be going back home so I can close the door on this one tonight.”

Backstretch stack up

https://x.com/LandonHuffman/status/1794582928095072639

CARS Tour Soundgear 125
Tri County Motor Speedway
May 25 2024

  1. Brenden Queen
  2. Chase Burrow
  3. Deac McCaskill
  4. Andrew Grady
  5. Kade Brown
  6. Bryce Applegate
  7. Brent Crews
  8. Conner Jones
  9. Chad McCumbee
  10. Mini Tyrrell
  11. Dexter Canipe Jr
  12. Buddy Isles Jr
  13. Connor Zilisch
  14. Kaden Honeycutt
  15. Isabella Robusto
  16. Jacob Heafner
  17. Ryan Millington
  18. Treyten Lapcevich
  19. Connor Hall
  20. Bobby McCarty
  21. Katie Hettinger
  22. Carson Kvapil
  23. Tommy Joe Martins
  24. Blayne Harrison
  25. Landon Huffman
  26. Cameron Bolin
  27. Brandon Pierce
  28. Ronnie Bassett Jr.
  29. Landen Lewis
  30. Mitch Walker

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Matt Weaver is the owner and founder of Short Track Scene. Weaver grew up in the sport, having raced himself before becoming a reporter in college at the University of South Alabama. He also has extensive experience covering NASCAR, IndyCar and Dirt Sprint Cars.

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