Takeaways from the CARS Tour opener at Southern National

Whatever chance Carson Kvapil has of a three-peat championship run in the CARS Tour Late Model Stock division has to include maximum points in these first two races at Southern National and New River, and he did just that on Sunday in the season opener.

Kvapil will miss the third race of the season at Hickory Motor Speedway so he can make his NASCAR Xfinity Series debut with JR Motorsports at Martinsville Speedway. He won the championship in 2022 after missing a race so its possible but its going to take multiple races like Sunday.

“I’m optimistic but I also get the realism of it,” Kvapil said. “In 2022, there were a lot of good cars but from then to now the competition level has taken a big leap. It’s tougher than ever but this is a really good start.”

He took the lead from a dominant Brent Crews on Lap 91 of 125 and drove away over the two subsequent restarts to win the KevinSaysYes.com 125.

He finished ahead of Connor Hall and Deac McCaskill and it was a race that could have been over for Kvapil and McCaskill three laps in.

https://twitter.com/FloRacing/status/1766935066763043154

Decisive Restart

Brent Crews led 85 of the first 91 laps, getting out to big leads and then matching the pace behind him to conserve tires like everyone else, but it was restarts that ultimately bit the newly crowned Super Late Model World Series of Asphalt champion.

His first restart on Lap 91 was called back by series founder Jack McNelly, who works the corner in Turn 4, and then Kvapil just beat him into Turn 1 on the next one. That second restart was actually really slow and the stack up actually led to a caution in the middle of the pack.

Ultimately, Crews said he got beat by experience.

“We fired off at the first line on the first two restarts and then I fired off in the same place, called it off and said we needed to fire off at the second line,” Crews said. “Honestly, Carson just got a really good jump and I spun (the tires) trying to catch him and missed a shift and that put me back to third.”

He ultimately finished sixth but came away with lessons learned and gratitude for his Kevin Harvick Inc. team.

“I’m super thrilled to be here,” Crews said. “It was a fun day and I felt like I learned a lot. I should have picked some lanes differently and saved a little bit more, but that’s why we’re here. This series is unbelievably competitive and it’s a blast, so I’m looking forward to the next one.”

Kvapil felt Crews fired early on the restart that was called back.

“I was laying back a little bit but I wasn’t even close to firing when he went,” Kvapil said.

Bad Br(e)ak(e)

It happens frequently in Chad McCumbee’s best CARS Tour races, that he once again suffered a brake failure after leading five laps from the pole and looked to be a contender for a podium.

McCumbee lost his brake pedal on the Lap 91 restart and had his left front catch fire.

He actually contributed to the next caution by limping around the track, which he needed to do since he couldn’t stop upon getting to pit road but stacked up Kade Brown and Layne Riggs.

The end results was a disappointing 26th place finish for a would be championship threat.

Acceptable Runner Up

Connor Hall, the reigning NASCAR Weekly Series national champion, finished second and was largely satisfied with it.

“I needed to turn better,” Hall said of chasing down Kvapil over a six lap final stint.

“I gave him the bumper a little bit and moved him up the hill but I just didn’t have the turn to finish the pass and he just carried the momentum and drove away from me.”

It’s the second year in a row that Kvapil and Hall finished 1-2 in the season opener at Southern National.

“We’re all here to win and there’s only one winner, but I couldn’t ask for more in our first outing together,” Hall said. “We’ve been here for five days and made a lot of progress, so I’m looking forward to the next one.”

Mixed results for Lapcevich

On one hand, reigning NASCAR Pinty’s Series champion Treyten Lapcevich scored a top-10 in his CARS Tour debut with Chad Bryant Racing but he also drew the ire of veteran Andrew Grady due to a crash between them in the middle stages of the race.

“Kid broke off the wall,” Grady said. “It was a very tight hole but I was clear. The video I saw, he was two wheels on the apron and cleaned me out.”

It was especially frustrating for Grady because he rebounded from a grenaded motor on Friday and stll had a chance to get a top-5 to top-8 run but felt denied by Lapcevich.

“It’s depressing man,” he added. “There’s no respect or etiquette. There’s no setting you and passing you. It’s catching you and punting you. I don’t know if I was raised different or am just a calmer driver but someone needs to sit these kids down and talk to them.

“These things are not cheap. A lot of hours go into these cars and now I’m sitting here with one torn up.”

To be fair to Lapcevich in this case, the son of Jeff Lapcevich respects a race car and what goes into it, and knows his way around the engineering side too just as older brother Cayden does too.

For his part, Lapcevich said it was a byproduct of racing.

“It looked like he was committed to the top,” he said. “I was on the bottom and he made a late dive to the bottom. Not much you can do there.”

He expressed pride in being able to work with Chad Bryant and for what comes next.

Queen slips and crashes

Brenden Queen, who was the series runner-up last year, starts his second full-time season on the tour with a 16th place finish. He had no grip from the start and was involved in a crash with five laps to go when he spun of Layne Riggs nose.

Praise for new tires

Everyone really seemed to like the new Hoosier ST2s that were on both sides for the CARS Tour race on Sunday and all season.

Carson Kvapil: “I liked them, honestly.They’re not much different from the F45s, they lasted a little longer and I thought we could race hard at the end.”

Connor Hall: “I think its pretty similar to the old stuff and I hate to admit that because I was a naysayer at first. For whatever reason, they do have like a straightaway spin, they don’t have as much lateral grip, I think. Honestly, it’s pretty close to hat’s off to Hoosier and CARS Tour.”