Gavan Boschele scores ASA New Smyrna win after messy race

A lot of people lost their minds but Gavan Boschele gained a trophy.

The new driver of the Wilson Motorsports No. 24 emerged victorious in the Clyde Hart Memorial 200 on Tuesday at New Smyrna Speedway that was otherwise an extremely messy ASA STARS national Super Late Model season opening affair.

For one, Boschele inherited that top spot when a dominant Ty Majeski crashed off the nose of Colby Howard in Turn 1 with 29 laps to go. Boschele would fend off William Sawalich over the next two restarts to earn his second career Super victory following the Red Eye 50 at the same track in January.

“Just a lot of patience,” said Boschele. “I knew we had a fast car. We kind of screwed ourselves there coming in to pit early. I just kept my head in it, listened to Dennis (Dean) and James and all the boys back in the pits, and they were right.

“I was just trying to keep smart. I knew we had a really fast race car. It was getting physical towards the end, so I just kept my head in it and kept smart. I can’t thank the guys enough. I’m just the lucky guy who gets to drive it.”

It was getting physically to the tune of 17 cautions, a mess by every objective measure, but none more obviously decisive that the one triggered by Majeski and Howard. Majeski was crashed out of the race and Howard was sent to the rear for his involvement, which does not take into account an subjectivity like intent.

Howard was involved so he went to the rear.

In real time, Majeski was as mad as he ever has been before in racing and even derided Howard in a FloRacing broadcast interview.

They talked after the race they both agreed on things that could have made that turn out different.

“Turn One is historically, where you battle for the same real estate when you’re side-by-side,” Majeski said. “We missed the stagger here by over five-eights of an inch and I was just on the defense, trying to hold the lead long enough to maybe the stagger would grow on the long run and have made it better.

“But I tried to give him room, hold my position, and keep my momentum up. He’s wanting more race track and I’m trying to hold him tight but not to get up too high at the same time too. I looked at the replay a couple of times

“It looked like he just tried to enter off of my left rear with his right front and I had to turn to the corner … and he was probably trying to hold me up, what I felt like probably a little bit too much for that early. “You know, we had plenty of time to go right? We had 30 some laps to go and he was so much better than me. He just didn’t need to do that that soon. But it’s a racing deal. He came over and apologized, so we’re all good.”

For his part, Howard was apologetic but ultimately concluded it was just hard racing for a big deal win.

“We’re driving these things to the limit, right,” Howard said. “Coming down to the end of a really big race, going for the same real estate. We made contact that got us both loose but I mean it from the deepest depths of my body, I am sorry to him.”

Howard said this was a Snowball Derby caliber field, which it was comparable in a lot of ways, he wanted to beat Majeski in this environment ‘fair and square.’

“I wouldn’t have been excited if I even booted him out of the way and got the win,” Howard said.

Howard was also frustrated with being sent back to the rear, which again, is standard operating procedure in these races.

“I think there should be a little bit more leniency for end of the race, driving really hard and racing for the win,” Howard said. “It happened at Cordele and it’s the same group. I’m going to respect it but politely disagree with it. They should look at it. This is a huge race. It’s a Snowball Derby field with amazing drivers and there’s going to be contact when you have guys going for the same lane like that.”

William Sawalich finished second but had to overcome a spin on Lap 53.

“We had a left-rear start to go down, so that’s what was wrong,” said Sawalich. “Unfortunate, but we had really good speed on way older tires than everybody else. I’m proud of that. The Rackley WAR guys did a great job all week. I’m proud to work with them and can’t thank them enough.”

Sawalich was tagged by Cory Hall behind him at the time and the Sunday night World Series of Asphalt race winner went onto finish third and was apologetic to Sawalich for not being able to stay off him.

“We tried to give it away multiple times, myself included,” Hall said. “I apologize to (Sawalich) for the contact there that sent him around. It put us in a hole. Then we got tagged and ended up scuffing the tires, and we had to pit to put tires on it. It ended up working out to where we were able to drive up through the field. We just didn’t get to adjust on it.”

There were a number of little mini conflicts during the race too.

At one point, Michael Hinde door slammed both Derek Thorn and Bubba Pollard to express frustration for racing amongst them. Dustin Smith was involved in numerous incidents, including one that sent Paul Shafer Jr. into the wall and out of the race and leaving the latter lamenting how this isn’t how they race back home in Wisconsin.

He also gave Smith a double barreled middle finger.

Lost in everything is that Christopher Bell recovered from his involvement in an early crash to come back and finished sixth as well.

ASA STARS Clyde Hart Memorial 200
New Smyrna Speedway
February 11 2025

1. Gavan Boschele
2. William Sawalich
3. Cory Hall
4. George Phillips
5. Stephen Nasse
6. Christopher Bell
7. Gabe Sommers
8. Derek Griffith
9. Bubba Pollard
10. Spencer Davis
11. Cole Butcher
12. Derek Kraus
13. Austin Nason
14. Derek Thorn
15. Colby Howard
16. Jake Finch
17. Matthew Craig
18. Nicholas Naugle
19. Michael Hinde
20. Chase Pinsonneault
21. Billy VanMeter
22. Dawson Sutton
23. Carson Brown
24. Dustin Smith
25. Ty Majeski
26. Paul Shafer, Jr.
27. Cody Ware
28. Conner Jones
29. Ty Fredrickson
30. Brad May
31. Kyle Steckly
32. Mike Hopkins