Former CRA Champ Snaps Three-Year Winless Streak at Anderson
Special from Speed51.com – Cody Coughlin broke a three-plus year winless streak Saturday night by winning the ARCA/CRA Super Series event at Anderson Speedway. The former series champion got by Scotty Tomasik on lap 77, holding on the rest of the way after fending off challenges from multiple drivers.
Coughlin just missed the invert after qualifying eighth, but his speed showed during the long runs. After Friday night’s open practice, the team decided to let the car sit during practice on Saturday to not risk losing what they had found in the car. It all paid off in the end with his first win since the 2016 World Stock Car Festival at Winchester Speedway, and his third win at Anderson between the Super Series and JEGS/CRA All-Stars Tour.
“Man I need to catch my breath, I haven’t won one in a while,” Coughlin said in victory lane. “They did a great job on this car. We didn’t practice just because we were good enough, there was no sense in working on it. This is great.”
After the runner-up position was traded multiple times in the final laps, it was Mason Keller emerging with a second-place result in his ARCA/CRA Super Series debut. He was the race’s hard charger, working his way from the 11th starting spot to secure his second top-five in as many weeks at the quarter-mile bullring.
“Man, that was a hot one. When you’ve got a head like me you’d do anything to be pretty and I tried to get a new pair of shoes and it didn’t work, my feet were on fire. It was a wild race,” Keller said. “We battled hard on restarts, that’s just how it is around here. I’m old school and I don’t have a whole lot of money, so they just stick tires on it and I get to go out and wheel it for a few laps. It worked out for us, the car came back in one piece.”
Former Redbud winner Dalton Armstrong made the best out of a trying race day and finished third in the Richie Wauters No. 5. It was just his eighth race since he finished runner-up in Super Series points in 2017.
“We were just a little off and I had to pull a backup car, we just got this car out and went to qualify. Not really as fast as we usually are, we kind of struggled all day,” Armstrong said. “I just had to hang tough and do what I could.”
Reigning ARCA Midwest Tour champion Casey Johnson and Kyle Crump rounded out the top five.
Click here to watch a replay of Saturday night’s ARCA/CRA Super Series event at Anderson Speedway.
-Story by: Koty Geyer, Speed51 National Correspondent – Twitter: @kgeyer3
-Photo credit: Speed51
ARCA/CRA Super Series Mitch Smith Auto Service 125 Results
1. Cody Coughlin
2. Mason Keller
3. Dalton Armstrong
4. Casey Johnson
5. Kyle Crump
6. Greg Van Alst
7. Josh Brock
8. Dan Leeck
9. Jeff Marcum
10. Ryan Issacs
11. Cassten Everidge
12. Jaren Crabtree
13. Michael Simko
14. Scotty Tomasik
15. Logan Runyon
16. Travis Braden
17. Hunter Jack
18. Austin Kunert
