In a thrilling finish at Elko Speedway, Cunningham Motorsports added two more top-10 finishes to the season with drivers Shane Lee and Dalton Sargeant in the Shore Lunch 250. On the final lap, Lee got caught up in a multi-car incident that pushed him out of the top-five into seventh and propelled Sargeant forward into eighth.
It was an up-and-down night for both teammates as they attempted to tackle Elko Speedway for the first time. Starting from the ninth spot, Lee battled to stay in the top 10 all night. With a caution out on lap 71, Lee would come in to get right-side tires and move up to eighth after the restart. From there Lee stayed with the leaders and with 16 laps to go, he was up to fifth and poised for a strong finish. On the last lap, though, two cars in front of Lee made contact spinning one around and with nowhere to go, Lee fell straight into the pileup and dropped two spots back to finish seventh.
“I hate the way we finished this one,” said Lee. “It looked like we were going to end up in fifth and then we just got caught up in that last-lap incident. I’m glad that Zane (Smith) is okay…he took a really hard hit. We had a fast No. 22 Big Tine Ford Fusion all day that the team put together and while it didn’t end how we hoped it would have, a top-10 finish at a track I’d never been to isn’t bad. We’ll take what we learned and get better for the next one.”
On the other end, after starting sixth, an early strategy kept Sargeant out of pit road until late in the race. With the majority of cars pitting for tires early on, Sargeant would stay out and take the lead under caution from laps 76 to 81, but fall behind shortly after. It wasn’t until lap 193 when Sargeant spun out of turn four that he would come in to get four fresh General Tires. From there, he battled to stay in the top 10 and narrowly avoided the multi-car pileup on the final lap to give him his fifth top-10 finish of the season.
“It was a pretty back and forth race,” said Sargeant. “For it being my first time at Elko, I’m pretty happy with how the car ran. We went with a different pit strategy that we felt could have gotten us the win, but unfortunately the race just didn’t play in our favor. We had a fast car and I’m proud of all the guys at Cunningham for how hard they worked all day. We’ll move on to Pocono, get back on track and hopefully take the No. 77 Big Tine Ford Fusion into victory lane.”
The team will head to Pocono Raceway next, where Lee and Sargeant will take part in an open test Wednesday, June 7. Race activities for the General Tire #AnywhereIsPossible 200 take place on Friday, June 9 with practice from 9:30-10:55 a.m.. General Tire Pole Qualifying is set for 2:00 p.m. with the feature event slated for a 5:45 p.m. start time. The race will air live on FS1. All times are local (ET).
Keep up with Cunningham Motorsports on Facebook and Instagram (@CunninghamRace) and on Twitter (@Cunningham_Race). Head to www.cunninghamrace.com for more news. You can follow Shane and Dalton on social media as well. Follow Shane on Facebook and Twitter (@ShaneLeeRacing) and on Instagram (@Shane_Lee00). Follow Dalton on Facebook (@DaltonSargeantRacing) and Twitter and Instagram (@DaltonSargeant).
Big Tine is manufactured in Rockville, IN and was introduced to the market in 2010. Big Tine is the only feed supplement on the market that utilizes the power of Whitetail InstitutesTM 30-06 mineral and vitamin supplement for year-round support management of a healthy, flourishing herd. For more information on Big Tine, products or where to buy visit us at www.bigtine.com on Facebook @BigTine and on Instagram @BigTineOfficial.
Cunningham Motorsports PR
- Indy 500 Décor, Community Initiatives Celebrate, Extend Iconic Month of May - April 29, 2024
- Rush Truck Centers/Cummins Racing: Chase Briscoe Kansas Advance - April 29, 2024
- Virginia Motor Speedway to host the FASTRAK Touring Series $5000 to win Commonwealth Clash this Saturday, May 4 - April 29, 2024