Chris Windom held off Buddy Kofoid in a four-lap shootout at the finish, with Daison Pursley placing third in a Toyota one-two-three on the opening night of the USAC NOS Energy Drink National Midget Championship’s Midwest Midget Championship at Jefferson County Speedway, Friday night.
The win is the third of the season for the current USAC point leader and the sixth win for his Tucker Boat Motorsports team in the last seven races. Toyota-powered drivers have now captured seven consecutive USAC victories and 22 overall national midget feature events this year.
Starting from the pole, Ethan Mitchell led the first four laps with Cannon McIntosh having moved up to second, Tanner Thorson third and Windom in fourth when a yellow flag came out on lap five.
On the restart, McIntosh would use a slider on Mitchell to take the lead, with Thorson and Windom moving up to second and third, with Mitchell in fourth and Kofoid having climbed up to fifth. Windom would claim second from Thorson on lap nine with Kofoid moving into third on lap 10.
After another caution flag waved on lap 12, the field would once again be shaken up on a restart, this time with Windom throwing a slider at McIntosh to take the top spot.
As they passed the midway point, Windom continued to lead with Thorson in second, followed by Kofoid and McIntosh, but Kofoid would overtake Thorson for second on lap 20 with 10 laps remaining.
As the laps began to wind down, Kofoid began closing in on Windom and was on his tail on lap 27, only to see the final caution flag of the night wave, setting up a four-lap shootout between the two leaders with the 15-year-old Pursley joining the fight in third.
At that point, fans would be on their feet as the top three began a wild shootout to the finish. Finally, as they came to the white flag, Windom and Kofoid appeared to make wheel-to-wheel contact as Windom went low. The two ran side-by-side heading into one. Kofoid would run the top side through one, then dive down coming out of turn two as Windom slid high. The two then went wheel-to-wheel into the backstretch, but Windom was able to shut the door on his pursuer. Kofoid went high through three and four to make one final run for the win, but came up just shy as Windom took the checkered flag, with Kofoid finishing just a car length ahead of Pursley for second.
Two more Toyota drivers would round out the top five as Tyler Thomas placed fourth and McIntosh took fifth. Andrew Layser would finish seventh and Emerson Axsom placed eighth.
The USAC National Midget Championship will return to Jefferson County Speedway on Saturday night.
TRD PR
