BLACK EAGLE, Mon. — Sam Hafertepe Jr’s drive towards a seventh championship is energized.
Maintaining the American Sprint Car Series points lead into the penultimate race of Frontier Speedweek at Electric City Speedway for the 30th Montana Roundup, Hafertepe secured his first National Tour win at the track while padding his points lead.
The Sunnyvale, Texas racer began the night with a win in Heat racing, then wheeled to a dash win to start the 30-lap feature from the pole.
Hafertepe jumped to the lead from the bottom lane of Turns 1-2 while front-row starter Terry Easum slipped up to the track, allowing space for the No. 15h to take charge.
Matt Covington capitalized on Easum’s early struggles on the cushion, taking over the runner-up spot on Lap 2, while Hafertepe stretched his lead over his championship adversary.
Hafertepe maxed out his lead to a 2.6-second gap until lapped traffic invaded his crosshairs around the bottom lane. While Covington used the low lane, Kyler Johnson added a fight for second place with his No. 45x ripping around the cushion.
On Lap 18, Johnson took the position and held it until the caution waved with 10 laps remaining. The ensuing restart saw Hafertepe have a perfect restart while Johnson had a delayed start. Covington took advantage and ran a slide-job move across Johnson to retake second place while Hafertepe found his new groove around the three-tenths-mile track’s cushion.
Hafertepe re-extended his lead to 2.6 seconds over Covington over the remaining eight laps, picking up a second consecutive win and the 93rd of his career with the ASCS National Tour.
“Before the last yellow, we were running around the bottom,” Hafertepe said. “We got to lap traffic, and a lot of those guys were making some runs on the outside. I got to them, and I was like, ‘Man, it’s probably time to go. We got to get up top.’
“We were probably better on the bottom of Turns 3 and 4, but in Turns 1 and 2, you definitely had to be up top in the cushion. Honestly, we were a little bit too tight to be doing that out in clean air out front. I could do my own thing and navigate the car, and man, I have to appreciate all the people that are part of this deal.”
Though Covington finished runner-up to Hafertepe at the finish, he lost ground as the Texan leads over the Glenpool, Okla., native by 22 points.
Garrett Benson finished third for his third podium appearance of 2026. Johnson took fourth, and Seth Bergman rallied to fifth.
The finish:
Feature (30 Laps): 1. 15H-Sam Hafertepe Jr[1]; 2. 95-Matt Covington[3]; 3. 2B-Garrett Benson[9]; 4. 45X-Kyler Johnson[7]; 5. 23-Seth Bergman[16]; 6. 88R-Ryder Laplante[4]; 7. 16G-Austyn Gossel[11]; 8. 88-Terry Easum[2]; 9. 37-Trever Kirkland[8]; 10. 3-Cole Schroeder[13]; 11. 23H-Jake Helsel[17]; 12. 17F-Paxton Fleming[5]; 13. 97-Sheldon Bender[12]; 14. 7F-Decklyn Fleming[15]; 15. 88C-Brogan Carder[6]; 16. 6C-Cruz Riggin[18]; 17. 81-Kelly Miller[10]; 18. 8M-Kade Morton[14]; 19. (DNS) 23N-Rich Bailey; 20. (DNS) 24M-Ian Myers
