SPENCER, Iowa — Aaron Reutzel may have shifted his focus to weekly racing at Knoxville Raceway this season, but that doesn’t mean he forgot how to get the job done with the American Sprint Car Series National Tour.
He proved that Tuesday night at Clay County Fair Speedway by topping the field in the Battle of the Blue Ribbon for his first National Tour win since a prelim victory during the 2023 360 Knoxville Nationals.
“All in all, a great night,” said the 2015 series champion. “After not even being able to hot lap, that was stressful. But luckily, everything was really close and didn’t really have to make too many changes tonight.”
Reutzel’s march to victory began from the inside of row two thanks to a third-place finish in the dash. An excellent start allowed him to move up in front of second-place starter Sam Hafertepe Jr. entering turn one and ride the top line against polesitter Hank Davis on the bottom through the first set of corners.
The No. 87 machine slid up over the cushion exiting turn two, which allowed Davis to drive away to an early lead while Hafertepe was busy fending off his fellow No. 15 Andrew Deal for third.
The inside groove was the preferred line through turns one and two while most drivers opted to ride the wall in turns three and four.
Reutzel was one of the first to buck that trend and try the bottom at both ends, resulting in several challenges for the lead in the first third of the race, but the No. 2c had enough speed on exit on the top side to hold onto the top spot.
The stalled car of Brandon Anderson paused the action for the first time on lap nine.
Reutzel went to the top on the restart and briefly held the lead before once again sliding off the track in turn two, which let Davis keep the lead down the backstretch.
Reutzel wasn’t keen on letting Davis drive away though, as he threw a big slider in turns three and four before Davis crossed him over exiting turn four to maintain the lead.
At that point, Hafertepe decided to make it a three-way battle between the red-and-black cars and split the middle entering turn one to make it three-wide for the lead. Reutzel prevailed on the bottom to take over the lead for the first time, with Davis trailing in second and Hafertepe in third after 10 laps.
Reutzel paced the field as the race stayed green through the middle portion while Hafertepe got around Davis for the second spot. Once Reutzel caught the tail of the field, Hafertepe began making inroads on the leader with his sights set on his 10th series win of the year.
The No. 15H was within striking distance of Reutzel with five to go, but trouble for Hafertepe in getting past the slower car of Scott Winters gave Reutzel the chance to pull away once more.
What looked to be a solid points night for Hafertepe turned sour four laps later, as his left-rear tire went flat to bring out the caution with two laps to go.
With Hafertepe in the work area and out of contention, Davis found himself in second once again with a chance to extend his win streak to three.
It was not meant to be though, as Reutzel went unchallenged in the final two laps to take his 24th National Tour win and first at Clay County.
“It was hard for me to get up to lap cars, so I figured as long as I kept a good pace, [Davis] wasn’t going to get up to me,” Reutzel said. “I was really just trying not to slide out of the rubber or do anything dumb. If a lap car screwed up in front of me and allowed me to get a run, I would pass them. If they didn’t, I just rode behind them. Just what you do in rubber.”
Although Davis came up one spot short of another triumph.
“Most people probably think that the stomp and steer places are our honey holes, but we just showed here tonight that we can play around on these slick places,” Davis said. “I honestly feel like I got caught out there like a sitting duck. After that restart, didn’t know exactly where to be, and they could kind of search and move around and afford to and they just got me.”
Seth Bergman’s quiet night ended in third spot, extending his lead atop the standings to 73 points due to Hafertepe finishing 14th.
“My mindset was just having a solid finish,” Bergman said. “I knew the way the track was, you were going to have to do some dumb stuff if you were going to go win that race and I’m just not in a position to do that. We’re racing for a championship, and with Sam’s misfortune, I knew I was in a position where I just needed a solid finish.”
Deal and Terry McCarl completed the top five.
The finish:
Feature (30 Laps): 1. 87-Aaron Reutzel[3]; 2. 2C-Hank Davis[1]; 3. 23-Seth Bergman[4]; 4. 15D-Andrew Deal[5]; 5. 24-Terry McCarl[12]; 6. 44-Chris Martin[7]; 7. 22-Riley Goodno[8]; 8. 45X-Kyler Johnson[6]; 9. 95-Matt Covington[21]; 10. 2J-Zach Blurton[17]; 11. 6K-Kaleb Johnson[13]; 12. 55B-Brandon Anderson[16]; 13. 10-Landon Britt[15]; 14. 15H-Sam Hafertepe Jr[2]; 15. 938-Bradley Fezard[20]; 16. 17B-Ryan Bickett[19]; 17. 36-Jason Martin[10]; 18. 35-Skylar Prochaska[9]; 19. 16G-Austyn Gossel[23]; 20. 83-Sam Henderson[11]; 21. 2B-Garrett Benson[14]; 22. 23W-Scott Winters[18]; 23. 88-Terry Easum[22]