BECHTELSVILLE, Pa. — Aaron Reutzel was a little bit lucky and a little bit good en route to cashing a $20,000 check Tuesday night at Grandview Speedway.
The box score will read that the Clute, Texas, native led all 35 laps from the pole, but he had to survive three bouts with traffic and lost the lead with seven laps to go when Rico Abreu blew past.
However, a timely red flag that negated the pass, allowed Reutzel to re-claim the top spot, properly adjust for the final run, and hang on to nail his fifth High Limit win of the season and seventh overall victory.
Transforming into the hottest sprint car driver in the country, Reutzel has taken his Ridge & Sons Racing, PowerPlus No. 87 to five wins in the last eight races — averaging an astonishing 1.75 finish over the stretch since April 30.
Those five wins — High Limit at Texas, High Limit at Kokomo, All Stars at Fremont, local show at Attica, and High Limit at Grandview — have paid a cool $105,000.
Reutzel has extended his championship advantage with Interstate Batteries High Limit Racing to 33-points over Rico Abreu, and he’s now assumed control of the Roto-Rooter Midweek Series battle by seven points over Tyler Courtney.
“It was a hard race, I got lucky on that win,” Reutzel said. “I’ll take a win any way we can get it.”
Presenting the biggest challenge to Reutzel was Abreu aboard the Tony Stewart/Curb-Agajanian Racing, Carquest Auto Parts No. 24.
The St. Helena, California, native powered to the lead on Lap 28 before an untimely – for him – caution erased his pass. Ultimately, a second-place finish marked his fifth-straight podium finish at Grandview and gives the TSR team seven consecutive top-10 finishes as they begin surging ahead of the summer.
Closing out the podium as the highest finishing PA Posse star was Chase Dietz with a third-place effort. That’s a career-best run at Grandview for the Stehman Motorsports No. 23 pilot as he now turns focus to Port Royal Speedway’s Bob Weikert Memorial this weekend, where he’s arguably the favorite to cash $100,000.
Rounding out the top five were Kasey Kahne in fourth aboard the Macri Motorsports No. 39m and Brady Bacon in fifth driving Chris Dyson’s No. 20.
The finish:
Feature (35 Laps): 1. 87-Aaron Reutzel[1]; 2. 24-Rico Abreu[5]; 3. 23-Chase Dietz[6]; 4. 39M-Kasey Kahne[7]; 5. 20B-Brady Bacon[2]; 6. 7BC-Tyler Courtney[12]; 7. 77-Giovanni Scelzi[3]; 8. 26-Justin Peck[16]; 9. 48-Danny Dietrich[9]; 10. 24D-Danny Sams III[8]; 11. 55-Kerry Madsen[11]; 12. 13-Tanner Holmes[10]; 13. 57-Kyle Larson[15]; 14. 5-Brenham Crouch[19]; 15. 88-Tanner Thorson[17]; 16. 5R-Tyler Ross[23]; 17. 11-TJ Stutts[20]; 18. 87X-Steven Snyder Jr[13]; 19. 42-Sye Lynch[26]; 20. 41-Logan Rumsey[24]; 21. 51-Freddie Rahmer[22]; 22. 17GP-Hank Davis[25]; 23. 69K-Ryan Smith[14]; 24. 19-Brent Marks[18]; 25. 9-Daison Pursley[4]; 26. 9R-Chase Randall[21]
