BENTON, Mo. — Sam Hafertepe Jr. continues to cement his legacy as one of the most accomplished drivers in American Sprint Car Series history with his fifth-straight win Saturday night at Benton Speedway.
The five-time series champion from Sunnyvale, Texas, has tied the national Series record for most consecutive feature wins, which was originally set in 2005 by four-time champion Gary Wright and later tied by Hafertepe in 2017.
He’s never been one to get caught up in statistics or record book facts, but the accomplishments he and the Hill’s Racing Team have made in their time together are not lost on him.
“To win five-in-a-row, not a lot of guys can do that, and it’s pretty awesome to be able to do that twice,” Hafertepe said. “To put your name anywhere with Gary Wright is a feat in itself.”
The streak began at the beginning of July, when Hafertepe swept both races of The Big One on Independence Day weekend at Belleville High Banks. A third-straight win came last Friday night at Creek County Speedway before the weekend sweep of Windy Hollow Speedway and Benton. He’s now up to 85 career national wins — eight of which have come this year.
His win Friday at Windy Hollow was a dominant showing from start-to-finish, but Hafertepe was put through a bit more adversity at Benton. He jumped to the lead in the opening laps but quickly reached lapped traffic, slowing his pace and opening the door for Matt Covington to throw a slide job on him to take the lead on Lap 8.
Covington led through the halfway point until disaster struck on Lap 17. With heavy lapped traffic in front of him and Hafertepe on his tail, Covington attempted to pass multiple cars in Turns 1–2 and made contact with Kory Bales, sending the No. 95 around and stalling out in Turn 2
“I went to slide the 88 car, and the 5 car that was in front of him I thought just peeled off the cushion a little bit — Cody said he was spinning out — and I tapped his left-rear with my right-front and it looped me around,” Covington said. “[Hafertepe] got into me a little bit — luckily just a little bit, didn’t ruin his night too — and it broke my Jacobs ladder.”
Despite the misfortune, Hafertepe had the confidence he would have regained the lead on his own.
“I didn’t know [Covington] was gonna crash, but I did know that if I bided my time, he’d get in the situation where maybe I could get him back,” Hafertepe said. “With that long of a race, we were only 10–11 laps in, I knew I had time to do what I needed to do to get back by him.”
Meanwhile, a seventh-starting Hahn had made progress on his way up through the field and lined up third behind Garrett Benson for the restart with 13 laps left.
The two immediately engaged in a slide-job battle, but Hahn was able to seal the pass for the runner-up spot on Lap 19 and set his sights on the No. 15h out front.
A restart with 10 laps remaining saw Hahn take a shot at the top spot, throwing a slidejob on Hafertepe in Turns 1–2, which Hafertepe defended with a crossover maneuver and a slide job of his own in Turns 3–4 to take the lead back before the yellow flag was displayed again.
Covington had broken at the rear of the field and was towed off the track.
One final restart gave Hafertepe another shot at playing defense on Hahn, which he did after a bit of game-planning under the caution period.
“[Hahn] was getting to the lead because I had a bad restart,” Hafertepe said. “Once I timed my restart better in (Turns) 3–4, I actually took off early in 3, and I think that kinda sealed it for me. It got me off 4 really nice, and it was smooth sailing from there on out.”
“Sam’s such a smart racer, he wasn’t gonna let that happen again,” Hahn said. “He changed where he took off from in the corner. I still had a good enough start to be able to slide him, but he was moving down, making sure I wasn’t going to be able to make that slider across.”
After the final restart, Hafertepe cruised to the checkered flag untouched, with Hahn in second and Benson in third.
Jason Martin crossed the stripe in fourth, while Austyn Gossel completed the top five.
The finish:
Feature (30 Laps): 1. 15H-Sam Hafertepe Jr[1]; 2. 52-Blake Hahn[7]; 3. 2B-Garrett Benson[5]; 4. 36-Jason Martin[10]; 5. 16G-Austyn Gossel[3]; 6. 14-Jordon Mallett[9]; 7. 88R-Ryder Laplante[16]; 8. 34-Sterling Cling[8]; 9. 71-Brady Baker[13]; 10. 10-Landon Britt[6]; 11. 45X-Kyler Johnson[12]; 12. 2J-Zach Blurton[11]; 13. 4X-Chase Howard[14]; 14. 44R-Ronny Howard[17]; 15. 5D-Zach Daum[23]; 16. 2-Chase Porter[20]; 17. 88-Terry Easum[19]; 18. 88C-Brogan Carder[18]; 19. 95-Matt Covington[2]; 20. 5-Kory Bales[15]; 21. 7D-Dylan DeJournett[21]; 22. 901-Tucker Boulton[4]; 23. 19P-Brady Parmeley[22]; 24. 3D-Jake Diehl[24]
