MARION, Ark. – Derek Hagar will return to I-30 Speedway this Saturday as the points leader in the ASCS Mid-South Region.
Hagar is back at the bullring after winning two of the three series races this year. He’s also the only driver to post a top-10 result during all three races.
“We just have to go out there and do what we’ve been doing,” Hagar said. “I-30 has treated us well this year other than the first night when we crashed in a non-wing. I know we can get it done if we put ourselves in the right position.”
Hagar earned a Lucas Oil ASCS National Tour and ASCS Mid-South Region victory at I-30 Speedway in March. He also captured a feature triumph at the quarter-mile oval during his most recent visit last month.
On top of the success on the track, Hagar has an added boost of getting his primary engine back this week.
“We started the season out the strongest we have in a while so I’m looking forward to going back to I-30 this weekend,” he said. “We have a fresh Dynotech under the hood so I’m excited to see how that will do. Hopefully the changes we made meet our expectations. Kenny (Conrad) and Ricky (Stenhouse) always come up with a good combination.
“This is our major engine. With Kenny getting sick last year he didn’t get to go through that stuff in the offseason. He is very picky about who touches the motors. Kenny does all the assembly and then Ricky does our machine work and dynoing. Once Kenny got well and in the shop he got it torn down and did some updates to the new ASCS rules. It has taken some time to get some parts. We’ve been running our second motor, which has treated us well to start the year. Now we’ll see if we can keep it up with our primary one.”