JACKSON, Minn. — Cameron Martin and Lee Goos Jr. kicked off the opening night of the 46th annual FENDT Jackson Nationals at Jackson Motorplex by earning feature triumphs on Thursday.
Martin won a thriller of a 25-lap Gunderson Racing Inc. Midwest Sprint Touring Series 360 Sprint Cars main event, marking his first career win at the track.
Martin paced the field for the first 10 laps before Kaleb Johnson powered into the lead entering turn three on lap 11. The drivers duked it out in thick traffic for several laps. Martin returned the favor with a slide job into turn one on Lap 18 to regain first place. He then held off late charges from Aaron Reutzel and Matt Juhl to win by 1.272 seconds.
“I just had to kind send it,” Martin said. “I made that early race mistake and let Kaleb get by, but ultimately I think I had the better race car. It all worked out my way. When you’re out front like that you try to think like you’re hot lapping, trying to hit every mark and not slip up. Lapped traffic was very difficult tonight. It almost cost us the win, but we were able to make the most of it and get up front.”
Reutzel hustled from ninth to second, using a last-lap pass to secure the runner-up result by four thousandths of a second.
“It was pretty narrow to start with, but it got wide and racy,” he said. “We’ll come back the next two nights and see what we can do.”
Juhl rounded out the podium.
“It feels good to be sitting up here,” he said. “Lapped traffic didn’t go my way. That’s part of racing.”
Skylar Prochaska placed fourth and Christopher Thram maneuvered from 12th to fifth.
Goos Jr. became the first repeat winner of the season at Jackson Motorplex as he garnered the Wyffels Hybrids RaceSaver Sprint Cars presented by Heser Auto & Detailing 20-lap feature triumph.
Nake Eakin led for the first eight laps before Goos Jr. rapidly closed in as traffic appeared. Eakin drifted up the track in turns one and two on lap nine, allowing Goos Jr. to pull even down the backstretch and enter turn three on the favored bottom lane. He then slid in front of Eakin to take over the top spot. Goos Jr. led the remainder of the race and pulled away following a restart on lap 14 to win by 2.052 seconds.
“I knew I had to have lapped traffic,” he said. “Once I got out front the car was super easy to drive.”
Eakin was the runner up with Brandon Bosma placing third. Matt Johnson finished fourth and Brandon Halverson ended fifth.
The finish:
Feature (25 Laps): 1. 4-Cameron Martin (1); 2. 87-Aaron Reutzel (9); 3. 09-Matt Juhl (4); 4. 35-Skylar Prochaska (3); 5. 24T-Christopher Thram (12); 6. 96-Blaine Stegenga (8); 7. 83-Sam Henderson (6); 8. 23W-Scott Winters (7); 9. 22-Kaleb Johnson (2); 10. 86-Jacob Hughes (10); 11. 20-Brant O’Banion (13); 12. 18-Corbin Erickson (14); 13. 10J-Justin Jacobsma (5); 14. 17B-Ryan Bickett (19); 15. 2-Dylan Opdahl (18); 16. 8-Micah Slendy (16); 17. 11D-Dominic White (15); 18. 91-Andrew Sullivan (17); 19. G5-Gage Pulkrabek (11); 20. 3J-Jeridan Jordahl (21); 21. 4W-Matt Wasmund (22); 22. 101-Chuck McGillivray (20); 23. 28-Nicholas Winter (23); 24. 32-Riley Valantine (24); 25. (DNS) 9W-Jeff Watson.