BULLS GAP, Tenn. — Aaron Reutzel ran down Cory Eliason en route to winning Saturday night’s Ollie’s Bargain Outlet All Star Circuit of Champions presented by Mobil 1 feature at Volunteer Speedway.
Reutzel started fifth and took the lead from Eliason on lap 24.
Although forced to endure a green-white-checkered finish, Reutzel’s dominance was clear, eventually escaping to a two-second advantage in just two trips around the speedway.
A sweet ending to a bitter night for the Baughman-Reutzel Motorsports team, Reutzel was forced to change motors after his respective hot-lap session, only to be caught-up in an incident during the evening’s dash. The familiar No. 87 did restart the dash, but had to settle with a fifth-place result.
The $5,000 triumph, a first-ever for Reutzel at Volunteer and a first as a full-time All Star in the state of Tennessee, bumped Reutzel’s win tally to six during All Star Circuit of Champions competition, continuing his chase toward a third consecutive series title.
Eliason, who led the first 23 laps before losing the top spot to Reutzel, held on to finish second at Volunteer on Saturday night, followed by Paul McMahan and three-time NASCAR Cup Series champion Tony Stewart.
“Everyone always talks about how good their team is, but I have the best team in the pit area. This was definitely a tough night,” Reutzel said. “We had to do so much tonight, but they never gave up and continued to work hard no matter what was thrown at them. They proved why we won the championship the last two years. My team won this race tonight.”
“We were good in one and two, but we struggled in three and four. That’s where Aaron (Reutzel) beat us,” Eliason said. “He was able to carry momentum a lot better than I could. We are getting a lot closer to where we need to be. This kinda happened to me in Australia where I finished on the podium twelve or so times in a row before I finally won one. Sometimes finishing second can get frustrating. Hats off to my team. We were fast all night.”
The finish:
Feature (30 Laps): 1. 87-Aaron Reutzel [5]; 2. 26-Cory Eliason [2]; 3. 13-Paul McMahan [1]; 4. 14-Tony Stewart [3]; 5. 70-Sye Lynch [4]; 6. 11-Zeb Wise [6]; 7. 17-Josh Baughman [8]; 8. O7-Gerard McIntyre [10]; 9. 1ST-Steve Surniak [13]; 10. W20-Greg Wilson [9]; 11. 22-Cole Duncan [11]; 12. 99-Skylar Gee [12]; 13. 21-Brinton Marvel [7]; 14. IO7-Mark Coldren [15]; 15. 23-Lance Moss [14]; 16. 22B-Ryan Broughton [16]; 17. 19-Paige Polyak [17] Leaders: Cory Eliason (1-23), Aaron Reutzel (24-30)