OSWEGO, N.Y. – Tim Jedzrejek may have had the International Supermodified Ass’n field covered early in Saturday night’s Bud Light Super Nationals, but Mike Lichty was the fastest man in town at the end.
Lichty roared to his third Super Nationals victory, and first since 2017, with a slick outside pass of Jedzrejek on a lap-29 restart off the second turn of the five-eighths-mile oval.
After that, the PATCO Transportation driver was never headed again and raced away to a 2.253-second victory over Jedzrejek, the event’s co-winningest driver who was looking for his record sixth triumph.
The ninth-starting Lichty admitted in victory lane that he was “nervous going into the day,” but that the handling on his car came to life when it mattered.
“I just really didn’t know what direction we needed to go in; we started off on the neutral side, in then it finally just started to come to me,” said Lichty. “I was working through all those caution flags that we had, because it gave the tires a lot of heat cycles, but I could roll the outside decent and that’s where I made the most ground up all night long, it seemed like.”
Lichty’s only lament was that he didn’t have a shot at racing either Chris Perley or Dave Shullick Jr., who were both eliminated after crashing while they raced for second on the 29th lap of the 60-lap feature.
“It definitely would have been nice to raise Perley and DJ there,” Lichty noted, “but we’ll take ‘em however we can get them, and this one is definitely a win we needed tonight.”
Jedzrejek crossed the line second, 2.253 seconds back, after dominating the first 28 laps and holding off the field on a pair of restarts in the first half – including one open red flag period on lap 14.
He just didn’t have enough to stop Lichty.
“We got a little tight after those red flags,” tipped Jedzrejek. “We had several of them, and they just didn’t seem to fit our car very well. We just weren’t as good at the end as we were at the beginning.”
Trent Stephens completed the podium, followed by Ben Seitz and Kyle Edwards.
The 60-lap race of attrition saw just eight of the 16 starters make it all the way to the checkered flag.
The finish:
Mike Lichty, Tim Jedzrejek, Trent Stephens, Ben Seitz, Kyle Edwards, Dave McKnight, Mark Sammut, A.J. Lesiecki, Mike Ordway Jr., Ryan Coniam, Nick Capellini, Mike McVetta, Dave Shullick Jr., Chris Perley, Lou LeVea Sr., Danny Shirey.