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The ARCA Midwest Tour’s first visit to Golden Sands Speedway in Plover, Wisconsin produced a first-time winner in the series as Dalton Zehr breaks through to get his first checkered flag on Saturday night by winning Mid-Summer Showdown 100.

Zehr was making his 28th start in the Midwest Tour, won at the same place where he is the defending track champion.

After starting 10th, he worked his way up to a podium position and appeared to have a fast car in the late going until a caution flew for Jonathan Eilen’s spin with 16 laps to go in the event.

On the restart, Chris Wimmer and Chris Weinkauf were battling for the lead with Zehr taking over the third spot from Ty Majeski.

Two laps later, as Wimmer & Weinkauf battled for the lead, the two made contact in turn four causing both cars to drift up the track and avoid spinning each other. Zehr was in the right spot as he drove underneath both of them to take over the lead.

Zehr started to pull away from the field until the caution flew with five laps to go after Weinkauf and Bryan Syer Keske got together causing Weinkauf to spin and make contact with John Beale. Weinkauf was done for the night.

After a delay for cleaning up the track and a light pole going out, the field took the green with five laps to go in the race. Zehr would not be contested for the lead as he drove to his first victory in the Tour.

“This win has been a long time coming, but we are finally here and I think it will get easier after the first one,” a happy Zehr said in victory lane. “To win any race, you have to be in right position to win it. I think they were faster 15 laps on, we had a good short run car. But It was a good car that put us in position. They (Wimmer & Weinkauf) got together and I was able to capitalize on it, what could have been a caution I think but they did an excellent job catching it. I just can’t thank everyone enough and all of the fans who came out tonight.”

Wimmer, who lead a majority of the 100-lap race and had a great battle with Weinkauf throughout, was hoping for third Super Late Model win in two weeks, but came up one spot short.

“Yeah, I got together with Weinkauf, but Zehr had the best car anyways,” Wimmer said about Zehr after the race. “We had a good car, just disappointing to finish second. His car had so much grip, but it was a good race.”

Current ARCA Midwest Tour point leader Ty Majeski had a busy night coming through the field in the late going to earn a podium finish.

“I think I had the car to do it and none of the restarts really went our way,” Majeski said. “At the start of the race we lost a lot of track position. We picked up a few spots on some of the restarts but the important one was not being able to clear the 14 (Nason). If I could have gotten down there, it may have been a different race, I would have been in third when Wimmer and Weinkauf got together and we could have gotten the spot instead of Dalton. Our car was OK, I think under the right circumstances we could have won. We just need to be a little bit better.”

Matt Kocourek finished fourth while Jason Weinkauf rounded out the top five.

For Dalton Zehr and his team, they kind of had an idea that luck would be on their side today, especially with numbers. With Zehr’s car # being 119, they used check #1119 to pay for their tire bill and were the 19th team in line to buy tires. But at the end of the day, they had the important number….one.

  1. Dalton Zehr
  2. Chris Wimmer
  3. Ty Majeski
  4. Matt Kocourek
  5. Jason Weinkauf
  6. Austin Nason
  7. Travis Dassow
  8. John DeAngelis Jr.
  9. Mark Eswein
  10. Cardell Potter
  11. Jonathan Eilen
  12. Paul Shafer Jr.
  13. Bryan Syer Keske
  14. Dennis Prunty
  15. John Beale
  16. Justin Mondeik
  17. Gregory Borchardt
  18. Chris Weinkauf
  19. Rich Bickle Jr.
  20. Collin Slife
  21. Michael Ostdiek
  22. Andrew Morrissey
  23. Dillon Hammond
  24. Casey Johnson
  25. Dean LaPointe
  26. Brian Hakala

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