Kyle Larson was chasing down Jonathan Davenport in the waning laps of a 40-lap feature at Volunteer Speedway on Wednesday night.
The top tier NASCAR star took two tenths of a second off of Davenport’s 1-second lead in one of the closing laps. The next time around, it was three tenths.
But Davenport threw on the jets with five laps to go. He got a critical pass on a lapped car to put some distance between himself and Larson, and then was able to split a pair of lapped cars to clinch the victory and get his second Castrol FloRacing Night in America race win of the year.
“I just got to move a bit around Ross (Bailes) to find his weaknesses,” Davenport said on FloRacing. “I saw the No. 6. on the board. I knew Larson was coming. I just had to pick where I slid the lapped cars.
The series, which is new to 2021 and highlights grassroots race tracks on week nights through the year, has just one race left in its inaugural year.
Davenport became the first repeat winner in the tour’s short life on Wednesday, too.
“Just going through lapped traffic there… the lapped cars don’t know you’re there, really,” Davenport said. “You catch them so fast, but this place was wide all night. You could race wherever.”
Larson took home the runner-up position on the night.
It was his sixth race with the series – he’s only missed one all year despite his busy schedule.
“That was a really fun track there,” Larson said. “I feel like I was pretty equal with Jonathan, he just did a really good job the last eight laps with traffic. It felt good to be competitive again. I feel like its been a little bit. Really since the Prairie Dirt Classic, I feel like we’ve been off a little bit. Wish we had some more laps, but all in all I had a really good time.”
The tour returns to the track on Thursday, October 28 at Tri-City for its finale race on the season. As always, it can be seen live on FloRacing.
Castrol FloRacing Night In America Results
Volunteer Speedway
1. Jonathan Davenport
2. Kyle Larson
3. Ricky Weiss
4. Hudson O’Neal
5. Cory Hedgecock
6. Ross Bailes
7. Mike Marlar
8. Shane Clanton
9. Forrest Trent
10. Ryan King
11. Eli Beets
12. Christian Hanger
13. Will Roland
14. Jensen Ford
15. Sam Seawright
16. Travis Stickley
17. Joe Denby
18. Benjamin Cranford
19. Kaede Loudy
20. Mack McCarter
21. Bobby Pierce
