Ron Hornaday pulled away from Johnny Benson on a green-white-checkered finish to win the rain-delayed Power Stroke Diesel 200 NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series race Friday at O’Reilly Raceway Park.
Hornaday’s victory was his third of the season and the 32nd of his career—tops all-time in the series. He also cut Mike Skinner’s points lead by more than half, from 164 to 77. Skinner finished 20th, his first race out of the top eight this season.
“What an awesome race, ” Hornaday said. “We certainly had to race hard. We did what we came here to do. Skinner had some bad luck, but we’ve got to win races. Skinner is still the guy we’ve got to beat. “
With qualifying rained out and the field set by owner points, Hornaday’s Chevrolet started on the outside of the front row. He passed Skinner for the lead on the 23rd lap and led until making a pit stop under caution on Lap 80.
Hornaday emerged in sixth, behind three trucks that didn’t stop, Travis Kvapil’s Ford and Rick Crawford’s Ford.
Rookie Willie Allen, on older tires, managed to hold off the faster trucks of Kvapil, Hornaday and Crawford for 23 laps. Kvapil blasted past Allen on a restart and Hornaday quickly moved into second.
Kvapil stayed in the lead for 66 straight laps. Hornaday and Benson were racing side-by-side for second for much of that period, but they began to gain on Kvapil.
Hornaday passed Kvapil exiting Turn 4 on Lap 170 to take the lead.
“I was getting into the corner better than Travis was, ” Hornaday said. “I had been keeping the pressure on him, getting his back tires hotter and hotter, and he got caught in some traffic. “
Kvapil had hoped for shorter runs, but the race went green from Laps 136 to 185.
“We had a good short-run truck and we had a long run there, ” Kvapil said. “Our truck was really good for 20 to 30 laps. We needed cautions to cool down the back tires. “
Benson’s Toyota had dropped from third to 11th during his pit stop on Lap 80. He climbed back to third in 60 laps. Benson passed Kvapil for second on Lap 174.
Hornaday had two restarts in the final 12 laps and drove away to significant leads each time. The second forced the race to go into a one-lap overtime, but Hornaday won by five truck lengths.
Kvapil finished third, followed by Crawford’s Ford and Ken Schrader’s Dodge.
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