Johnny Benson admitted it would take a couple days to absorb his three-peat accomplishment.
Benson led 130 of 200 laps and claimed victory Friday night for the third consecutive time in a NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series race at The Milwaukee Mile.
It was the first win of the season and 10th in the career of Benson, a Grand Rapids, Mich., native who maintained the Trucks Series points lead with the victory.
“It is overwhelming to win three races here,” said Benson, who drove a different truck to the win compared to the one that sat in victory lane at The Mile in 2006 and 2007. “It will sink in in a day or two. Milwaukee isn’t too far from where I grew up, on the other side of the lake there. It’s just a neat place.”
Benson held off Matt Crafton and Landon Cassill, who finished second and third, respectively.
“It feels great,” Benson said. “I could do almost anything I wanted. That last set of tires was awesome. This is way cool. I can’t believe we won three in a row.”
Benson entered in third, took four tires and fuel, and exited in first. Crafton, also taking four tires and fuel, maintained second and Crawford fell to third, followed by Cassill and Darnell. However, Crawford’s truck was detected speeding and had to go to the tail end of the longest line for the next restart.
Shortly thereafter, NASCAR red-flagged the race for lightning, but there was no rain. The grandstands were cleared with 50 of the 200 scheduled laps remaining.
“I felt like it wasn’t going to rain tonight,” crew chief Trip Bruce said. “That pit stop was key for sure, for the momentum, for clean air. Just being in the lead with the end of race coming up on you makes a big difference.”
Rick Crawford led 33 laps and came out between Benson and Crafton, but he was caught for speeding off pit road and had to fall to the back of the pack. He finished ninth.
“(Benson) would have been hard to beat,” Crafton said. “There were times that he was faster than us and times when I was faster than him. If I was leading the race, I would have been getting clean air on the nose (to help handling), but I can’t complain.
“If you’d have told me at the end of practice we’d end up second, I’d have told you you were crazy. I thought we’d have a top-10 truck at best, but the guys didn’t quit. For the most part they hit a home run to take a truck that was as bad as it was in practice to where it was.”
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