On Monday night, Ryan Gustin made his first start with the DIRTcar Summer Nationals Late Models for the first time since 2022.
On Tuesday at Davenport Speedway, the Marshalltown, IA native scored his first career win with the tour on his home state turf in the Iowa Governor’s Cup.
Gustin showed speed from the start of the night’s program by setting the fastest time in his Qualifying group, then drove towards the win in Heat 3.
Gustin started alongside World of Outlaws Real American Beer Late Models presented by DIRTVision rookie contender Jake Timm for the start of the 30-lap race, with Gustin taking the lead early on the bottom of Turns 1-2 before shifting towards the top as Timm transitioned to the bottom.
The two drivers stayed even with each other until Timm conceded the lead on Lap 6 after Gustin got clear of Timm and moved down to the bottom line.
Amid the two drivers racing for the lead, Hampton, GA’s Ashton Winger began his charge towards his Outlaw competitors for the win at the 1/4-mile race track.
In the first restart on Lap 6, Winger crossed Timm on the high lane to take second place, but could not mount a pass for the lead on the Todd Cooney Racing No. 19R Infinity Chassis.
The three drivers each stayed within one second of each other through the halfway point until the final caution on Lap 21 gave Winger and Timm a final chance at overtaking Gustin.
Gustin controlled the lanes behind him on the last restart as Timm took back second place over Winger by performing the exact move that the Jeff Mathews Motorsports No. 12 executed on him.
Timm had to focus on maintaining his track position over Winger as “The Reaper” extended his lead to 2.5 seconds to capture his first career Hell Tour win, and his first win at Davenport.
“We’ve lost a bunch of (races) here, whether it be flat tires or mechanical issues or whatever,” Gustin said. “It definitely feels really good to win here. It’s been an uphill battle for sure. We unloaded yesterday and didn’t know what the heck to do, so we worked on it all day today and found a bunch of things that weren’t correct. So we fixed them, and this thing drove right around there tonight.”
Up Next: The DIRTcar Summer Nationals Late Models and DIRTcar Summit Racing Equipment Modified Nationals join forces for the first time in Week 2 for a night at Quincy Raceways on Wednesday, June 18.
If you can’t make it to the tracks, you can watch every DIRTcar Summer Nationals race live on DIRTVision.
Feature (30 Laps): 1. 19R-Ryan Gustin[1]; 2. 49-Jake Timm[3]; 3. 12-Ashton Winger[2]; 4. 1-Tyler Erb[5]; 5. 28-Dennis Erb Jr[12]; 6. 40B-Kyle Bronson[6]; 7. 75-Dillon McCowan[10]; 8. 10-Joseph Joiner[8]; 9. 09-Michael Leach[18]; 10. 28M-Sam Mars[11]; 11. 99JR-Frank Heckenast Jr[14]; 12. 14JR-Trey Mills[15]; 13. 22*-Drake Troutman[13]; 14. 15-Clay Stuckey[16]; 15. 31M-Tyler Millwood[22]; 16. 28B-Carson Brown[21]; 17. 99-Mckay Wenger[20]; 18. 25F-Jason Feger[7]; 19. 5-Mark Whitener[17]; 20. 43-Derrick Stewart[9]; 21. 21-Billy Moyer Sr[19]; 22. 29-Christian Hanger[4]
