INDIANAPOLIS — If Friday’s second night of preliminary action for the 5th annual Driven 2 Save Lives BC39 is any indication of how the main event is going to look, buckle up and hold on tight. The elbows were out in a drama filled evening at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway.
Justin Grant passed Emerson Axsom with a slider in Turn 1 with 10 laps remaining in the 30-lap A-Main feature to score his 15th career USAC National Midget Series victory under the lights on the .25-mile dirt track tucked in the shadows of Turn 3 of the big track.
“We’re here racing at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway in front of all you great fans, and I’m not going to phone it in and come third if we can help it,” Grant said. “Our RMS race cars are fast. I feel like it could be a slugfest between me and Thomas tomorrow. Neither one of us are very good at playing nice guy.
“Should be entertaining, should be exciting tomorrow.”
Grant used his experience to get by as Axsom took the early race lead from pole sitter Cannon McIntosh. The Franklin, Ind native was honest with his assessment of the night in saying that he didn’t know where to put his No. 68 Toyota for Keith Kunz Motorsports while leading.
That inexperience out front allowed Grant to shine in the end with knowing damn well where his No. 2 Honda should be placed.
On a night where youth vs. experience was the main storyline, the veteran took the youth to school in scoring the win and giving RMS Racing a clean sweep of preliminary night wins. Grant’s teammate, Thomas Meseraull led all 30 laps on Thursday night in his No. 7 entry.
Grant only led the final 10 a night later.
The drama started early and often with veteran drivers being perturbed with how overly aggressive the younger drivers were being.
In the second qualifier of the night, Daison Pursley got in too hot and threw an overzealous slider on points leader, Logan Seavey, in Turns 1-2. It pushed Seavey out of the groove. Seavey came back and tried to push Pursley out of the way and nearly crashed them both in the process. Then, a few laps later, Seavey drove it in deep in Turn 3 for revenge.
“He had two decisions to make,” Seavey said of the final incident between he and Pursley. “Get out of my way or crash. He chose to crash.”
Seavey blamed Pursley’s youth and aggressive moves on why he had enough. Brady Bacon who won the second qualifier said it looked like Pursley forgot there were others cars on track to race again and cited his youthful ways too.
Two qualifying races later, Zach Daum and Ryan Timms had a battle and incident in the closing laps. Daum, while in victory lane, called Timms a dipshit and blamed his youthful and inexperienced ways on how not to race.
Both Pursley and Timms didn’t understand why the veterans were mad at them.
In the A-Main feature, Zach Wigal and Grant had an intense battle for third early on. Grant pushed Wigal high in Turn 2 on Lap 6 taking third and forcing Wigal down to fifth. With Wigal trying to bounce back, he tried a slider on Sarff in the third turn and found the wall ending his night early.
He blamed Grant and made gestures to him while he rode by under caution.
Axsom led McIntosh, Grant, Sarff and Timms on the restart and pulled away. While he was catching the back end of the field, another caution flew at the midway point giving Axsom a break in more than one way.
While he was starting to get into traffic, McIntosh was right on his bumper for the lead. He’d get a chance to regroup for another go at it.
On the restart, Kenney Johnson stalled in Turn 4 to bring out the quick caution. A lap later, we’d get back at it on Lap 17 with Grant taking second from McIntosh by squeezing him off the Turn 4 exit. Three laps later, Grant was in the lead.
On Lap 24, Zach Daum, Miller and Cline all had an incident in Turn 2 bringing out the final caution. Grant would lead Axsom, McIntosh, Timms and Sarff to the restart with 7 laps remaining.
Grant would never be challenged as he ended the night not only on top, but perfect. From being quickest in hot laps, to winning his heat race by more than 5 seconds to winning his qualifier to winning the A-Main. Grant was aggressive and made it count with a Friday night victory under the lights at IMS.
McIntosh, who was passed by Axsom on the opening lap, repaid the favor by passing Axsom on the final lap in the final corner to score P2 with Axsom finishing third to join Grant in the A-Main on Saturday night.
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