Race Weekend Central

Ty Gibbs Wins ARCA Race at Mid-Ohio for 4th Straight Victory

In the second-ever ARCA Menards Series race at Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course, Ty Gibbs won the 2021 Dawn 150 for his fourth straight victory on Friday, June 4. It’s his fifth win this season and his 13th career main ARCA series win.

Gibbs will attempt to sweep the race weekend at Mid-Ohio tomorrow in the NASCAR Xfinity Series race. He won the series’ most recent race at Charlotte Motor Speedway, as well as his Xfinity Series debut at the Daytona International Speedway road course earlier this year.

The last driver to win four straight main ARCA series wins was NASCAR Cup Series rookie Chase Briscoe in 2016. In addition to his five main ARCA wins and two Xfinity Series wins, Gibbs also won the ARCA Menards Series West season opener and the most recent ARCA Menards Series East race at Dover International Speedway.

“It’s definitely nice because I feel like that’s the points lead after he jumped the start,” Gibbs told FS1 after climbing victoriously out of his No. 18 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota. “That’s nice. I’m really relaxed right now and happy… this is just awesome. Won at Mid-Ohio so hopefully, we can make it two in a row and win tomorrow.”

“I learned a lot of stuff,” Gibbs said about running double-duty at Mid-Ohio. He will start second. “More track time than anything. I got some in 2019 but it’s been so long since then and I’ve grown as a person. Sometimes 18-year-olds forget that. I got a lot of track time and hopefully, Chris Gabehart and the guys have it set up for tomorrow.”

Gibbs dominated the race, regaining the lead after Corey Heim served a pass-through penalty for jumping the final restart.

As he drove down pit road to serve the penalty, Heim added insult to injury as he sped, incurring another pass-through penalty. He ultimately finished as the last car on the lead lap in seventh place. It’s his worst finish of this season.

“My Venturini Motorsports Camry today was really good,” a dejected Heim told FS1. “We came a long away. We were off in practice. I feel like we could’ve competed for the win there and just unfortunate.”

NASCAR Camping World Truck Series regular Austin Hill finished second in his fourth career ARCA start. Hill notched his ARCA career-best finish and his second ARCA top-10 finish.

“It’s one of those things where you want to push as hard as you can but at the same time you don’t want to slip your right-rear tire; trying to run down the No. 18 [Gibbs] clicking off fast lap times,” Hill told FS1 post-race. “He was saving his stuff a bit, I started overheating the tires, using a lot of brakes; I played with the brake bias a bit to give some rear brake to it. I’m not sure what I could’ve done differently; maybe a restart to have another go at it. All in all, we did a really good job.”

Hill said he will also compete in the other ARCA road course race this season at Watkins Glen International.

After his David Gilliland Racing team made a track bar adjustment at the scheduled halfway competition caution, Thad Moffitt wheeled his No. 46 Ford to a third-place finish. It tied his career-best finish, previously set in the second ARCA race of this season at Phoenix Raceway.

NASCAR Xfinity Series regular Brandon Jones finished fourth in his first ARCA race since the eighth ARCA race of the 2018 season at Michigan International Speedway.

“That was my goal to get laps for tomorrow,” Jones told FS1. “All in all, a solid day. We were probably comparable to the No. 1 [Hill], No. 18 [Gibbs] was still pretty fast so we got work to do when we come back for Watkins Glen.”

Jones will join Gibbs and Kris Wright in driving double-duty at Mid-Ohio in the Xfinity Series race. Jones will start seventh.

With his fifth-place finish, rookie Nick Sanchez scored his fifth straight top-10 result. Sanchez credited reigning Xfinity Series champion and talented road course racer Austin Cindric with his performance in the Dawn 150.

Wright finished one lap down in eighth place, but it wasn’t indicative of the speed in his No. 30 Rette Jones Racing Ford. Wright raced alongside the top five drivers, but he never rebounded from an opening lap spin which cost him two laps.

Wright will start 33rd in the Xfinity Series race tomorrow. He also will compete in the ARCA races at Pocono Raceway and Watkins Glen.

Unofficially, after seven races this season, Heim leads Gibbs by one point in the point standings. Moffitt, Sanchez, and Drew Dollar round out the top five in the points.

ARCA Mid-Ohio Results

Gibbs will seek his fifth straight main ARCA series win at Pocono Raceway. Tim Steele was the last driver to win five straight, a feat he achieved in 1997.

About the author

Mark Kristl joined Frontstretch at the beginning of the 2019 NASCAR season. He is the site's ARCA Menards Series editor. Kristl is also an Eagle Scout and a proud University of Dayton alum.

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Tom B

What’s up with throwing your driving gloves at the camera? Are you looking for a “signature move” after winning a race? Act like you have been there before, don’t whine, don’t try to be funny and leave some rubber on the tires so you can drive back to victory circle. Just say thank you to your sponsors

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