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Hafertepe Jr. Looking to Build off Early Momentum

Sunnyvale, Texas-Sam Hafertepe Jr. and The Plumbfast Racing Team are heading into a weekend at their hometown track riding a wave of momentum that Sam hopes will bring success against The ASCS National Tour at Devil’s Bowl Speedway.

Hafertepe is coming off a 4th place finish at his family-owned Lone Star Speedway in Kilgore, Texas against The ASCS Lone Star region and has 5 straight top 10 finishes including a win against the ASCS Gulf South region at Golden Triangle Raceway Park and two 6th place finishes with The World of Outlaws.

“Lone Star went pretty well but wasn’t really what we were hoping for,” said Sam. “We drew an 8 pill for the feature again after passing Gary Wright and coming from 7th to 2nd in our heat. In the feature we passed Wright again who went on to win but we struggled clearing a guy who was really all over the place and Gary got by us while we dealt with him. By the time I got by the guy Gary was gone and the rubber was down.”

For Hafertepe leaving The World of Outlaws has presented him with a rare opportunity to race at home that he has rarely had the past few seasons.

“It’s really nice to be able to race at home,” he said. “Lone Star is only about an hour and a half from our house and Devil’s Bowl this weekend is about 15 minutes away from our front door. To be able to race for the kind of money we do against The ASCS National Tour without the travel expenses is a really good situation for us. That’s been one of the most important aspects of not being on The World of Outlaws tour. We can pick and choose the races that make sense for us to race and as a result our per race average in terms of cash coming in has gone WAY up versus racing The Outlaws exclusively and we’re not having to travel all over the country to do it.”

Despite being able to race close to home since coming home from Florida Sam does know that he’s going to have to start travelling pretty soon.

“We’re going to race at Devil’s Bowl and then The Lucas Oil Late Models are coming to my dad’s track for 3 nights the following week so we are going to take the weekend of from racing to help out my dad at that race,” explained Sam. “The following weekend (April 8th and 9th) we will hit Attica for 2 nights with The All Stars and then we’ll head to Paducah and I-55 to try our luck against The Outlaws. Really when we hit Attica is when we’ll start travelling around and from then on we should be racing all over pretty steadily throughout the year.”

The upcoming weekend will also allow Hafertepe the opportunity to capture his first ever win at his hometown track.

“I’ve actually never won at Devil’s Bowl,” said Sam. “I’ve been very fast there in the past, I’ve been walking away with races there and found ways to lose them. I’ve also come from deep in the field to almost get there but we’ve just never really put it all together there for a night. I really think we’ve got a good chance to win there this weekend. We’ve been running really strong no matter where we’ve been racing and I think it’s going to be tough going up against guys like Jason Johnson, Shane Stewart and Jack Dover but I like our chances if we can get the car close to where it needs to be.”

Sam would like to thank the following supporters: Plumbfast Mechanical, Lone Star Speedway, Keizer Aluminum Wheels, Pancho's Racing Products, Kear's Speed Shop, PPM Titanium Products, GPC Race Products, Butlerbuilt, Infinity Shocks, DMI, Finish Line Machining, Torco Racing Oils, Smiley's Racing Products, Brown and Miller Racing Solutions, Vortex Wings, AFCO Racing Shocks, Simpson Racing Products, Quick Sand Express Inc.

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