AUDIO/RECAP: Ward Wins the Battle, But Marinak Takes the War in Outlaw Truck Series Finale at Chicagoland

JOLIET, Ill. — Recap by Race Chaser Online Managing Editor Jacob Seelman — LSRTV audio — Jacob Seelman/iRacing.com photo —

After saying he would “likely not be a factor all night,” Jeff Ward sprung to life when it counted, rolling to his fifth =RSR= Outlaw Truck Series victory in eight races during Wednesday night’s season-ending Windy City Showdown at Chicagoland Speedway.

Ward, who led 68 of the race’s 110 laps, took the lead for good on lap 93 from Stefan Marinak and never looked back en route to a dominating victory — leading by as much as 3.4 seconds in the closing stages.

The race officially ended under caution after a crash with three laps to go saw Dwayne Vincent, Thomas Lattimore and Anthony Palombo tangle on the backstretch, sealing the victory for the No. 89 Unocal 76/Stihl High Performance Chevrolet Silverado.

“I don’t know [how we did it],” Ward admitted in Gatorade Victory Lane. “We qualified fifth and I didn’t feel like we were all that fast, but we had a pretty good truck on the long runs. I don’t know that we really figured anything out, but we made it work and got ourselves another one. It feels pretty good.”

After sustaining damage in the race’s second caution on lap 32, sparked when Anthony DeBaro got loose off the exit of turn four while racing for second and triggered a six-truck melee, J.D. Laird used a short-pit strategy in the closing stages to rally back from 13th and finish in the runner-up spot at the checkered flag.

“[We finished second] by pure luck,” Laird laughed. “After the wreck we were in at lap [32], I thought we were done. I knew the only way to even get a top ten out of all of it was to outsmart everyone on pit strategy. When I ducked onto pit road it was the perfect time to be able to run the fuel tank all the way to the end, and I guess somehow we ended up second. How about that?”

Cody Gibson came back from damage in the same wreck to finish third, with Nick Kohan and Matt LaCross rounding out the top five at the finish.

Marinak, who spun at lap 26 to bring out the race’s first caution and took two tires before the race’s final restart at lap 92 to try and “go out with a bang,” managed an eighth place finish — but locked the points championship up simply by taking the green flag on Wednesday night.

The title was Marinak’s first-career Outlaw Truck Series championship and his second Real Sim Racing crown overall, after winning the inaugural =RSR= Asphalt Assault Series championship in 2013.

“Jeff was easily the most dominant driver all season, but luckily for me, he missed a race early on so I took advantage of that,” Marinak said on the champion’s stage. “I just tried to manage my gap until tonight, when I knew we had it locked up.”

“It means a lot, because this field was so deep,to be able to win the championship. It’s certainly a big addition to my sim-racing resume and I’m proud of everyone at the Wolfpack who put time into making this possible for us. It was a team effort.”

On the other side of the spectrum, the night was rocky for RCO-Boomtown Sim after the team swept the front row in qualifying. DeBaro’s night ended after the lap 32 mishap, while his teammate and polesitter Mitch Rollo was collected in the second-to-last caution on lap 85 — knocked into the inside wall on the backstretch after Jose Gonzalez smacked the outside wall in turn two and came down the race track.

In total, the race saw four caution flags for 12 laps and 12 lead changes between seven different drivers.

While Marinak was celebrating on the champion’s stage, Ward, meanwhile, was left to wonder what could have been. His first victory of the year came at Michigan as a substitute driver for his Steel Horse Racing teammate Dan Murray — had the points that Ward earned been credited to his own total, he would have collected the championship hardware by an unofficial margin of 19 points.

“Looking back on it, you kind of have to wonder,” Ward admitted. “I always like to help a teammate out, and it was great that we were able to get the win for Dan that night, but we should have entered our own truck. At the time, I was focused more on the Asphalt Assault [XFINTY] Series and wasn’t looking to run the trucks, but I got in and had a blast subbing for Dan and figured I ought to make a run at it.”

“[Losing the title] doesn’t hurt until you think about it like that, and then it does sting a little bit. What might have been, right?”

Audio with race winner Jeff Ward: