BRANDON, Miss. — Story by Race Chaser Online Managing Editor Jacob Seelman — Real Sim Racing photo —
It may have looked like a modified at the finish, but Adam Benefiel’s No. 01 Adasign Wraps/Rollspeed Dynamics Ford Fusion got the job done during Monday night’s =RSR= Full Throttle Cup Series event at Martinsville Speedway.
Benefiel stormed his way to the front of the field after taking tires inside of 20 laps to go during the Garry Mercer Trucking 200 and utilized several late-race restarts and field stack-ups to finish third — just ahead of teammate Dwayne Vincent — both notching his best FTCS finish of the season and first top five of 2015 after three straight weeks of connection problems.
The front end was ripped off and had no fenders on it, but according to the driver, “it still had speed.”
“Even though the car looked absolutely destroyed, somehow, it still had a little bit in it and I was feeling pretty good,” Benefiel said of the final laps on Monday night. “When I made my final stop, I pitted from eighth and when everything cycled around I was tenth on fresh tires — so I knew I had a chance.”
“I was just going for what I could at the end there — we’ve had trouble even finishing these races and I just wanted to flex a little bit of muscle for a few laps. I’m glad we were finally able to show what we were capable of.”
The effort is one that Benefiel calls “a relief” after having four wins in 2014 and subsequently floundering through the opening of the 2015 campaign.
“It was huge for us,” Benefiel said. “We had shown we had speed every week and in a couple races, we probably had the car to beat — we just didn’t have Lady Luck on our side. I feel like Monday night was a step in the right direction to getting back on track to the way we ended last season (winning the season finale).”
While the run moved Benefiel to 34th in points, it still leaves him 18 points shy of the top 30 in the championship standings — the threshold that will not only lock Benefiel into the field each week and pull him out of the dreaded “go or go home” qualifying category, but would also put him on the Full Throttle Chase Grid if he is able to score a regular-season win before the Chase cutoff at Richmond in September.
Not that he’s worried, of course.
“It’s still too early in the season to start stressing about the Chase,” Benefiel smiled. “As long as the guys at One Up keep giving me cars like they have for the first six races I feel confident that we will snag us a win — and then all the pressure’s off.”
Benefiel also says that the recent addition of teammate Dwayne Vincent — expanding One Up Motorsports’ efforts to a two-car operation — has been a huge benefit to both him and the greater group as a whole.
“Dwayne has been an asset to One Up — and he’s really shown me a completely different way to race a race,” Benefiel said. “[He’s taught me to] be patient and race smart so that you’re there at the end, when there’s 50 [laps] to go and it’s go time.”
“We feed off each other and test for hours each week so when it come to the race on Monday night we have a game plan going in and know exactly what the car is gonna do on each part of a run. We’re hoping to keep that moving forward into race seven at Texas.”
Benefiel will have his next opportunity to chase after a victory when the =RSR= Full Throttle Cup Series takes to the track next on April 13 for a 300 km throwdown in the Real Deal Grafix 300 at Texas Motor Speedway.
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