For the second time with the American Sprint Car Series in 2025, Sam Hafertepe Jr. asserted his dominance over the field with a flag-to-flag victory Saturday night at Dodge City Raceway Park.
Hafertepe, the five-time Series champion from Sunnyvale, TX, led all 25 laps of the 15th running of the Steve King Memorial at the 3/8-mile Kansas oval, pocketing the $4,000 grand prize and his 80th career Series victory — breaking the tie between he and the late Jason Johnson for second on the all-time wins list.
The win also counts as his second in the Steve King Memorial (2024, 2025) and his third consecutive Series Feature win at Dodge City. He also becomes the only driver in history to win three Series races at the track.
“We’ve come here and now we’ve won three different races with three completely different setups — different shocks, different torsion bars, different race cars, everything,” Hafertepe said. “I don’t know if it just fits my driving style; I don’t know the answer. It’s one of those places that we just go good at.”
Lining up to the outside of Austyn Gossel on the front row of the 25-lap main event, Hafertepe got the jump on the field and won the race into Turn 1 on the opening lap, allotting him the time and space to begin opening up a gap on the rest of the field — one that grew to over four seconds in the first six laps before a caution flag erased his advantage.
“I felt like if we got out front, we would be the car to beat, and the only way we would get beat was if I made a big mistake,” Hafertepe said.
On the restart, Hafertepe maintained his strength out front, once again creating separation on second-place Austyn Gossel and third-place Kyler Johnson. The two former Series rookies chased the Hills Racing Team No. 15H through traffic for the remainder of the race but were unable to catch him as Hafertepe led the field back around to the checkers with Gossel in second and Johnson in third — almost four seconds behind at the finish line.
“Honestly, I don’t think it would have mattered who started in front of us, I think we could’ve got around them,” Hafertepe said. “I think getting out to the lead on the bottom and getting that jump definitely did help. But I think our car was good enough that we could float across the middle, and I don’t think a lot of guys could.”
Gossel, of Fort Collins, CO, crossed the finish line with the runner-up spot to collect his first career American Sprint Car Series podium finish — five spots better than his previous best finish of eighth at Texarkana 67 Speedway last June.
Johnson, of Quinter, KS, crossed the stripe in third, notching his first podium finish of 2025 and tying his personal best with the Series, which came back in 2023 at 81 Speedway.
Roger Crockett turned the fastest lap in Qualifying (13.627) to earn Quick Time honors.
Heat Races were won by Matt Covington (Heat 1), Hafertepe (Heat 2), Jake Bubak (Heat 3) and Whit Gastineau (Heat 4).
The Honest Abe Roofing Dash was won by Austyn Gossel.
The Smith Titanium Last Chance Showdown was won by Jason Martin.
UP NEXT
The American Sprint Car Series returns to action next Saturday, June 7, at Texarkana 67 Speedway in Texarkana, AR. Tickets for the event will be sold at the track on race day.
If you can’t be there, stream every lap live on DIRTVision.
FEATURE RESULTS (view complete results)
Feature (25 Laps): 1. 15H-Sam Hafertepe Jr[2]; 2. 16G-Austyn Gossel[1]; 3. 45X-Kyler Johnson[4]; 4. 11-Roger Crockett[8]; 5. 27B-Jake Bubak[5]; 6. 95-Matt Covington[3]; 7. 14-Jordon Mallett[6]; 8. 23-Seth Bergman[9]; 9. 36-Jason Martin[17]; 10. 2-Whit Gastineau[7]; 11. 1X-Bryant Wiedeman[10]; 12. 2B-Garrett Benson[13]; 13. 17W-Harli White[16]; 14. 52-Blake Hahn[21]; 15. 10C-Jeremy Campbell[20]; 16. 6G-Bryan Gossel[12]; 17. 88J-Jeremy Huish[14]; 18. 71-Brady Baker[15]; 19. 10-Landon Britt[11]; 20. 88-Terry Easum[19]; 21. 88R-Ryder Laplante[24]; 22. 11H-Rodney Huband[22]; 23. 0-Steven Richardson[18]; 24. 2J-Zach Blurton[23]
