Mother's Day Salute

For 624 days, Matt Covington waited his turn to be a winner again with the American Sprint Car Series (ASCS) National Tour. A drought of 47 Tour races contested without a win, completely shut out of Victory Lane since his last checkered flag in August 2023.

At last, the waiting is over.

The 13-year Tour regular from Glenpool, OK, broke through Saturday night in the Tour’s return to Paducah International Raceway — where he won in the Tour’s first appearance in 2018 — leading all 30 laps of the main event to end the dry spell and collect his 20th career checkered flag with the National Tour.

“I’d be lying to you if I said it didn’t bother me a little bit,” Covington said. “It’s good to get that off our shoulders early in the season.”

The win marked his second career victory at the high-banked, 3/8-mile oval and his 20th with the Tour overall, moving him into a tie with Sammy Swindell and Johnny Herrera for 14th place on the all-time wins list. He also becomes the first driver in National Tour history to win more than once in the state of Kentucky.

Six-hundred forty-two days is a long time to wait for anything. Though Covington’s won races in other places since then, he admits the wait was getting to him. So, did it really feel like that long of a wait to get back to the winner’s circle with the nation’s premier 360 Sprint Car series?

“I’ve been racing a Sprint Car for a living since 2008, and it feels like yesterday,” Covington said. “Time flies when you’re having fun they say, and I’d say that’s definitely true — time flies, for sure. It doesn’t feel like it’s been that long.”

After turning the fastest lap time in his Qualifying group, winning his Heat Race and the Honest Abe Roofing Dash to earn the pole starting spot for the Feature, Covington took off at the drop of the green flag, leaving past Tour champions Blake Hahn and Sam Hafertepe Jr. in his wake as he worked his way through the first third of the race.

The next 10 laps were filled with multiple yellow and red-flag periods — one for Aaron Rixmann and another for Kyler Johnson, who were involved in rollover incidents in Turns 3–4 — which forced Covington to be strong on several restarts.

“Out motor was taking off strong, and I felt like we had good speed, and the track was so fast,” Covington said. “I’d have to really mess up, I felt like, for them to get around me. So, if anything, I didn’t mind the cautions and the reds.”

Covington has never been shy about his preference for high-speed, large-size tracks. Despite the moisture in the surface of the high-banked, 3/8-mile confines of Paducah on Saturday, that never once bothered Covington in his pursuit of victory. In fact, he embraced its characteristics.

“Honestly, a little bit of roughness and that kind of thing makes me drive the car harder,” Covington said. “When you get off the gas and you don’t keep the tires spinning a little bit when you go across the ruts, it can make your car a handful. I did it one time myself out there and it kinda hopped the front end a little bit.”

Hafertepe crossed the finish line second after running the entire race inside the top-five. From fifth on the starting grid, he worked his way to third inside the first 10 laps, chasing Hahn around until Hahn’s right-rear tire came off in Turn 3 on Lap 18, putting him directly behind Covington for the following restart.

All of which he did with a tire going soft.

“Probably right around halfway, I felt like we cut that right-rear tire down just battling,” Hafertepe said. “Those cautions and reds, we had a pretty slow leak, and then I felt like it got worse and worse as the race went on.”

In the closing laps, Hafertepe made every effort to keep the car straight and brought home a runner-up finish, which officially sets him as the new Tour points leader.

“Out in clean air, I don’t think anybody had anything for Covington,” Hafertepe said. “We were battling a few guys just because of the right-rear being low on us on the restarts. But I felt like once we got some speed up and I got some air pressure built back up, we could hang in there pretty good. And actually, I felt like we had a shot at Covington right before that last caution came out.”

Jason Martin completed the podium with a third-place finish after starting eighth. Harli White bagged the fourth spot, marking her best finish with the Tour since her fourth-place finish at US 36 Raceway in August 2020. Despite the incident losing his right-rear tire, Hahn was able to drive all the way back through the field in the remaining 12 laps after coming out of the work area to finish fifth.

UP NEXT

The ASCS National Tour is back in action Friday–Saturday, May 30–31, for a weekend in Kansas at Salt City Speedway and Dodge City Raceway Park for the annual Steve King Memorial.

Tickets for both races will be sold at the track on race day. If you can’t be there to watch in person, stream every lap live on DIRTVision.

ABBREVIATED RESULTS (view full results)

Feature (30 Laps): 1. 95-Matt Covington[1]; 2. 15H-Sam Hafertepe Jr[5]; 3. 36-Jason Martin[8]; 4. 17W-Harli White[10]; 5. 52-Blake Hahn[2]; 6. 10-Landon Britt[14]; 7. 21-Joey Moughan[9]; 8. 14-Jordon Mallett[18]; 9. 71-Brady Baker[13]; 10. 938-Bradley Fezard[6]; 11. 88C-Brogan Carder[11]; 12. 16G-Austyn Gossel[7]; 13. 23-Seth Bergman[4]; 14. 2J-Zach Blurton[19]; 15. 88-Terry Easum[17]; 16. 45X-Kyler Johnson[3]; 17. 31-Casey Wills[12]; 18. 3A-Aaron Rixmann[15]; 19. 2B-Garrett Benson[16]