The ARCA Racing Series presented by Menards had its qualifying Friday afternoon for the Lucas Oil 200 driven by General Tire. Group qualifying is in place for all ARCA races, including restrictor plate tracks. Christian Eckes in the #15 JBL Audio Toyota was the fastest driver securing the General Tire Pole for the event on Saturday afternoon. Eckes’s lap averaged just over 183 miles per hour for a time of 49.180 seconds on the Daytona high-banks.
“You always want to start your season off this way,” Eckes said. “We watched a couple of others do it. Our plan was to stay up tight with the cars in front of us and see what happens but it turns out we dropped back and got a really good run We brought a really fast car here and we didn’t really show it yesterday. We have 80 more laps to do this. My whole team is just excited to get going.”
Eckes’s pole is the third straight year that Venturini Motorsports will lead the field to green at Daytona International Speedway. In 2018 it was Natalie Decker who grabbed the first starting spot, while Tom Hessert III scored pole in 2017.
Thad Moffitt, grandson of seven-time NASCAR Cup Series champ Richard Petty, missed the top spot by less than .046 seconds. Moffitt is driving the #46 Performance Plus Oil Chevy in his first appearance at Daytona.
“It’s really important for me to come out here and run well in my first race at Daytona,” Moffitt said. “I feel like racing at Daytona is a part of the family legacy and on Saturday I’ll do that. That’s one foot in the door. To win here would be getting both feet in the door.”
With the front row comprised of up and coming racers, the 2019 Lucas Oil 200 driven by General Tire is sure to be another thrilling race. The green flag is scheduled to drop at 4:30 ET on Saturday, February 9. It will be televised live on FS1, with live timing and scoring on ARCARacing.com
Qualifying Results
- Christian Eckes
- Thad Moffitt
- Leilani Munter
- Willie Mullins
- Harrison Burton
- Michael Self
- Natalie Decker
- Travis Braden
- Andy Seuss
- Connor Hall
- Brandon McReynolds
- Tyler Dippel
- CJ McLaughlin
- Bret Holmes
- Codie Rohrbaugh
- Gus Dean
- Riley Herbst
- Todd Gilliland
- Brenden Queen
- Joseph Graf Jr.
- John Ferrier
- Sean Corr
- Paul Williamson
- Bobby Gerhart
- Grant Quinlan
- Derrick Lancaster
- Dave Mader III
- Scott Melton
- J.J. Pack
- Tommy Vigh Jr.
- Jason White
- Eric Caudell
- Chuck Hiers
- Brad Smith
- Con Nicolopoulos
Nate Zimmerly is the Co-Owner of FifthTurn.com, which covers all things NASCAR. He loves NASCAR Racing more than he probably should and works full-time at Chick-fil-A to support his addictions to NASCAR and DraftKings.
