ON SITE: It's wreckers-to-checkers for Travis Stearns

After nearly destroying his car in a violent crash a week earlier, Travis Stearns thought it would look cool just to hang some white body panels on the car with duct tape everywhere and bring it back to the track looking like that.

But crew chief Brad Hammond stopped him.

"No, I told him it would look cool to get it painted back up, decal the car and put our sponsors on it, just like nothing ever happened," Hammond said. "I told him if we went out there and won the race like that, then that would be cool."

It was. Very cool.

Stearns took the lead from Donnie Wentworth just before halfway and then led the remaining 22 laps of the 40-lap Late Model feature at Oxford Plains Speedway last night to collect his 1st career win in any division across 3+ seasons of racing.

"I'm just speechless right now, I really am," said an elated Stearns, 23.

Stearns held off former OPS champion Ricky Rolfe by more than half a straightaway at the checkered flag -- after Rolfe's Race Basics shop worked through Thursday afternoon to get the car back together for Stearns. Stearns had smashed the backstretch wall at Oxford the week before in what he called "by far" the hardest hit he'd ever taken in a race car.

"I told him that I guess I fixed it up too good," Rolfe said moments after congratulating Stearns in victory lane.

"We almost trashed the car and just threw it out. We bent the front clip, rear clip, an entire part of the middle section," Stearns said. "Even the seat was no good anymore."

But after Stearns and his team worked until almost 4 a.m. on Saturday to get the car back together in time to participate in the afternoon practice session, he believed he had a car good enough to win. He'd also taken some gentle ribbing from Rolfe about trying not to crack the car up again this week.

"I thought I was going to get (the first win) last week, to be honest. But you couldn't ask for a better first win, you really couldn't -- all my guys were just awesome," Stearns said. "They just wanted to race. Brad kept saying, 'We're going to make it, we're going to make it, we're going ot make it.' I'm glad we did.

"I saw Ricky coming (at the end), and I was afraid it was just a matter of time. I just kept telling myself to take it easy, easy. I'm really still kind of speechless right now."

But with only 1 caution flag to slow the race -- for a Ben Ashline spin on lap 8 -- the field never had the opportunity to reel Stearns back in.

Carey Martin posted his 2nd straight 3rd-place finish behind Stearns and Rolfe. 3-time and defending Late Model champion Travis Adams, who'd won the first 2 races of the season, finished 4th.

"Now we're getting into old tires," Adams said. "Now we're into one tire a week, which is different for our setups. We certainly dialed her in for the feature... but I just didn't have the track position I needed."

Wentworth held on for 5th.

In other Oxford Championship Series features, Larry Emerson won the 30-lap Strictly Stock main and Bill Childs Sr. took the checkered flag first in the 30-lap Mini Stock event.

Comments

[Unknown]

That was a truly insane display by Travis Stearns, I'm a fan of that kid. He was running great the week he hit the wall too, he must have went from like 13th to 3rd in 12 laps the week before and this week he just dominated the field after wrecking his car last week, everything the 85 team must have gone through to get that car going, that was an excellent race! That story makes racing fun to follow.

[lovegardenin]

travis sterns looked for you past couple saturdays haven't seen you in oxford everything ok travis adams wanted to congradulate you on your championship but cann't email you from your website congradulations to skipp tripp and truck # 74 also to car #46 jame berry first win