ON SITE: Travis Adams rolls on at Oxford

Travis Adams got out of his car and immediately paid homage to one of the greatest drivers in the storied history of Oxford Plains Speedway.

"My hero is Jeff Taylor," Adams said Saturday night after winning his 2nd straight 40-lap Late Model feature to open the season at Oxford. "I grew up watching him just dominate everybody, and he did it by driving super-clean.

"I'd like to think that I'm half the driver he is, and I'd like to think I'm just as clean."

Adams extended his points lead over Ricky Rolfe -- who missed the heat race after returning from running his car at Wiscasset Raceway earlier in the day -- as he seeks his 3rd straight Late Model championship and 4th overall. But even with his 26th career win at the .375-mile speedway, he still has a long way to go to match Taylor's accomplishments.

Taylor holds the OPS record with 9 career driving titles -- including the last Super Late Model crown offered in 2006 -- and sits 3rd on the track's all-time win list with 61 victories.

But the way Adams finished last season, by winning his 1st career American-Canadian Tour event in the Oxford finale, and the way he's started this season, with 2 dominant wins in weekly competition, he's on the way to at least being mentioned in the same name as some of the track's all-time greats.

About the only challenge Adams received after taking the lead near the midpoint of the event came from his own psyche.

"On one of those restarts, they got into my right rear quarter panel, and I radioed in and said something didn't feel right," said Adams, who beat 2nd-place Carey Martin by more than 4 seconds. "But it was probably just the driver's head that felt funny."

Jim Childs, Dale Verrill and Tommy Ricker rounded out the top-5.

"I ran as fast as I could until there were 5 laps to go, and then you've just got to protect your position," Martin said of seeing the rest of the top-5 racing furiously behind him. "It was one of those deals where he was so far ahead you weren't going to catch him."

"The car is just going really well right now," Adams said. "It's awesome."

Skip Tripp won his 2nd straight Strictly Stock feature, while Don Mooney won the 30-lap Mini Stock main.