He may have sat out the NASCAR Camping World Truck Series race earlier in the day, but after watching Kyle Busch win that event, Truck series semi-regular Cole Custer went out and won the afternoon’s undercard ARCA race event, the ModSpace 125, at Pocono Raceway.
It was the third career ARCA start for Custer, surpassing his previous best finish of fifth earlier this season at New Jersey Motorsports Park.
The 17-year-old Custer, who has one win in five Truck starts this season, captured the 50-lap ARCA event by 4.991 seconds over Grant Enfinger.
“It was just a great race for us today,” Custer, son of Stewart-Haas Racing executive Joe Custer, told Fox Sports 2. “I was just able to bide my time and keep things clean.”
Enfinger finished second, followed by Matt Kurzejewski, Austin Theriault and Josh Williams.
In addition to his first ARCA win, Custer also has four career victories in the K&N Pro East and West Series and two in the Truck series.
He becomes the ninth first-time winner in the ARCA Series this season, joining Blake Jones (Talladea), 15-year-old Todd Gilliland (son of NASCAR driver David Gilliland, at Toledo), Kyle Weatherman (New Jersey), Trevor Bayne (Pocono in June), Ross Kenseth (Michigan), Ryan Reed (Chicagoland), Austin Wayne Self (Winchester) and Travis Braden (Indianapolis).
The race began in rather dubious fashion as, coming off the Tunnel Turn on Lap 1, Kyle Weatherman got loose, piled into the car of Frank Kimmel, and then a number of other cars were collected as a result.
The biggest victim of the incident was Tom Hessert, who suffered heavy damage to his car, ultimately finishing 25th in the 30-car field.
But Hessert suffered even greater damage in the ARCA point standings. He entered Saturday’s race 70 points behind series leader Enfinger.
Hessert leaves Pocono now tied for third place with Austin Wayne Self, both drivers 185 points behind Enfinger.
Follow @JerryBonkowski
