Bret Holmes, driver of the #23 Holmes II Excavation Chevrolet, holds the trophy after winning the ARCA Menards Dawn 150 on July 24, 2020 at Kansas Speedway in Kansas City, Kansas. (Ed Zurga/ARCA Racing)
Bret Holmes, driver of the #23 Holmes II Excavation Chevrolet, holds the trophy after winning the Dawn 150 for the ARCA Menards Series on July 24, 2020 at Kansas Speedway in Kansas City, Kansas. (Ed Zurga/ARCA Racing)

Bret Holmes Dominates Race, Awards At Kansas Speedway

www.arcaracing.com July 27, 2020

Throughout the 2020 season, Bret Holmes (No. 23 Holmes II Excavation Chevrolet) has been inching closer and closer to victory lane. The fifth-year driver out of Alabama tied his best career finish of third at his home track of Talladega and then followed it up with a runner-up performance at Kentucky, leading a career-high 17 laps in the process. Friday night at Kansas Speedway, Holmes finally broke through and won – and won big. The 23-year old driver won the Dawn 150 in style, racking up ARCA’s special awards for the Bret Holmes Racing team as he won the race by nearly half a lap.

The starting grid was once again determined by the owners’ points standings, awarding Joe Gibbs Racing’s Riley Herbst (No. 18 Monster Energy Toyota) the General Tire Pole. It was Herbst’s first pole start of the season, though his JGR teammate Ty Gibbs also has a pole on his record from Phoenix in March. Michael Self (No. 25 Sinclair Lubricants Toyota) and Chandler Smith are the only drivers with multiple starts from the General Tire Pole position this season. Self has started P1 three times while Smith has done so twice.

Dawn 150: Results | Race Recap | Photo Gallery

Herbst jumped out to lead the first 18 laps of the race, but Bret Holmes quickly tracked him down following an early restart. Holmes made the pass for the lead on lap 19 and never gave up the spot for the remainder of the evening, leading the final 82 laps and picking up the Valvoline Lap Leader and Richmond Water Heaters Halfway Leader awards for the evening. Holmes became the first driver besides Ty Gibbs to lead at the halfway mark more than once this season, claiming the award at Daytona as well. Gibbs has led at halfway four times in the 2020 season.

In the yearlong Valvoline Lap Leader standings, Holmes has jumped to third on the leaderboard with 107 laps led, still trailing a pair of young Toyota hotshots. Ty Gibbs has dominated the season so far, leading 424 laps, and Chandler Smith is his closest competitor with 187 laps led. Neither Gibbs nor Smith was in the field at Kansas.

The win by Holmes put his crew chief, Shane Huffman, back in Victory Lane at an ARCA race for the first time in just over two years. Huffman had last won with driver Brandon Jones at Pocono in 2018 prior to coaching Holmes to the win at Kansas. Huffman was named the Cometic Crew Chief of the Race for his role in the victory. Huffman is currently fourth in the Cometic Crew Chief of the Year standings with 80 points. At the top of that leaderboard, Michael Self’s crew chief Kevin Reed is in a battle with Joe Gibbs Racing No. 18 crew chief Mark McFarland. Reed has 42 points on the season, with McFarland very close behind at 44 points.

The No. 23 team’s win has lifted Bret’s father and car owner, Stacy Holmes, to the second spot in the General Tire Superspeedway Challenge standings, trailing only Coy Gibbs and the No. 18 Joe Gibbs Racing team. Gibbs has 204 points after five superspeedway events, with a gap of only three points back to the BHR No. 23 team. Cathy Venturini, car owner of Michael Self’s No. 25 Toyota, is four points out of the lead and Bill Venturini’s No. 15 Toyota driven by Drew Dollar is six points back of Gibbs. The next scheduled General Tire Superspeedway Challenge race will be at Michigan on August 9.

Holmes ended a six-race streak of drivers with rookie stripes on their back bumper winning ARCA Menards Series races. The Bounty Rookie of the Race at Kansas went to second-place Ryan Repko (No. 20 Craftsman Toyota), making his fourth start of the season, all coming on the superspeedways. The race was another speedbump for Bounty Rookie of the Year contenders Hailie Deegan (No. 4 Monster Energy Ford) and Drew Dollar (No. 15 Dollar Concrete Toyota), who both finished outside the top five. Dollar finished seventh, rebounding from an engine issue at Iowa that left him over 40 laps down at the finish, while Deegan avoided a third consecutive DNF by finishing ninth. Deegan and Dollar are in a dead heat at the top of the rookie standings with 285 points each, the only rookies to have started all eight races this season.

Michael Self finished on the lead lap in sixth at Kansas, completing every lap of the race for the seventh time this year. Self is on top of the S&S Volvo Laps Completed standings, having run 934 of a possible 936 laps of competition.

Marietta, Georgia’s Corey Heim (No. 12 JBL Audio Toyota) was a familiar sight on the ARCA Menards Series tour a year ago, making 13 starts for Chad Bryant Racing, but had yet to reappear in the series until Friday night at Kansas. Driving a car prepared by Venturini Motorsports, Heim ran second to Bret Holmes for much of the evening until fading in the closing laps back to fourth. Heim earned the K&N Filters Hard Charger status anyway, driving up six spots after being placed in tenth on the starting grid.

The next race weekend for the ARCA Menards Series will be a unique doubleheader at Toledo Speedway. The Menards.com 200 presented by SPxE is scheduled for an 8:00 PM Eastern green flag time on Friday, July 31. The second half of the twin bill will be the Menards 200 presented by Crosley Brands on Saturday, August 1 beginning at 6:00 PM Eastern. The races will serve as the fourth and fifth events of the Sioux Chief Showdown schedule, in which Chandler Smith holds the lead through three rounds. Both races will be broadcast live on MAVTV and NBC Sports Gold’s TrackPass subscription service, and live timing & scoring will be available on ARCARacing.com.