Top Finishers Split Awards In ARCA Menards Series East Opener At New Smyrna

The ARCA Menards Series East began its 2021 season Monday night with the Jeep Beach 175 at Florida’s New Smyrna Speedway without a clear favorite in the field.

When the smoke cleared after 187 laps, an hour-plus red flag for rain and two green-white-checkered attempts, Max Gutiérrez in the No. 30 TOUGHBUILT Ford emerged as the surprise winner. He also was one of a few drivers who staked claims to ARCA’s special awards for the evening.

REWIND: What We Learned at New Smyrna

Monday’s proceedings began with a General Tire Pole qualifying session that saw the top seven drivers on the speed charts lay down fast laps within a tenth of a second of the pole time. That pole time belonged to Taylor Gray in the No. 17 Ford Performance Ford, whose lap speed of 92.072 mph earned him the first General Tire Pole Award of the year.

Gray assumed the point when the green flag waved to start the Jeep Beach 175, but it took only 10 laps for Parker Retzlaff in the No. 42 Ponsse Toyota to chase down Gray and take the lead.

Retzlaff, who qualified sixth but benefitted from a chaotic start to the race, held the lead for the next 55 laps until Gray regained the spot near the race’s midpoint. Retaining the lead at the scheduled break, Gray took Richmond Water Heaters Halfway Leader honors and set out to finish the second half of the race strong.

Sammy Smith, making his ARCA Menards Series East debut for Joe Gibbs Racing in the No. 18 Engine Ice Toyota, had a different plan in mind and took over as race leader on pit road at Lap 94. Smith held the position until the late-race red flag with four laps to go, leading 78 laps in the process to become the Valvoline Lap Leader for the first time.

Retzlaff sits second to Smith in the yearlong lap leader standings with 55 laps led. Gray led 43 laps, leaving him in third.

Gutiérrez’s three-wide pass for the victory in the final stretch was the winning nominee from the Reese’s Sweet Move of the Race voting. New for 2021, ARCA has partnered with Reese’s to create an award for the driver that pulls off the “Sweet Move of the Race” as voted on by the fans the day after each race via the official Twitter account for the ARCA Menards Series. Capturing 73.7 percent of the votes, Gutiérrez’s pass won the inaugural award in a landslide.

Yeah, it was pretty sweet@reeses | @RetteJones30 pic.twitter.com/X1lrieTB1j

— ARCA Menards Series (@ARCA_Racing) February 9, 2021

Gutiérrez’s win came in just his third career ARCA Menards Series East start, leading him to be named the Bounty Rookie of the Race. Gutiérrez plans to run the full East schedule with Rette Jones Racing, giving him a head start in the Bounty Rookie of the Year chase, as well.

Though it may be little consolation in defeat, Smith was the K&N Filters Hard Charger at New Smyrna as he rose from his ninth-place starting position to finish second by the time the checkered flag waved. He finished ahead of Gray in third.

The ARCA Menards Series East will be back in action on Saturday, Feb. 27 at 5 Flags Speedway in Pensacola, Florida, for the running of the Pensacola 200. Live coverage will begin at 6 p.m. ET on NBC Sports Gold’s TrackPass. Live timing and scoring for all on-track activity can be found on ARCARacing.com.