ARCA: Mid-race header problems gives Blaise Zebrataur his second career last-place finish; prevents Ray Dent Jr. from getting his first

Blaise Zebrataur picked up the 1st last place finish of his SCRL Lucas Oil ARCA Racing Series career in Sunday's Shore Lunch 200 at the Lucas Oil Raceway when his #52 Federated Auto Parts Chevrolet fell out with header problems after completing 9 of the 20 laps.

The finish came in his 10th start. In the SCRL Lucas Oil ARCA Racing Series, it's the 1st for car #52 and the 5th for header issues. Across all the series in the SCRL, it's the 4th for the #52 and the 21st for header issues. 

Blaise Zebrataur

Blaise had a lot of pressure on his hooves, as he was the replacement of one of the most longest active and most successful drivers in league history, Oreius Centaur, who retired after competing for 5 years and ranking up 20 career wins as well as winning a championship in the ISCR. Blaise also happened to be stock car racing's first and only pegasus zebrataur to race in a league in the entire history of gaming. Blaise was making only his second ever full time season after having competed full time in Season 2 of the SCRL Formula E Series Presented by Twitter, a season he posted a best finish of 2nd in the series final race of the season at Surfers Paradise and would finish 14th in the overall point standings. Despite having only one full time season under his belt, Blaise was tapped by Ken Schrader Racing to drive full time in the ARCA Series, having signed up for at least three seasons driving for the team in hopes of one day possibly racing in the SCRL's Strictly Stock Series.

In just his first career ARCA start, Blaise would once again impress starting 3rd and would lead 5 laps and would finish 2nd once again, in the next round at his home track, Blaise led 7 laps and was the race leader when the race was extended by way of the Green, White, Checkered rule and had to settle for a 3rd place finish. A disappointing 24th at Nashville would be followed with 6th at Salem, 27th at Talladega, 33rd at Charlotte and a 36th at Gateway before he would score his second runner up finish at Pocono before finishing 14th in the last round at Chicagoland.

In qualifying, Ray Jones scored his first career series pole with a time of 23.503 seconds, winning the pole by one thousandths of a second, while Blaise posting a time of 24.163 seconds, 0.660 behind Jones's pole run, placing Blaise 39th on the grid while starting last was Salem last-place finisher the unsponsored #40 Carter 2 Motorsports Dodge of Matthew Logan

Ray Dent Jr. stalls on pit road.

When the command was given for drivers to start their engines and begin their lone pace lap, the unsponsored #69 Kimnmel Racing Ford of Ray Dent Jr. stalled on pit road and was forced to be pushed into his pit stall while the other 39 drivers started the race. Dent would remain on pit road for two laps as his crew replaced all four tires before sending their driver back out onto the track. Dent would trail the first through the first caution and appeared on his way to his first last place finish of his career. That all changed on Lap 10 when Blaise, who had worked his way up to the 34th spot, began to slow going down the backstretch, his car starting to smoke as he pulled onto pit road and then making that hard left turn into the garage. His team would look under the hood and discovered the header was broken, and with only ten laps to go, the team, would not have enough time to repair it, so their night was done, not taking the final spot until Lap 12, one lap after the car had been listed out by officials while Dent would drive home finishing 39th, avoiding his first last place finish.

Rounding out the Bottom Five all finished on the same lap as the race leaders; 38th was the #15 Renton Coil Spring /  Venturini Motorsports Toyota of Anthony Lopez, 37th was the aforementioned #40 of Matthew Logan and 36th was the unsponsored #99 Roulo Brothers Racing Ford of Grace Takayoma.

SCRLASTCAR STATISTICS
*This was the first time the #52 has finished last in the ARCA Series race at Lucas Oil Raceway.
*This marked only the second time in the history of the ARCA Series the #52 has finished last; the only other time it happened was in the Season 2 ModSpace 125 at the Pocono Raceway when Jay Jefferson was involved in a multi-car crash after 5 of the 22 laps; 16 races ago.
*This marked the fifth time a driver has trailed the field in a ARCA Series race due to header problems; the most recent time it happened was the Pocono ARCA 200 at the Pocono Raceway when Sebastian Cucalon's #19 Battomi-Lawton Insurance Dodge fell out with header problems without completing any of the 22 laps; 2 races ago.

THE BOTTOM FIVE
40) #52-Blaise Zebrataur / 9 laps / header
39) #69-Ray Dent Jr. / 18 lap / running
38) #15-Anthony Logan / 20 laps / running
37) #40-Matthew Logan / 20 laps / running
36) #99-Grace Takayoma / 20 laps / running