Numerous times over Sean Rayhall’s debut Full-Time Sprint Car season in 2020, he’s said the words, “it’s how you get up.” After a tough outing this past weekend with the USCS 360 Sprints, Rayhall got up in a BIG way back in familiar territory on asphalt.
The weekend began at Night 1 of the USCS Sprints “Flip Flop 50” at Riverside Speedway in West Memphis, AR. A unique format featured 36 entries and 4 heats to run on Friday, with passing points determining Feature qualifiers, then 2 B Mains to be run on Saturday night, with the top 4 from each advancing to the A Main. Rayhall was slated to start 4th in a stacked heat race, and although the 67 of Hayden Martin passed 4 cars from 6th before turn 1 including the 14R, Rayhall would move past 3rd place starter Chase Howard and maintain 4th after lap 1 and quickly close in on 3rd running Mallie Shuster during the second circuit. Entering turn three on lap 3, Rayhall threw a perfectly timed slide job on Shuster and seemed poised to exit turn 4 in 3rd and with valuable passing points gained. However, as Rayhall reached the cushion exiting four a full two car links ahead of Shuster’s 49 machine, Shuster failed to turn under the slider and rammed the 14R’s left front, resulting in a full 360 spin on the rear tires for Rayhall, a completely destroyed front end, and a swift, disappointing end to what was a promising start to the weekend.
With Rayhall technically going from 4th to 9th in terms of passing points, the Woodstock, GA native would have to start from 11th (last) in the 12 lap B Main. Unfortunately, the race went green to checkered on a largely one-lane racing surface, and a 9th place was all that could be done for the 14R team. A disappointing end to what was overall a fantastic first full sprint car season for Rayhall.
However, there was more work to be done. A drive through the night to Dawsonville, GA saw Rayhall meet up with Legends Car owner Nick Pistone to drive the Marthaler Chevy #100 car in the US Legends Cars Road Course World Finals at Atlanta Motorsports Park. Due to the weekend’s sprint car commitments, Rayhall missed practice and qualifying on Friday and Saturday, and thus would start in 23rd at the very back of the field.
The 10 lap Feature race began and Rayhall immediately started moving through the field. At the first caution flag on lap 3, Rayhall found himself up to 14th place. Unfortunately, on the restart Rayhall made contact with another car resulting in bent front suspension on his Marthaler Chevy #100 machine. Rayhall would not be fazed however, and continued to push over the final 7 laps and bring the car home in a fantastic 6th position.
“Really unfortunate that we got ran over in the heat race (at Riverside).” Rayhall said. “That really put us behind the 8 ball and we had such a fast car. Once we got to the B Main, we knew it was going to be a tough track to pass on and just took what we could get and got back on the road to Georgia.
“We moved up through the Legends Pro division pretty quickly and on one of the restarts got caught up in a wreck that bent our left front suspension pretty bad. But we were still able to come away with a 6th place in our #100 Marthaler Chevy thanks to Nick Pistone for giving me an awesome car. I’m really thankful to all of the opportunities our partners gave me this year and I can’t wait to get 2021 started!”
Rayhall finished the year with an impressive stat sheet across Sprint Cars and 1 Asphalt Legends race.
Quick Times: 2
Top 15’s: 16
Top 10’s: 5
Race Wins: 2
IRA Sprints Final Points Standing: 6th
IRA Sprints Rookie of the Year
Sean Rayhall Race Results
11/6 Riverside, AR USCS
Heat S/4, F/DNF
11/7 Riverside, AR USCS
B Main: S/11, F/9
11/8 Dawsonville, GA US Legends Road Course World Finals
S/23, F/6
NEXT RACE:
END OF SEASON
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