[media-credit name=”ARCA Racing Network” align=”alignright” width=”180″]
[/media-credit](TALLADEGA, Ala.) – With only one practice session to consider when choosing a contender in a previously rainy week at Talladega Superspeedway, Alex Bowman seems a favorite for today’s International Motorsports Hall of Fame 250.
The 18-year-old Tucson, Ariz. native led this morning’s 55-minute practice session, the only on-track activity before today’s fourth race of the season for the ARCA Racing Series presented by Menards. His lap of 51.391 seconds (186.336 mph) topped April open test leader Will Kimmel, Chris Buescher, Brett Hudson, and 2001 Talladega winner Bobby Gerhart.
Bowman drove 16 laps in the session. He won last week at the 0.555-mile Salem Speedway in Indiana, his third ARCA Racing Series win in five career starts.
All 43 cars participated in the practice session after rain forced the cancellation of three hours of practice and Menards Pole Qualifying presented by Ansell on Thursday.
Matt Lofton, driver of the No. 16 Chevrolet for Coulter Motorsports, will start first in today’s race, and he finished ninth in the practice session. Lofton’s team acquired the owner points of the No. 41 Chevrolet, last year’s ARCA Racing Series champion. The previous year’s owner points are used to set the field in instances where qualifying is cancelled in any of a season’s first four races.
Today’s International Motorsports Hall of Fame 250 will air live on SPEED at 5 p.m. (4 p.m. Central). ARCARacing.com will feature live timing and scoring coverage, as well as live audio coverage of the race, as presented by WTDR Thunder 92.7 FM of Alabama.
2012 is the ARCA Racing Series presented by Menards’ 60th Anniversary Season, featuring 20 races at 18 tracks. The complete 2012 event schedule is available at ARCARacing.com.
The ARCA Racing Series presented by Menards has crowned an ARCA national champion each year since its inaugural season in 1953, and has toured over 200 race tracks in 28 states since its inception. The series has tested the abilities of drivers and race teams over the most diverse schedule of stock car racing events in the world, visiting tracks ranging from 0.4 mile to 2.66 miles in length, on both paved and dirt surfaces as well as a left- and right-turn road course in its most recent season. This year, the series will visit Alabama’s Mobile International Speedway and Minnesota’s Elko Speedway for the first time; ARCA’s first visit to Minnesota will give ARCA a race in a 29th state.
Founded by John and Mildred Marcum in 1953 in Toledo, Ohio, the Automobile Racing Club of America (ARCA) is recognized among the leading sanctioning bodies in the country. Closing in on completing its sixth decade after hundreds of thousands of miles of racing, ARCA administers over 100 race events each season in three professional touring series and local weekly events.
