Hartlaub Earns Hard Charger; First 410 Start of Season This Week

The following night, the 358 Summer Series event at Lincoln Speedway drew a quality field of 33 cars.  Four heat lineups were set by a pill draw.  The top five finishers would transfer to the A-main but only the top two would be handicapped.

The draw didn’t help Hartlaub much more than the handicap system did the night before.  Once again, he lined out outside row four for the second heat race of the night.  

Hartlaub was able to surge into 5th on the opening lap but that was the limit of his progress on the narrow, early program racing surface.  

The outcome of qualifying put Hartlaub behind a lot of good cars to start the A-main.  He would take the green in the 18th position.  

Hartlaub’s team continued to adjust on his No.95 throughout the night, dialing it in.  Meanwhile the racing surface widened.  When the green lights flashed on for the 25-lap main event, the East Berlin, PA resident went right to work.

Hartlaub charged forward seven spots in just the first five laps.  By lap eight he had cracked the top ten.  From there, it was a methodical effort to chase down and pick off competitors.

When the checkers fell on the event and the dust had settled, Hartlaub had cracked the top five yet again, passing thirteen cars to get there.

Summing up Friday and Saturday night, Hartlaub passed a grand total of 25 cars to turn in finishes of 6th and 5th on what could have very easily been two very tough finishes outside the top ten instead.