GUELPH, ON- 2013 Sunset Speedway weekly champion Mike Bentley will be back in familiar surroundings on May 23rd, when the APC United Late Model Series rolls into his home track for their inaugural 100-lap event.
“I couldn’t have asked for a better place for the tour to start,” says Bentley. “Sunset has been home for a long time. It’s definitely the place that our team feels most comfortable at. We’re hoping to fall back on everything we’ve learned over the last 5 seasons and hit the ground running”
The second-generation competitor will debut a brand new Grand American Race Cars chassis in Saturday’s event, after an off-season spent redesigning his team’s program for competition with the upstart APC Series.
“This car has been a labor of love in a lot of ways,” explains the 2-time Autumn Colours Classic winner. “We have a ton of hours into this thing – I can’t thank my dad and [Streamline Race Products founder] Shaun McWhirter for all that they’ve done”
“We didn’t cut any corners with this new piece,” continues Bentley. “We know that every single team on this tour is coming loaded for war this season – so we did the exact same. This is the nicest car I’ve ever sat in”
When asked if he believes Sunset will provide a home track advantage, Bentley notes how difficult the Innisfil, ON facility is to get a handle on.
“Sunset is not quite like any other track in the province – it’s a handful. It takes a lot of laps to be fast there. Lots of seat time. There aren’t many drivers that can just walk in there and start laying down competitive lap times”
“This tour has the very best of the best on it,” continues Bentley, “and I’m not taking anything away from any of these drivers. But, I think there will most certainly be advantage for any driver that has put in some time racing at Sunset in the past”
For Bentley, an eight-race schedule is radically different from the grueling weekly campaigns he’s become accustomed to. Because of this, ‘Lights Out’ is aware of just how crucial each event will be.
“When you run an 18-night schedule, you become used to that luxury of having a few bad nights. However, when you only have eight races to win a championship, all of a sudden you can’t have a bad night”
“This season, we have to be on our game every single time the trailer door swings down,” continues Bentley. “I think that the tour champion is going to be the driver that was able to be as close to perfect eight times in a row. With a little bit of luck, I think our team is capable of that.”
Mike Bentley’s 2015 season will carry sponsorship from Grand American Race Cars and Streamline Race Products.
Fans can stay up to date with Mike by following him on Twitter @MikeBentley51 or logging on to the all-new Mike Bentley Racing page on Facebook.
By Spencer Lewis (@itsspencerlewis)
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