Matt Covington, Blake Hahn capture ASCS features at Lakeside
Photo by Tyler Carr
Kansas City, Kansas—After eight straight finishes outside the top three, Matt Covington had said he just wanted to get back on the podium.
Mission accomplished.
The Glenpool, OK native accomplished that feat the best way possible by scoring his second American Sprint Car Series win of 2025 at Lakeside Speedway Friday night – the first of two Friday night Features at the Kansas track.
“Victory Lane is what I meant, that’s even sweeter,” Covington said about wanting a podium after leading all 25 laps of the Feature. “We haven’t been running all that great. We haven’t been bad, we just haven’t been on the podium.”
His No. 95 was strong all night, placing second fastest in his Qualifying group, winning the third Heat Race, and winning the Honest Abe Roofing Dash. That put him on the pole for the 25-lap event with five-time Series champion Sam Hafertepe Jr. to his outside.
When the race went green, Covington darted ahead of the field, gapping Hafertepe by two car lengths by the time they reached the backstretch. However, Hafertepe cut that distance in half through Turns 3 and 4, running the top lane, while Covington ran low.
The No. 15H car couldn’t match Covington’s drive off the corner, though, and Hafertepe was left to watch the No. 95 car leave tenths between them every lap.
Covington almost ended his night early on Lap 6 by jumping the cushion in Turn 3 and nearly slapping the wall. The quick scare led to his commitment to the bottom line for the rest of the race.
In clean air, that commitment helped him pull away by over two seconds, but when he hit traffic his pace was hindered. His two-second lead evaporated in about two laps as Hafertepe saw new light with the No. 95 back within reach.
A caution on Lap 10 brought the entire field back to Covington’s rear bumper, but also awarded him a clear track again when the race resumed.
While he led, Hank Davis snuck around Hafertepe for second, and left him to fend off any attacks from Blake Hahn and Chris Martin, who dueled lap after lap for fourth.
Like the previous stint, once Covington hit traffic, second-place closed in. And this time, it was Davis on the attack, running high while Covington continued to roll the bottom. But before Davis could attempt a pass, another caution slowed the field.
When the race resumed for the final time, Covington had the best launch of the night, reaching the backstretch by the time Davis was still making his way through the first corner.
Hafertepe and Martin argued over third for a couple of circuits before the Texan found his rhythm around the top and took one more shot at Covington in the closing laps.
He passed Davis for second on Lap 21 and then closed within a few tenths of Covington on Lap 23.
The two left Turn 4 side by side with the white flag in the air. Covington was able to put a car-length distance between them when they reached Turn 1 and maintained that gap down the backstretch. Neither tip-toed into the final corner, but Hafertepe carried more momentum around the top and pulled even with Covington again through Turn 4.
With the checkered flag waving, Covington’s commitment to the bottom paid off as he was able to launch off the corner better than Hafertepe and beat him to the line by 0.307 sec.
“Luckily, the bottom was good because I could not run the top to save my life,” Covington said. “Got up over the berm twice. Luckily, I didn’t tear it up and get it up into the wall. The car was dynamite on the bottom.”
Hafertepe’s runner-up finish was his second straight podium finish after three finishes outside the top 10. However, he would’ve rather seen the race go caution-free for a better shot at stealing the win away.
“Anybody can ride out there by themselves, but when you get in lap traffic it’s tough,” Hafertepe said. “That’s kind of what we were waiting for. We were a little tight restarting right behind those guys. Once they got a little traffic we can move around them. Sometimes guys are pretty complacent with where they’re at and we’re not. We want to move around. We want to pass cars. Would’ve liked to not see any of those cautions and kept it green, and race with the traffic, that’s when this place gets really fun.”
Blake Hahn rounded out the podium, while Cameron Martin scored his third ASCS National Series top-five finish with his fourth-place run, and Hank Davis held on to finish fifth.
UP NEXT -- The American Sprint Car Series is back in action in Kansas at 81 Speedway on Saturday, Sept. 6. Then, the Series returns to Nebraska’s Eagle Raceway for the Stewart Alley Memorial on Sunday, Sept. 7.
Tickets for the two events will be sold at the track on race day. If you can’t be there, stream every lap live on DIRTvision
RESULTS
Feature (25 Laps): 1. 95-Matt Covington[1]; 2. 15H-Sam Hafertepe Jr[2]; 3. 52-Blake Hahn[7]; 4. 4-Cameron Martin[5]; 5. 11X-Hank Davis[6]; 6. 44-Chris Martin[3]; 7. 3Z-Cole Vanderheiden[17]; 8. 2-Chase Porter[10]; 9. 36-Jason Martin[8]; 10. 77-Jack Wagner[16]; 11. 45X-Kyler Johnson[22]; 12. 17B-Ryan Bickett[20]; 13. 10-Landon Britt[23]; 14. 91-Scotty Thiel[15]; 15. 88R-Ryder Laplante[9]; 16. 2J-Zach Blurton[11]; 17. 88-Terry Easum[21]; 18. 16G-Austyn Gossel[24]; 19. 73-Samuel Wagner[14]; 20. 2B-Garrett Benson[13]; 21. 88C-Brogan Carder[18]; 22. 2C-Brekton Crouch[19]; 23. 99-Tony Rost[4]; 24. 71-Brady Baker[12]
Smith TI LCS (10 Laps): 1. 77-Jack Wagner[1]; 2. 3Z-Cole Vanderheiden[7]; 3. 88C-Brogan Carder[4]; 4. 2C-Brekton Crouch[6]; 5. 17B-Ryan Bickett[3]; 6. 88-Terry Easum[10]; 7. 45X-Kyler Johnson[5]; 8. 16G-Austyn Gossel[8]; 9. 12W-Dale Wester[13]; 10. 7C-Chris Morgan[9]; 11. 3D-Jake Diehl[12]; 12. 10-Landon Britt[2]; 13. 32D-Daryn Langford[11]; 14. 31BW-Braxton Weger[14]
Honest Abe Roofing Dash (5 Laps): 1. 95-Matt Covington[1]; 2. 15H-Sam Hafertepe Jr[3]; 3. 44-Chris Martin[2]; 4. 99-Tony Rost[6]; 5. 4-Cameron Martin[4]; 6. 11X-Hank Davis[5]
Heat 1 (8 Laps): 1. 4-Cameron Martin[1]; 2. 99-Tony Rost[4]; 3. 52-Blake Hahn[3]; 4. 2-Chase Porter[2]; 5. 2B-Garrett Benson[5]; 6. 77-Jack Wagner[6]; 7. 3Z-Cole Vanderheiden[10]; 8. 16G-Austyn Gossel[8]; 9. 10-Landon Britt[7]; 10. 12W-Dale Wester[9]
Heat 2 (8 Laps): 1. 44-Chris Martin[1]; 2. 15H-Sam Hafertepe Jr[4]; 3. 36-Jason Martin[3]; 4. 2J-Zach Blurton[2]; 5. 91-Scotty Thiel[6]; 6. 17B-Ryan Bickett[5]; 7. 45X-Kyler Johnson[8]; 8. 7C-Chris Morgan[7]; 9. 3D-Jake Diehl[10]; 10. (DNS) 31BW-Braxton Weger
Heat 3 (8 Laps): 1. 95-Matt Covington[1]; 2. 11X-Hank Davis[4]; 3. 88R-Ryder Laplante[2]; 4. 71-Brady Baker[7]; 5. 73-Samuel Wagner[3]; 6. 88C-Brogan Carder[8]; 7. 2C-Brekton Crouch[6]; 8. 88-Terry Easum[5]; 9. 32D-Daryn Langford[9]
Qualifying 1 (2 Laps): 1. 99-Tony Rost, 00:14.672[2]; 2. 4-Cameron Martin, 00:14.793[5]; 3. 2-Chase Porter, 00:15.088[7]; 4. 52-Blake Hahn, 00:15.139[6]; 5. 2B-Garrett Benson, 00:15.143[4]; 6. 77-Jack Wagner, 00:15.262[8]; 7. 10-Landon Britt, 00:15.275[3]; 8. 16G-Austyn Gossel, 00:15.287[1]; 9. 12W-Dale Wester, 00:15.595[10]; 10. 3Z-Cole Vanderheiden, 00:15.874[9]
Qualifying 2 (2 Laps): 1. 15H-Sam Hafertepe Jr, 00:14.713[4]; 2. 44-Chris Martin, 00:14.818[5]; 3. 2J-Zach Blurton, 00:15.166[7]; 4. 36-Jason Martin, 00:15.234[1]; 5. 17B-Ryan Bickett, 00:15.310[8]; 6. 91-Scotty Thiel, 00:15.366[3]; 7. 7C-Chris Morgan, 00:15.420[6]; 8. 45X-Kyler Johnson, 00:15.470[2]; 9. 31BW-Braxton Weger, 00:15.585[10]; 10. 3D-Jake Diehl, 00:16.519[9]
Qualifying 3 (2 Laps): 1. 11X-Hank Davis, 00:15.318[4]; 2. 95-Matt Covington, 00:15.331[8]; 3. 88R-Ryder Laplante, 00:15.333[2]; 4. 73-Samuel Wagner, 00:15.347[5]; 5. 88-Terry Easum, 00:15.440[1]; 6. 2C-Brekton Crouch, 00:15.537[7]; 7. 71-Brady Baker, 00:15.562[9]; 8. 88C-Brogan Carder, 00:15.773[6]; 9. 32D-Daryn Langford, 00:15.883[3]
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BLAKE HAHN BESTS MATT COVINGTON IN ASCS MAKE-UP FEATURE AT LAKESIDE SPEEDWAY
KANSAS CITY, Kans. -- When two of Oklahoma’s best battle for the lead with the American Sprint Car Series, one thing is for certain — it’s sure to make for a memorable race.
Sooner State racers Blake Hahn and Matt Covington put on an exciting fight for the top spot in the second of two Features contested Friday night at Lakeside Speedway, first in the opening laps and again as the checkered flag neared. In the end, Hahn prevailed, holding off multiple close pass attempts from Covington and holding strong on a green-white-checkered finish to earn his second Feature win of the season.
In the first main event of the single-day doubleheader, Hahn finished third to Sam Hafertepe Jr. and winner Covington, which set the stage for his breakthrough in the July 11 makeup Feature later on. The win marked his 24th career Series victory and second overall at the 4/10-mile oval. It was also his first trip to Victory Lane since the tour’s stop at Batesville Motor Speedway on June 21 — a span of 14 races.
“Any time you can win is great, and then to be able to pick up another podium in the same night is really stellar,” Hahn, of Sapulpa, OK, said. “We’re happy with it.”
From the pole, Hahn jumped to the lead on the opening circuit but quickly encountered a challenge from outside polesitter Covington, who threw a slidejob in Turns 3 and 4 to take the lead on Lap 2. Covington held strong out front with Hahn in tow, but behind both of them was a driver determined to get back to Victory Lane.
Hafertepe — a winner of nine Series races in 2025 but none in the last three weekends — had wound-up great speed around the top side of the track, and on Lap 11, hit the cushion in Turns 1 and 2 and drove around the outside of Hahn to take over second place. One lap later, he shot to the bottom of the track in 1 and 2, and as Covington slipped up the track in his push through lapped traffic, Hafertepe snuck by underneath to take the lead.
“I kinda messed around on the bottom a little bit on that restart and that’s when Sam got by me,” Hahn said. “I looked up and he was already by Covington. The racing was getting really good there before the caution came out, so I was ready to get going there.”
Hafertepe began to pull away from Hahn and Covington, but his time out front was short lived. On Lap 17, Hafertepe collided with the slower car of Daryn Langford on the backstretch and spun, inciting a caution period and sending the Hill’s Racing No. 15H to the tail of the lead-lap cars for the restart.
“For Sam, that’s terrible,” Hahn said. “Obviously, I wanted to race that one out. I felt like I had a good enough car to contend for the win.”
Hahn inherited the lead for the restart, and immediately, the battle was on for the top spot. Covington tried to slide Hahn twice through Turns 3 and 4, leaving only inches between their two cars each time, but Hahn was able to retain the lead with his high-side momentum.
“After that restart, it kinda gave him the opportunity to slide me into (Turn) 3,” Hahn said. “They were really close sliders; he definitely gave me some room, which I do appreciate. That’s one great thing that I love about racing with these guys with ASCS is we can race hard like that between me, Sam and Covington. We race super, super hard, but we don’t have to worry about somebody just keeps going across your nose. That was really fun.”
One final caution flag flew with two laps remaining, forcing a green-white-checkered finish, but Hahn held strong out front and cruised to the checkered flag with Covington in second.
“We’re not complaining; car was really good,” Covington, of Glenpool, OK, said. “I think Blake might have been just a little bit better there. I had a run on him and left him just enough room to squeeze his car through there and he did it. He took off well on that restart; that last restart, I didn’t take off quite as good. He earned it.”
Fellow Oklahoma native Hank Davis, piloting the Beaver Racing Team No. 11x, crossed the stripe in third to collect his first podium finish of the season with the national Series.
“To be honest, I think we might’ve just been a third-place car all night,” Davis said. “We just struggled on restarts. We could get going, but once you lose a little bit on restarts, it kinda screws your whole run up.”
Kansas native Kyler Johnson finished fourth after starting eighth on the grid, while Oklahoma racer Terry Easum finished fifth, garnering his second top-five run of the season.
UP NEXT - The American Sprint Car Series travels to 81 Speedway in Park City, KS, for a clash with the ASCS Sooner Region on Saturday, Sept. 6. Tickets for the event will be sold at the track on race day.
If you can’t be there, stream every lap live on DIRTVision.
FEATURE RESULTS
7/11 Makeup Feature (25 Laps): 1. 52-Blake Hahn[1]; 2. 95-Matt Covington[2]; 3. 11X-Hank Davis[3]; 4. 45X-Kyler Johnson[8]; 5. 88-Terry Easum[9]; 6. 15H-Sam Hafertepe Jr[4]; 7. 3Z-Cole Vanderheiden[19]; 8. 36-Jason Martin[20]; 9. 2J-Zach Blurton[13]; 10. 2B-Garrett Benson[7]; 11. 10-Landon Britt[14]; 12. 73-Samuel Wagner[6]; 13. 88R-Ryder Laplante[17]; 14. 16G-Austyn Gossel[5]; 15. 88C-Brogan Carder[12]; 16. 7C-Chris Morgan[11]; 17. 3D-Jake Diehl[18]; 18. 32D-Daryn Langford[15]; 19. 99-Tony Rost[10]; 20. 71-Brady Baker[16]; 21. 4W-Jamie Ball; 22. 17W-Harli White; 23. 1X-Bryant Wiedeman
CURRENT ASCS NATIONAL TOUR STANDINGS
Points Updated: September 5, 2025
Pos # Competitor Hometown Points Gap Wins Top 5 Top 10 Features
1 15H Sam Hafertepe Jr Sunnyvale, TX 2759 - 9 16 19 23
2 52 Blake Hahn Sapulpa, OK 2633 -126 2 13 18 24
3 95 Matt Covington Glenpool, OK 2610 -149 2 14 19 24
4 36 Jason Martin Liberal, KS 2560 -199 2 10 16 23
5 45X Kyler Johnson Quinter, KS 2333 -426 0 5 10 20
6 2B Garrett Benson Concordia, MO 2276 -483 0 2 12 20
7 71 Brady Baker Alexander, AR 2255 -504 0 2 11 20
8 2J Zach Blurton Quinter, KS 2244 -515 1 2 8 22
9 16G Austyn Gossel Fort Collins, CO 2179 -580 0 4 5 20
10 10 Landon Britt Memphis, TN 2104 -655 0 0 5 19
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E-Mods
Feature (12 Laps): 1. 6-Zach Boyd[3]; 2. 51-Corey Myers[2]; 3. 8-Devin Dultmeier[6]; 4. 61-Jeff Degroot[5]; 5. 20S-Shali Buck[1]; 6. 16-Brian Dultmeier[7]; 7. 58W-troy wilson[10]; 8. 15X-Dustin Lawrence[11]; 9. 5J-Jeff Goepferich Sr[4]; 10. 72M-Juan Martinez[9]; 11. 95-Dale Hughes[12]; 12. 115-Jason Park[13]; 13. (DNS) 86-Tony Sowers
Heat 1 (6 Laps): 1. 6-Zach Boyd[2]; 2. 51-Corey Myers[5]; 3. 61-Jeff Degroot[7]; 4. 16-Brian Dultmeier[6]; 5. 58W-troy wilson[3]; 6. 15X-Dustin Lawrence[4]; 7. 115-Jason Park[1]
Heat 2 (6 Laps): 1. 5J-Jeff Goepferich Sr[3]; 2. 20S-Shali Buck[4]; 3. 8-Devin Dultmeier[5]; 4. 86-Tony Sowers[2]; 5. 72M-Juan Martinez[6]; 6. 95-Dale Hughes[1]
Pure Stocks
Marshall Jewett was the feature winner
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