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Tucker Minter earned an eNASCAR Coca-Cola iRacing Series win for the third year in a row, cruising to victory on Tuesday at a virtual Rockingham (N.C.) Speedway.

Minter, whose No. 97 Chevrolet led exactly half of the 200 laps, finished with a 3.769-second margin of victory over runner-up Zack Novak in the No. 2 Toyota.

Collin Bowden came in third place in the No. 6 Ford, and Michael Guest took fourth place in the No. 21 Chevrolet. Malik Ray rounded out the top five in the No. 1 Chevrolet.

The first-ever eNASCAR points race at Rockingham resulted in Minter’s fifth career win.

“It’s just huge to be able to get a win,” said Minter, a Warrenton, Va., resident. “The relief for the rest of the season to know you are in the playoffs and not have to worry about points as much and be able to kind of take a little bit more risk, that’s going to be huge. … It’s just huge, and a huge boost of confidence for us as well.”

Looking ahead to the middle portion of the season, Minter said, “Obviously we still want to get a lot of points because we can get a bunch of playoff points through the (second) segment, so that’s still going to be a pretty high priority. We’re going to try to survive Talladega. As long as we come out ahead there, I think we’ll be in a good spot for points.”

Bowden, who was 39th in the point standings entering the night, posted his best finish of the season.

“We didn’t have any challenges on that first run,” the Suffolk, Va., resident said. “We were going to the woodshed right there on the first run. … The car ran really good. I was worried about running the tires off of it. I’m pretty good at doing that. And I never really did it.

“This is a drivers’ track, and that shows by how I was going to the front. Tucker just made a really good change there on the second run, or maybe I’m just old and can’t do a 200-lap race anymore.”

The next eNASCAR Coca-Cola iRacing Series is scheduled for April 22 at a virtual Talladega (Ala.) Superspeedway.

–Field Level Media