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Ben Collins celebrated his Days of Thunder Championship victory with a stunning performance in the season finale at Rockingham. Collins demonstrated why he is head and shoulders ahead of the pack this season with a crushing performance in his Territorial Army Deuce Racing RML Chevrolet in front of 31,000 spectators. Leading from start to finish, Collins put in a series of record-shattering laps during the last ten laps to win his second race of the day, his sixth Days of Thunder race of the year, 5.8 seconds ahead of Ian McKellar Jr and the Team Learn Direct Chevrolet of Rob Speak. Having already won the series in the first race of the day, the newly-crowned champion led from the start of the 50-lap race from McKellar Jr, Michael Vergers and Speak when Mark Proctor hit the wall in Turn Three causing a multi-car pile-up, involving Oli Playle, Andrew Kirkaldy, John Mickel, John Steward, Niklas Loven and Tony King. The race was restarted on Lap 14 with Collins maintaining his lead ahead of the Torquespeed/dsiAnyDoc Chevy of McKellar Jr, while Vergers was under pressure from his team-mate Speak, who was resisting the threat of Rehfeld behind him. Rehfeld tried to pass Speak into Turn One but couldn’t make it stick and lost momentum and dropped back to sixth. The race went yellow again on Lap 16 when Andy Smith’s car stopped in a shower of sparks after hitting the wall out of Turn One. The race restarted on Lap 23 and Collins immediately extended his lead to 2.5 seconds ahead of McKellar, while Speak squeezed past Vergers into Turn Four on Lap 27 to go third.
McKellar, Vergers and White were the first of the leaders to pit, with Collins and Speak staying out for another lap. As Collins rejoined the race, McKellar Jr was able to close right up on the leader but Collins held on long enough to warm his tyres sufficiently to stay in front. Two laps later and Collins set a new lap record, with a stunning time of 34.695 seconds, nearly three tenths faster than the record he set in the first race of the day. As Collins set his quick lap, John Steward spun in Turn One to bring out the yellow flags again.
Collins then set about confirming why he is the class of the field this season. While Speak put McKellar Jr under intense pressure in the battle for second, on Lap 42 Collins set his fastest and record-breaking 34.475 second lap. He then followed up with laps of 34.506s, 34.504s, 34.507s, 34.664 and 34.777s, before easing off with a pedestrian 36.017s! Collins swept past the final chequered flag of the season, 5.8 seconds ahead of McKellar Jr and Speak, with White fourth, just ahead of Vergers in the Chicago Pneumatic Racing Pontiac and Rehfeld. “RML gave me a car that was ridiculously quick all weekend,” said Collins. “The team said it didn’t matter if I didn’t finish the last race so I pushed as hard as I could.”
DAYS OF THUNDER ROUND 13 RESULT
FINAL POINTS STANDING FOR 2003 DAYS OF THUNDER SERIES
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