Bowmanville, Ontario – Scott Steckly set his sights on a top five finish in the Canadian Tire Dodge at Canadian Tire Motorsport Park this weekend. While finishing just short of that mark he maintains the championship points lead in the NASCAR Canadian Tire Series presented by Mobil 1 which was the ultimate goal.

Again Steckly posted fast times in practice consistently in the top three and would fall back slightly in qualifying with the sixth quickest time. “I think we have a little more speed in the car and hopefully we can move up a few positions in the race,” said Steckly.

When the green waved for the Pintys presents the Clarington 200, Steckly settled into sixth place pacing himself for the 51 laps around the 10 turn 2.459 mile road course. At lap twelve just prior to the caution flag waving, Steckly ducked into the pits to top up with fuel to go the distance.

The crew decided to stay out during the ensuing caution and not come back to pit road for tires. Steckly restarted in 8th and steadily moved forward and by lap seventeen he was in the top three. When the caution waved a second time, Steckly came back to the pits to the attention of his crew who had a very quick pit stop and got him back to the track ahead of several of his competitors.

On the ensuing restart on lap twenty one, Steckly would line up 17th and by lap thirty seven the Canadian Tire Dodge was back into the top five. A restart with four laps remaining had Steckly in the fifth position looking to move up before the finish, but another competitor pushed him into a run off area in turn two allowing a couple of other cars to get by. Steckly would settle for a seventh place finish and a nine point lead in the championship standings heading to the final event.

“It’s not the finish we had had hoped for and I thought we had a shot at a third or fourth on that final restart but overall my crew did their usual great job on the car all weekend and again their pit stop was fantastic,” said Steckly. “We know we have our work cut out for us at Kawartha but we will bring our best game and see what happens.”

Steckly remains in the lead by nine points in the NASCAR Canadian Tire Series presented by Mobil 1 championship standings going into the final event at Kawartha Speedway on Saturday Sept. 19th where he will challenge for his fourth series title.

Scott Steckly and 22 Racing are supported by Canadian Tire, MAXIMUM Tools, Mobil 1, Erb Group, AW Millwrights, Reefer Sales, Sturdy Formed Concrete and NOCO Lubricants.

Fans can follow Scott Steckly throughout the season on his website at 22Racing.ca or on Twitter @ScottSteckly22 or you can Like the 22RacingTeam Fan Page on Facebook. For team updates on Scott and the other 22 Racing team entries follow us on Twitter @22RacingTeam.

The Pintys presents the Clarington200 will air on TSN on Saturday September 5th at 12 p.m. and on RDS2 on Thursday Oct. 22 at 7 p.m.

For more information on the NASCAR Canadian Tire Series presented by Mobil 1 please visit nascarhometracks.com