Cole Powell finished fourth in the Bumper to Bumper 300 at Autodrome Chaudiere just outside of Quebec City Saturday evening in his first-ever start at the track. After struggling during practice team EHR found its footing during qualifying, securing a solid fifth-place starting position in the 17-car field.
In the race, by the time the competition caution came out at lap 150, Powell had made it up to third place. When he returned to the track he was ready to take a run at the leaders. On lap 190 after a pitched battle, Powell passed LP Dumoulin’s #47 for second, setting his sights on Andrew Ranger who was in the lead.
“This track’s pretty amazing. There’s like five different groves you can run, everyone’s running different lines,” Powell explained. “He [Andrew Ranger] was like way, way, way up at the top and I was as close to the bottom as you can get. It was pretty cool to run around here in second and challenge for the lead my first time here.”
After challenging for the position Powell ended up falling back a spot to third on lap 220, then to fourth where he would ultimately finish the event following a rain delay.
“Getting rained out in fourth, feels like one got away from us,” said Powell after the event. “We had a really strong car. When we came in on the break the new set of tires was a lot different compared to the first set, so that hurt us a bit. I would have liked to have finished three-hundred laps.”
The fourth-place finish moved the team to second-place in the overall points standings.
The next event for team EHR and Cole Powell is on Saturday, July 14 for the Pinty’s Grand Prix of Toronto at Exhibition Place.
Race Results:
1 27 Andrew Ranger
2 47 L.P. Dumoulin
3 24 Donald Theetge
4 3 Cole Powell
5 17 D.J. Kennington
6 22 Marc-Antoine Camirand
7 4 J.F. Dumoulin
8 79 Peter Shepherd III
9 37 Simon Dion-Viens
10 1 Larry Jackson
11 18 Alex Tagliani
12 2 Kerry Micks
13 19 Adam Martin
14 56 David Michaud
15 46 Brett Taylor *
16 74 Kevin Lacroix
17 28 Joey McColm