Mike Rowe edges Clarks for win at 95’s Sunday PASS race

HERMON – Auto racers don’t often run side-by-side to the checkered flag like the Ricky Craven-Kurt Busch Nextel Cup finish at Darlington Raceway (S.C.) in 2003.

Add a third car to the mix and that’s exactly what happened at Speedway 95 Sunday afternoon as Turner’s Mike Rowe edged the Clarks, Johnny and Cassius (no relation), to claim the E.J. Prescott 150 Pro All-Stars Series race.

The three were bunched together behind lapped traffic on the final lap and Rowe, who was wedged between the Clarks with Cassius on the outside and Johnny on the inside, squeezed across the finish line a fender-length (.066 seconds) ahead of Farmingdale’s Johnny Clark.

Farmington’s Cassius Clark, who won Saturday night’s makeup Community Pharmacies 100 at Speedway 95, finished third and shouted angrily at Rowe right after the race.

“I had a run coming off the [final] turn but he ran me off the front stretch,” said a fuming Cassius Clark, who slid down into the dirt but was still able to make it across the finish line. “It was either back out of it or end up in the flag stand. It was one or the other and I chose to back out of it.”

The 55-year-old Rowe said, “It was just good, hard racing.

“These young kids don’t like it,” added Rowe, who notched his fourth PASS win over the last 10 races. “I don’t know if he thought I was going to let off [the accelerator] or what.

“It’s the last lap. I ain’t letting off,” said Rowe, who also won his third TD Banknorth Oxford 250 on July 30.

“We had lapped traffic. Johnny got under me and Cassius was outside so I just had to flatfoot it off the corner. We were three wide. I was just trying to hang on,” added Rowe.

Johnny Clark said Rowe “did what he had to do to win.

“This is Bangor. The track is three grooves wide. Mike wanted to cover all of them on the last lap. That’s what he’s supposed to do,” he said. “He wouldn’t be a racer if he didn’t. I would have done the same thing and I truly and honestly believe Cassius would have done the same thing, too.”

Johnny Clark said he should have won the race.

“I messed up. I had the bottom going down the back stretch. I had the race wrapped up. But I didn’t do the right thing. I should have moved [Rowe] out of the way. I kept trying to get a lean on him but he wouldn’t give me a lane,” said Johnny Clark. “He wasn’t afraid to make contact with me going for the lead earlier in the race and I shouldn’t have been afraid to make contact with him going for the win.”

Turner’s Ben Rowe, Mike’s son, finished fourth and rounding out the top 10 were Boothbay Harbor’s Corey Williams, Hebron’s Alan Wilson, Winterport’s Ryan Deane, Bangor’s Erik Worster, Stetson’s Gary Bellefleur and Eric Hudson of Goffstown, N.H.

In Saturday’s Community Pharmacies 100, it turned out to be a duel between the Clarks with Cassius spending a healthy portion of the race in pursuit of his close friend Johnny.

Despite re-starting on the slower inside groove, Johnny Clark was able to stay in front of second-place Cassius Clark during re-starts on laps 34 and 62.

But the third restart on lap 74 was a charm for Cassius. He parlayed the faster outside groove to make his way around Johnny and, since there were no more cautions, Cassius was able to pull away to post his third win of the season.

His margin of victory over Johnny Clark was 20 car-lengths or 1.232 seconds.

Nineteen-year-old Williams finished third to post his best ever PASS finish. Otisfield’s Gary Drew, the 2001 Oxford 250 winner, was fourth and Ben Rowe was fifth. Rounding out the top 10 were Bangor’s Gary Smith, Corinna’s Paul White, Hollis Center’s Richie Dearborn, Mike Rowe and Wilson.

“I think [Cassius] was just waiting for a later restart. I think he was biding his time. He knew there would be a caution here with about 20 laps to go and that was would be the time to take the lead,” said Johnny Clark. “My tires weren’t cleaned off good enough on that last restart. I could hear marbles kicking up for a couple of laps. I needed a longer yellow to let the tires really cool down. That’s when I was really good.”

“We kind of let that happen a little bit [on the first two restarts],” acknowledged the 23-year-old winner. “It was early in the race so there was no sense racing right then. It was going to be at the end so we just made sure we got a good one there at the end.”

He said if he had tried to take the lead earlier and had succeeded, “Johnny would have been outside me [on a late-race restart] and maybe Benji [Rowe] would have gotten up there. It could have been a whole different race. So I just tried to make it between us two [Clarks].”

Cassius Clark said he had been “a little lazy on the previous restart” but was confident he could wrest the lead from Johnny Clark on the lap 74 restart.

“We just got on the gas like we should. We were in the preferred groove anyway so as long as Johnny didn’t wash up [the track], we were going to be fine,” said Cassius. “After riding behind him when he was leading, I could see he was a little bit tight and struggling a little bit so I thought we had a pretty good chance at it.”

Cassius Clark said his car was “flawless” all day.

Johnny Clark, on the other hand, had to replace several engine parts between the time trials, heat race and feature including two fuel pumps, an MSD ignition box, a carburetor, a coil and spark plugs.

“The car was awesome,” said Johnny Clark.