WISCASSET – All Travis Benjamin could do was grin after his bid for his first-ever victory on the Pro All-Stars Series’ Super Late Model North tour fell half a car-length short.

“Always the bridesmaid, never the bride,” grinned Morrill’s Benjamin, who did everything possible to pass Farmingdale’s Johnny Clark as the two battled it over the last 105 laps of the Ray Haskell Ford 125 at Wiscasset Raceway Sunday.

But Clark held him off on a track that has been very good to him.

“I’ve been here six times since August and this is my fifth win. The only time I didn’t win, I finished second,” said Clark.

The victory guaranteed Clark a spot in the New England Toyota Tundra 250 on Aug. 17 that will pay the winner $30,000.

“Man, I’ve never had to wheel a car so hard in my life,” said Clark. “[Benjamin] was all over me. Lapped traffic saved me. [When we came up on a lapped car], he’d have to stay behind me and follow me. We had a lapped car with two laps to go. I thought he would make his move on the white-flag [final] lap but I looked in the mirror and saw I had a car-length on him.

“So I stayed on the bottom on entry into turn three and once we got to the middle of the turn, I kept it on the throttle and let the car float up the track and gave him the bottom,” added Clark, who started on the pole. “I knew I could drag race him [successfully] to the start-finish line. It was an awesome race.”

Benjamin, who started eighth, said he lost his power steering with 40 laps remaining in the race and that may have cost him the victory.

“If we had [our power steering] we could have driven underneath him a couple of times. I just couldn’t turn the car down in the corner,” said Benjamin, who sidled up alongside Clark coming off turn four but didn’t have enough to nose him out at the checkered flag.

“If he had his power steering, he would have beaten me hands down,” said Clark. “He was awfully good.”

“We had a great car,” said Benjamin. “We had a car that could go [well] everywhere. Johnny would get me out of turn four and I could get him between [turns] one and two. We had kind of an equal deal there. He had just as good a car as we did.”

Benjamin was “real happy” with his finish but said he needs to improve his restarts as Clark pulled away from him on the restarts.

There were nine cautions in the race.

Turner’s Ben Rowe finished a distant third with Farmington’s Cassius Clark and Adam Bates of Warner, N.H., completing the top five in the 23-car field.

Rounding out the top 10 were D.J. Shaw of Center Conway, N.H., Scarborough’s Kelly Moore, Dresden’s Scott Chubbuck, Hollis’ Richie Dearborn and Gorham’s Steve Berry.

Ben Rowe said his car was “decent” but not good enough to challenge Clark and Benjamin.

“We had a third-place car and we came home third. I was pretty happy with that,” said Rowe.

In the PASS Modified race, Mark Lucas of Harpswell took the checkered flag.

Pownal’s Kenny Harrison was second with Windham’s Tom Oliver, Ronald Gooden Jr. of Whitefield, N.H., and Bill Dixon of North Waterford completing the top five.

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