2018 MRT Race 2 - Toledo (Toledo 100)

DNQ:
0 Brenda Barns
23 Ezekiel Trotz
31 Vladamir Mraz
80 Tage Hebert
83 Joseph Santiago

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Results
Standings

Spoiler:

JN Motorsports MRT development off to a slow start

After another dismal race at Toledo for the two JN drivers, Jimi Brett and Junior Larouche, the two find themselves in 23rd and 21st, respectively in the championship standings.

The relatively unknown potential of both youngsters has most of the JN faithful prepared for this slow start, seeing as its their first time in the top-4 of the AARO leagues. Larouche in particular is a guy most are keeping tabs on due to his untapped superstar potential, although it’s likely to never hit, it doesn’t appear JN is going to rush him.

The slow start, while expected, has some JN members feeling a bit uneasy, stating that results shouldn’t be this hard to come by. Marc-Andre Smyth, team president, told AARO writers that, “The new standard to development that we’ve tried to stick to the past couple of seasons is something we’re not looking to change. We have had rough seasons in the past here at JN, before my time, in developing AERS talent. The more we let them marinate and figure things out in these high powered cars in lower tiers, we feel like the more they will be ready when the time comes for them to compete against the best.”

Regardless, we can probably expect both Brett and Larouche to be finding their groove relatively soon. Both are immensely talented and both absolutely dominated their regional series’ last season. The future is yet to be seen but I’d expect to see these guys near the front very soon.

Three Vastly Different Stories Developing in ACS's MRT Teams

Each of the 3 ACS Racing Teams in the MRT have had 3 very differing level of success. Early on, Malte Arvidsson has ran up front 24/7 and is near the top of the point standings. He seems to be adapting to stock cars very quickly. On the other hand, Joseph Santiago, a former drifting champion, has not. He ran into mechanical problems late in the Livonia race after having an overall mediocre race, and more importantly, failed to qualify for Toledo. Anatoly Sevenin, who was also a German Touring Car driver before being talent scouted for ACS, has seen mixed results thus far.

The team is watching these drivers very closely, as it was seen as a huge risk to not have any oval drivers at this level of competition, and were criticized for possibly failing at driver development, at least as far as turning left is concerned. If Arvidsson continues this success, and his teammates can join him, this would reiterate the team's conviction that there is a deep and untapped pool of International talent that can succeed in a stock car given the opportunity.