The cream always rises to the top. For Joey Logano, who was making his DIRTcar Nationals debut in Friday night’s UMP Modified event at Volusia Speedway Park, a third-place finish was all in a night’s work.
Logano started 19th in the 15 lap feature race — the first of five features on the night — and after being damaged in a crash, came back to finish an impressive third.
His car’s a little banged up after evading a wreck, but @joeylogano had a stellar @DIRTcarNats debut with the UMP Modifieds, coming all the way from 19th to finish 3rd! #FLinFeb? pic.twitter.com/WN3bKQe1KC
— DIRTcar Racing (@DIRTcarRacing) February 6, 2021
While Logano, who was driving a dirt modified owned by Ryan Flores (a Team Penske crew member), finishing third was cool, the winner of the race also had a NASCAR connection.
David Reutimann, who won two NASCAR Cup Series races in his career, won this race from the 15th starting spot.
Reutimann made the race-winning pass on Taylor Cook as he was coming to the white flag.
.@dirtvision REPLAY: David Reutimann comes from 15th on the starting grid to win the first UMP Modified Feature of the night, passing @TaylorCook_21 coming to the white flag. @joeylogano, making his first appearance of 2021 in a modified, came home third.#DIRTcarNats #FLinFeb pic.twitter.com/Hy8ncYH2sc
— DIRTcar Racing (@DIRTcarRacing) February 6, 2021
Cook had started the race from the pole, but was unable to hold off the hard-charging Reutimann.
The UMP Modified DIRTcar Nationals action at Volusia will continue on Saturday night. Perhaps Logano, the 2018 NASCAR Cup Series champion, can walk away with some hardware.
