PENSACOLA, FL :: Defending ARCA\CRA Super Series champion Travis Braden was defeated once by emerging superstar Erik Jones in Super Late Model competition but vows he will not make the same mistakes if placed in a similar situation at the Snowball Derby.

It is perhaps fitting that Jones is the early favorite to win his third-straight Tom Dawson Memorial Trophy because Braden says he would not want it any other way.

The two recently dueled in the Winchester 400 in October, swapping the lead several times over the final 10 laps of the event at Winchester Speedway in east Indiana.

Jones had led the most laps and was leading with six to go when Braden caught him and shoved him up the track in Turn 1 and out of the top spot. But Jones immediately responded with a crossover and push of his own, reclaiming the lead by the end of the very same lap.

Jones then took a more defensive approach for the remaining five circuits, snatching the middle and bottom lanes away from Braden, leaving him very few options to complete an overtake. It was a tactic that earned Jones the victory and has been stuck in Braden’s memory for about six weeks.

Braden now understands what he would have done differently.

“I pulled my move and it worked out but I guess I was too calm because I didn’t get away from him in the next corner,” Braden told

Race22.com. “It allowed him to get right back to me and move me. I really feel like if I had just driven it down right into Turn 3, we would have pulled away and won the race.

“But in hindsight, I’m very grateful for the opportunity that the mistake has given me. I will never forget it and I don’t think I will make it again if I’m in that same situation.”

Given the circumstances surrounding his upcoming debut in the Snowball Derby, Braden could easily get that chance a few weeks from now on the Gulf Coast. The West Virginia native has never turned a lap around Five Flags Speedway but has a track legend for a crew chief in two-time Derby winner, Gary St. Amant.

“Working with Gary this season has been a blessing but it’s going to be even more valuable in Pensacola,” Braden said. “This seems to be his favorite track, and his ambition for the race and his experience, will be a great thing to have when we travel down there.”

When the two first met in January — at the St. Amant shop in Columbus, Ohio — the pairing challenged each other to think about big about their goals for the upcoming season.

“When we first met in January, I told him that my goal was to win the Winchester 400 and he told me that his was to win the Snowball derby,” Braden said. “So we built a brand new car together over the summer which was built almost entirely for these two events and it’s played out nearly perfect so far.”

Braden admits that his lack of experience on the track makes him an underdog for the Snowball Derby but he also believes that he has the tools and resources needed to simply survive until the closing laps — where anything can happen at the end.

“It would be a huge underdog story in my opinion,” Braden said about potentially winning the Super Bowl of Short Track racing. “I’m just some kid from a hole in the wall in West Virginia with no money and no family background in racing, going up against the best competition in the country, in his very first attempt.

“That would be really neat.”

After winning two championships against the toughest competition in the Midwest and with St. Amant at his side, the sky is truly the limits for Braden at the Snowball Derby.