Even though Christopher Bell won the Championship Auto Racing Series (CARS) Super Late Model Tour race at Orange County Speedway earlier this season, it was Dominique Van Wieringen who stole the spotlight.

Van Wieringen, 19, dominated in the early stages of the Orange Blossom 300 back in April, leading 32 laps and running up inside the top-five for the entirety of her race.  Van Wieringen looked poised during the race and appeared destined for a top-five finish before her strong run literally went up in flames on lap 87 in the 150 lap race.  Now, she’s returning to the Rougemont, North Carolina bullring in a Super Late Model with hopes of finishing what she started in April.

“We’re all ready to go back,” Van Wieringen said.  “It’s almost like a redemption race.  We’re hitting the reset button and making a run at it again and hopefully we don’t have the same incident.”

Van Wieringen reflected on the incident that ended her strong run.

“It was pretty scary,” she recalled.  “It wasn’t so much, there wasn’t fiure in the cockpit, it’s just the smoke and fier extinguisher suffocates you.  Not being able to breathe, it’s kind of scary.  It wasn’t pretty.  I had to go to the hospital nearby and spent the night there getting oxygen pumped into me so I could get stuff out of my system.”

Van Wieringen is confident heading into Saturday night’s CARS Tour encore at Orange County Speedway. She felt like she could have won in April if not for the mechanical issues that ended her race.

“I’m pretty confident,” Van Wieringen stated.  “We ran quite competitively and I have a good feel around that place even though it didn’t end well.  I feel like we could have won that race so I’m definitely excited to go back.”

So far, Van Wieringen has made two starts in the CARS Tour.  She has also made starts in the ARCA/CRA Super Series and in the Southern Super Series.  Just last week, she earned a top-five finish in the ARCA/CRA Super Series race at Lucas Oil Raceway at Indianapolis (Indiana).  She has posted a season-high second place finish at the famed Five Flags Speedway (Florida) back on April 24th, one week following her breakout performance at Orange County Speedway.

She has plans to return to Five Flags Speedway in December to compete in the Snowflake 100 and Snowball Derby racing for NEMCO Motorsports – the team that fielded the race winning car of John Hunter Nemechek in last year’s Snowball Derby.  Along with the Derby, she will also compete in the ARCA/CRA Super Series’ biggest race of the season, the Winchester 400 at the high-banked Winchester Speedway (Indiana), in October.

“We’ll be hitting Winchester and Five Flags.  We’ll be heading to Winchester on Labor Day Weekend to get more track time and practice for the 400… I have been to Winchester.  A couple years ago, I ran a Pro Late Model race there.  I led about every lap but the last corner.  It’s my favorite track.”

Along with the two biggest events in Super Late Model racing, the Canadian driver is hoping to make her debut in the NASCAR Camping World Truck Series at Martinsville Speedway on Halloween.

Van Wieringen will definitely be one of the drivers to watch on Saturday night in the Super Late Model portion of the CARS Tour Summertime Showdown at Orange County after she made the entire short track racing world aware of her presence at the same track back in April.

The race will be held on Saturday night.  RACE22.com will have live updates on Twitter and RACEFEEDX.com will have live streaming pay-per-view video coverage of the race.