Brayton Haws survived a frantic Championship Auto Racing Series (CARS) Late Model Stock Car Tour race at Tri-County Motor Speedway, staying ahead of the turmoil and chaos behind him to take his third victory in five CARS events in 2015.

Haws inherited the lead by dodging an incident between Myatt Snider and Deac McCaskill as they battled for the lead on a lap 55 restart. Snider was to the inside of McCaskill when the two drivers made contact, nearly spinning in turn four. Haws missed them both, taking a lead he would not relinquish for the remainder of the race.

“Southern National wasn’t the race that we wanted but we’re not going to win them all,” Haws said after his third victory of the season.  “You’ve got to learn from them and I learned from that race and brought it to Tri-County and came away with a win.  It was really fun battling with all those people.  I’m just glad they raced me clean and those are the type of people I like to race with every day of my life.”

The mishap between Snider and McCaskill was just one of many incidents during the 100-lap event at the Hudson, North Carolina facility. Of the 27 cars that started the race, only 14 saw the checkered flag.  Snider and McCaskill were the lucky ones, as they rebounded to finish fourth and sixth, respectively.

Not so fortunate were many of the series heavy hitters, such as Todd Gilliland and Tyler Ankrum.

That pair of drivers were among the casualties of a lap 59 melee, which halted the race and spiked the tempers of those involved.  Tommy Lemons, Jr. was also involved in the lap 59 crash, but rejoined the field and finished eighth.  Each of the drivers disagreed on what caused the CARS Tour version of the big one.

“I don’t know what happened,” Gilliland said.  “We had the best car and got run over.”

Ankrum and Lemons both pointed their fingers at Gilliland as the cause of the melee.

“It’s hard to run somebody over on the inside when you’re crowded against the wall,” Ankrum said.  “He tried to spin me out the whole race.”

When asked why he was forced out of the race, Lemons pointed to Gilliland’s wrecked car and used some colorful language when calling the 15-year-old an idiot.

While Brayton Haws pulled away for the victory over the closing stretch of the race, RD Smith and Jamey Caudill battled to the finish for second. Ultimately, Smith won the duel, relegating the veteran Caudill to the final step on the podium.

Chad McCumbee, making his CARS Tour debut, appeared poised for a fourth place finish. However, his machine began billowing smoke over the final ten laps and he limped home to a seventh-place finish.

RACE22.com’s Andy Marquis contributed to this report.

Race Results:
1. Brayton Haws
2. RD Smith
3. Jamey Caudill
4. Myatt Snider
5. Garrett Campbell
6. Deac McCaskill
7. Chad McCumbee
8. Tommy Lemons, Jr.
9. Austin McDaniels
10. Clint King
11. Robert Tyler
12. Thomas Beane
13. Justin Crider
14. Craig Stallard
15. Jeff Oakley
16. Payton Ryan
17. Christian PaHud
18. Tyler Ankrum
19. Todd Gilliland
20. Roddey Sterling, Jr.
21. Michael Fose
22. Stefan Parsons
23. Chris Davis
24. Shane Lee
25. Mike Darne
26. Blake Stallings
27. Chris Hudspeth