NORTH WILKESBORO, N.C.- After a long, cold night of racing at North Wilkesboro Speedway, Brenden Queen and Kaden Honeycutt walked away as the 2024 CARS Tour champions.
The night started off with the Pro Late Models, where Spencer Davis held a small six-point lead over Honeycutt at the drop of the green.
Saturday’s race quickly went south for Davis and the No. 29 team. Davis made contact with T.J. DeCaire on lap 5 while battling for second. The contact broke the trackbar on his No. 29, forcing Davis to hit pit road for repairs.
Adding insult to injury, Davis was hit with a rough driving penalty for the incident and was held for two laps by CARS Tour officials.
After that, it was Honeycutt’s title to lose. He led most of the way, briefly losing the lead to Tristan McKee before taking back over to win his third series race of the season. The max points night clinched the title for Honeycutt, who’d been cutting into Davis’ points lead in recent weeks.
Honeycutt was quite emotional in victory lane afterwards.
“It was just a combustion of things,” Honeycutt told Frontstretch. “I’ve run second in this deal twice, both in the stock actually, and I was coming in the bridesmaid again, I definitely didn’t want to come out being second again.
“It just hit me all at once man. Everything we’ve worked for, all the sacrifices we’ve had and just got to that point, and we were able to celebrate it.”
In the night cap, it was Queen who held an unofficial 10-point margin over Connor Hall due to season ending bonus points.
Both drivers survived multiple scares, including when McKee nearly spun Queen in front of the field with 87 laps to go. Queen righted the car, continuing on to finish fifth in what proved to be a battle of attrition at North Wilkesboro.
With Hall finishing fourth, Queen clinched his first CARS Tour title by eight points, just one year after falling five points short to Carson Kvapil in 2023.
“I don’t think there’s anything sweeter than that right now in late model racing,” Queen said of his CARS Tour title. “I won those championships at Langley [Speedway] and they were special, but I think this one here has got to be a little bit bigger.”
Queen’s rise to the top in late model racing has been exponentially quick, with the Virginian claiming the CARS title in only his second season. In his short time with Lee Pulliam Performance, they’ve racked up a South Carolina 400 triumph, two Hampton Heat victories, seven CARS wins and now a championship.
Having already made a few NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series starts this season, the door has been opened for Queen to potentially make a jump, should the right opportunity present itself.
After ending the season with eight-straight top fives and a championship, Queen has made his case to be the next driver following the Kvapil, Josh Berry path to stardom in a NASCAR national series.
Chase began working with Frontstretch in the spring of 2023 as a news writer, while also helping fill in for other columns as needed. Chase is now the main writer and reporter for Frontstretch.com's CARS Tour coverage, a role which began late in 2023. Aside from racing, some of Chase's other hobbies include time in the outdoors hunting and fishing, and keeping up with all things Philadelphia sports related.
Great job Butterbean…. Championship in the Bean Basket!!!
I’ve been watching Queen race at Langley for the last 4+ years, via FloRacing and NBC Sports now dead streaming. Really good driver. Hall is easily in his class. I glad that the last race came down to just racing, instead of having a crash decide it. Great Job to them both!! Kaden Honeycutt’s championship was one that I bet most people would not have expected, after getting bumped out of the seat by a paying driver mid-season. Unfortunately Kaden doesn’t have a rich family, or a big sponsor to foot the bill. Just a large amount of talent. I’d seen Lopez Racing (his new team) semi-regularly via Flo, and I sure didn’t see how he was going to win a race, let alone a championship with them. Absolutely fast, right out of the gate. He made that team better, much better. Then, just look at the results of the team that replaced him, yeah, nowhere near the results that Kaden gave them. Honeycutt in a decently funded team, for a whole season, I can’t wait!! A Texas driver, driving for Texas Niece Motorsports team. If they can keep a good piece under him, and not have so many pit road mistakes, this should be really fun to watch. And watch I will..