Twenty-two drivers are entered for the ARCA Menards Series race at Berlin Raceway, but unfortunately, three of the drivers in the top 10 in points are not competing. Ninth-place Gio Ruggiero is competing part time, but the disappointment lies in the absence of third-place Ryan Vargas and seventh-place Andy Jankowiak.
Vargas began the year by joining Maples Motorsports as the Operations Manager and the anchor driver for the organization’s No. 91. After competing in the first eight races, he announced he will now run part time.
“It’s just best to put our resources where we need to put them, focus on races and make sure that whenever I am in the car, we’re going 110%,” Vargas told Frontstretch. “This is a business, and for full transparency, the decision for me to pull my hat out of going as many times as we have started with me. We looked at everything and we really need to focus on this stuff and devote our resources where we can. Selfishly as a racecar driver, I’d race every weekend. But, at the end of the day, I have to put my businessman cap on, let’s put it that way. It it just needs to make sense for all parties involved. We looked at Berlin, Elko Speedway and these next couple races, and it does not really make sense right now.”
Jankowiak intended to compete at Pocono Raceway, but after crashing at Michigan International Speedway, using the intended Pocono car, Jankowiak and KLAS Motorsports elected to return to their initial part-time slate.
“I’m still the guy holding the steering wheel and one way or another I’m managing to find these wrecks, so I take some responsibility somewhere for it,” Jankowiak said. “It’s a privilege to be able to do this stuff, race these tracks and compete in ARCA. It’s something you must earn, and in one way or another, we’re not getting the finishes the team deserves. When that happens, you must be smart, take a step back, and look at it.
“Obviously, the Toledo Speedway car got torn up. We already had to fix that one. There was one more car left. It’s our perennial backup car that we could have gone with. But then if that happened, then we’re completely out of racecars and didn’t want to get into that position. We didn’t feel like we were where we wanted to be with the points to really justify the expense of adding all the races. So, it just became too difficult.
“It’s a bummer not being there. Probably not so much some of the short track ones, just because we didn’t really figure on going to those. We had all that good fortune, and then we had enough bad fortune that we’re probably about back to where we figured we would be season-wise. Adding the races that we did add was a gift. I’m grateful that we went to a couple extra races after the Talladega Superspeedway win. It was never really the plan.”
Jankowiak will return to the racetrack multiple times the rest of this season: Chicagoland Speedway, Lime Rock Park, Lucas Oil Indianapolis Raceway Park, Iowa Speedway, Bristol Motor Speedway and Kansas Speedway.
“At the end of the day, the expense to go full time vs. what we planned to do is such a large number that it would have to be probably only to go for the championship so being top 10 or even top five unfortunately doesn’t really warrant that the investment it would take to add eight races,” he explained. “Just based on that, it would have to be to go for an ARCA championship or at least compete for one, and realistically, ever since Talladega, things haven’t fallen our way so it’s the smart thing to do to take a step back.”
Maples Motorsports began the year with four full-time entries. Now the team is down to two. It’s about improving the overall program, according to Vargas.
“It’s how do we do everything in our power to be as successful as we can be?” he said. “Is bringing three or four cars to the track stretching ourselves and stretching our resources. Is that doing that? We had to sit back, look and say it’s probably best if we put two bullets on the racetrack, knowing we have the time to refine everything, dial in the setups, make sure everything is where we need and go full bore. We’re fast now. We are proving that we can do what I’ve always known we can. There will probably be races this year where we are three or four cars again. If it doesn’t make sense and we don’t have the renters or sponsors in line, then it doesn’t make sense to do so.”
MMS will likely field three or four entries again, as its speed has attracted attention.
“Certainly, showing our speed as we have the past couple of weeks has gotten some drivers interested, which is great,” Vargas noted. “That’s probably the most rewarding thing so far this year is the fact that that our speed is proving to be attractive to potential renters and drivers who want to join our arsenal and want to go and compete because you know we may not be the big teams we may not be those guys but if the speed that we’ve had is to show anything is to show that we can absolutely beat them.
Despite not running full time, Jankowiak still praises the series.
“The simple fact that a guy like me or a guy like Ryan can compete at this level says a lot for the series,” he noted. “It’s a series that is accessible in that way. It is a high-dollar performance-based series. We’ve got this opportunity to race on these big racetracks, do all these cool things, sometimes it goes well and then sometimes it catches up with you. This is the difficulties of it, so when it doesn’t really go well, we have to bow out as we did.
“Sometimes racers cannot help themselves. There’s a lot of money that’s spent to race on a professional series and we could probably save ourselves so it’s a product of the way racing is that it’s become a very expensive game to play for sure.”
“ARCA does a fantastic job promoting its drivers and the series,” Vargas concurred. “The TV deal that ARCA has with FOX is a huge deal, especially for the sponsors that I’ve been able to run with this year. We have consistently run top 10, which means we’re going to get TV time. So, the values there are good.”
Austin Vaughn will be in the No. 91 for MMS at Berlin and Elko, along with running full time in the ARCA Menards Series East.
“He’s proven to be a very talented driver,” Vargas added. “He’s 80% of the way there. Truthfully, he is a very smart kid when he’s behind the wheel and he’s still learning. He’s still going to come across things he doesn’t know, but he’s in the shop every single day, busting his tail working on his car. At the racetrack, when he’s not racing, he’s a crew member. It’s impressive to see that. I hope to see a similar pace to what we’ve had so far. I have a lot of confidence in him and the entire No. 91 group to carry that momentum that we’ve been having.”
MMS’ No. 91 is seventh in the owners’ points and KLAS’ No. 71 is 12th. Vargas wants a top-five finish, both to earn more money at the end of the year and to bring pride to the organization.
“That’s exactly why we stayed out stayed out on that restart at Pocono to lead those laps because that was a bonus point for the No. 91 car,” he noted. “Leading in ARCA, that’s a big deal. So, we did that because we knew, hey, let’s bag as many points as we can for this racecar so that when whoever is in this car, we have as much padding as we can so that we can really go out there and contend. I want to see the No. 91 top five in the owner’s title. I want to see that and we can, truthfully.”
Clubb Racing Inc. drivers Alex Clubb and Jeff Maconi are arguably the two biggest beneficiaries of Jankowiak and Vargas no longer running full time. Clubb is 10th in points and Maconi is 16th.
“It’s really cool for us,” Clubb said. “If Jake Bollman ends up winning the title, then Jeff can win Rookie of the Year. I’m the biggest Bollman fan because it would be cool for our team to have someone win Rookie of the Year. We’re striving for the goal of both of us in the top 10 and Jeff winning Rookie of the Year.”
Owners’ points are what pay at the end of the year. Clubb’s No. 03 is 15th and Maconi’s No. 86 is 20th.
“It’s tough and you need to be as high up as you can,” Clubb explained. “They also only give out 15 Golden A plans for the extra start money so our No. 86 is on the A plan, which doesn’t pay as well. We are working hard to get both our cars in the top 15 at the end of the year so that we can have two cars on the Golden A plan for 2027.”
While race purses remain a topic of conversation, Clubb does not believe an increase would make a significant improvement.
“It doesn’t matter if you run a four-cylinder car at the local level or racing at any level, you’re not making money on the purse,” he emphasized. “In the past 20 years, payouts have never been enough to support the habit. It’s sponsor-driven. There’s no way you’re going to get sponsors for our series for us all to be competitive or break even. To do everything right to run an ARCA short track the full distance, your cost is $25,000. And you’ll never see an ARCA race pay $25,000 to start. You might see that much to win, but the people who are winning are spending more than that $25,000.
“The series does a great job of attracting sponsors. They might be able to do more, but I’d hate to see them potentially bankrupt themselves. If you doubled our payouts, it would help, but not enough to really make a difference, unfortunately.
“It’s hard to make it in racing. When you see the winning car, it’s plastered with sponsors. Because that is what pays the bills. You will always have people with good and underfunded budgets. It’s what makes it go.”
CRI operates on a smaller budget, but Clubb has slowly grown his team from a one-car effort with a rotation of drivers to a stable two-car effort with Brayton Laster running a third entry, No. 83, in the two dirt track events.
“It’s a numbers game,” Clubb continued. “25% of your payouts go to mechanical issues and repairs, and the other goes into the income along with sponsors and pay drivers. So far, we’ve been able to do that.
“We’re always three races from going out of business. If we have three bad races, we could be out of cars, motors, and out of the series. We hope that never happens. You don’t know when that bad day will come, and it cannot be a weekly occurrence or you’ll be out of the sport.”
Mark Kristl joined Frontstretch at the beginning of the 2019 NASCAR season. He is the site's ARCA Menards Series editor. Kristl is also an Eagle Scout and a proud University of Dayton alum.
Thanks for choosing to comment on this article. A name and email address are required to post a comment. The email address is not publicly visible or shared. Please keep in mind that comments are moderated according to our comment policy.