In practice Steckly took the No. 22 Dodge out on the streets of Toronto for one lap and wasn’t happy with the car and came to pit road to make a few adjustments. After making the adjustments, Steckly went back out on the 1.755 mile temporary street course and turned the quickest time posted to that point. Practice, however, was not over and the time posted by the 22 Racing/Canadian Tire Dodge ended up being the third quickest overall. For qualifying, the cars were sent out in two groups according to their practice times, and each group was given fifteen minutes. On his third lap Steckly posted a time of 1:17.002 with an average speed just over 82 miles per hour and after running one more lap, he pulled down pit road. This is because the tires the teams qualify on are the ones they start the race with. At the Toronto Honda Indy the NASCAR teams do not pit for tires, therefore Steckly opted to save his tires for the race once he posted a time he felt would hold up. Steckly started the event on the inside of row two and with the drop of the green flag maintained his third place position without any issues and safely manoeuvred the car into turn one. The No. 22 Racing/Canadian Tire Dodge was running in third place and the top three cars began to pull away from the pack and Steckly had a comfortable ten car length lead over fourth place. However, on lap number three the first caution of the day would wave, tightening up the field. Steckly had another great restart and again settled into third place, but was catching the No. 11 of Jason Bowles and managed to out brake him going into turn three to make the pass for second place. Shortly after making the pass the second caution came out, meaning Steckly would have to restart on the outside. On the restart Steckly was challenging the No. 27 of Andrew Ranger for lead, but could not make the pass and was filed back, eventually able to duck into fourth. While running in fourth, Steckly was turning the same times as the leaders and was challenging the No. 02 of Kerry Micks for third. On lap 21 Steckly made a pass on the No. 02 at the end of Lakeshore Blvd. under braking going into turn three. Steckly and the Canadian Tire Dodge were running in third when the third caution came out, forcing a green white checkered. Steckly was prepared to restart on the inside, when the second place car of JR Fitzpatrick had to come to pit road with a flat tire, moving Steckly up to second, where he would again restart on the outside of Andrew Ranger. Steckly had a phenomenal restart and with the help of his spotter was able to duck down into second position and was on the back bumper of Ranger, pushing him down Lakeshore Blvd. Steckly tried to get under him going into turn three, but was unable to make a clean pass and followed Ranger through the duration of the eight turns, crossing the finish line in second place. In the Media Center after the race Steckly told reporters, “What an awesome day, we ran in the top three all day and we tried to save our car for the end. We were better than Ranger in some spots and tried to make the pass at the end, but he was able to hold us off. All in all it was a good day for the Canadian Tire Team.” This weekend’s events at Toronto Honda Indy will air on TSN on July 17 at 5 p.m. EST. Steckly and the 22/Racing Canadian Tire team are having a great season, with only five races under their belts, the team has five top five finishes, four of which were podium finishes. The next stop for Steckly and the NASCAR Canadian Tire Series will be in two weeks’ time when the teams head out west. The first stop is in Vernon, British Columbia at Motoplex Speedway were Steckly took home the checkered flag for his only win in the 2010 season. For more information on the NASCAR Canadian Tire Series please visit www.nascarlocalracing.com. Scott Steckly would also like to thank his sponsors: Canadian Tire, MotoMaster, Exide, Erb, Castrol and AW Millwrights. For more information on Scott Steckly and 22 Racing please contact:
Linda Jones
Wide Open Motorsport Solutions | 
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