Watertown, Conn.—April 21, 2013—Oftentimes in racing top-five finishes lead to podiums, which ultimately lead to wins. David Gravel has finished among the top-five on a handful of occasions this year and move up to the podium on Saturday night with the World of Outlaws STP Sprint Car Series at Tri-State Speedway in Indiana, as he closes in on his first win of the season. He made a charge on the last lap, nearly passing eventual winner Tim Kaeding at the line. For Gravel, the runner-up performance was his best finish of the season as he continues to pilot the No. 6 Firetext Response Maxim for Bill Rose Racing.

In his second career start at Tri-State Speedway on Saturday, April 20, Gravel lined up fifth and battled Paul McMahan early in the race for the fourth spot. The native of Watertown, Conn., restarted fourth, following a lap-24 red flag and was up to third on the restart. One lap later, he got around McMahan for second and began to track down the leader, Tim Kaeding.

The caution came back out on lap-26 and on the ensuing double file restart, Gravel took the lead from Kaeding, only to have the caution flag come back out for a driver further back in the field, who had jumped the start. On the next restart, Kaeding got the advantage on Gravel and the latter tucked into the second position for the time being. With seven laps remaining, the leaders got into lapped traffic, allowing Gravel to close back in on Kaeding. Gravel made a last lap charge and came up just 0.518-seconds short of the win. Read more »

Watertown, Conn.—April 18, 2013 — It’s become second nature for David Gravel over the last six weeks to visit a track for the first time and have a handful of laps to get up to speed. He did exactly that on 11 occasions in four different states during the World of Outlaws STP Sprint Car Series West Coast Swing. Now back in the Midwest, he’ll visit a pair of tracks that he made his debut at last year and will thus be visiting for the second time as the series begins a stretch of races in the Midwest.

Prior to returning the Midwest, the native of Watertown, Conn., competed in the inaugural World of Outlaws STP Sprint Car Series event at El Paso Speedway Park in Texas, on Tuesday, April 16. He set a new track record in qualifying en route to his first fast time honor of the season at the three-eighths-mile and finished fourth in the 30-lap main event, which matched his best finish of the season. He charged from fourth to finish second in the first eight-lap heat race and finished fourth in the dash.

“We were fast right off the truck and to set a new track record is always neat, especially in a World of Outlaws event,” said Gravel. “Qualifying well and getting into the dash is so important with the Outlaws and we were able to do that and really put ourselves in a good spot. If we hadn’t had that late restart, I think we probably would have finished on the podium, but all in all, to finish fourth in our first time at El Paso was great.” Read more »