With three laps remaining in the ARCA RE/MAX Carolina 200 at Rockingham

Speedway Sunday afternoon, Ken Schrader had all but taken all the drama from the race, but then the unexpected happened.

After leading for virtually the entire race, Schrader ran out of fuel on lap 197. Sean Caisse, who was in second place, took advantage of Schrader’s misfortune and had just enough in his gas tank to cross the finish line first at “The Rock” and earn his first-career ARCA victory.

Caisse’s No. 25 car was exactly the same car driven by last year’s Carolina 500 winner Joey Logano.

“I didn’t even know what was going on until my crew chief told me that I was in the lead, and that I was going to win the race,” Caisse said. “Ken had a pretty good lead and it was unfortunate what happened to him.

“But I had a good crew that made me understand that I needed to conserve my gas. I guess I somehow stole this race. This track has a lot of history, and there are a lot of emotions going through me.”

Caisse made five career ARCA series starts last season. But before

Sunday’s victory, the 23-year-old Caisse had experienced some disappointments in his young racing career.

At the Kentucky Speedway, Caisse was leading before another driver tapped him and spun him out. The accident resulted in Caisse’s car making contact with the wall and he was unable to finish the race. Caisse led 94 laps at Nashville Superspeedway before an altercation with another car while racing for the lead left his car too damaged to contend. As a result of the altercation Caisse wound up finishing in 16th place.

During a race at Michigan International Speedway, Caisee led 51 laps, but a cut tire eliminated him from race contention and finished

19th.

“Last year, everything seemed to not go my way” the New Hampshire

native said. “I just had some bad luck even though it looked like I had

put myself in position to win some races. But hopefully this win will

be the start of things going my way this season.”

Patrick Sheltra, who entered the Carolina 200 coming off a victory at

the ARCA Series’ second race of the year at the Salem Speedway, finished behind Caisse. Though low on fumes down the stretch of the race, Sheltra’s No. 60 Dodge coasted to a third-career second place ARCA finish.

“It was a good day for the BuckUp racing team,” Sheltra said. “We had a good car, and we had to conserve our tires and fuel in the second half of the race. But we did enough to finish second and we will go to our next race looking for a victory.”

Sheltra felt sympathetic towards the veteran Schrader, who will have to

wait yet another year for his elusive first win at “The Rock.”

“I know this was a place he wanted to win at, and I hated for him that he ran out of gas towards the end,” Sheltra said. “He is an awesome guy and I just feel bad for him.”

Sheltra’s performance allowed him to unofficially grab the ARCA

series points lead heading into the next race at Talladega

Superspeedway. Sheltra has come a long way since suffering injuries in a wreck that left him hospitalized during the season-opening race at Daytona.

“It’s great to have taken the points lead, but right now, it’s still early in the game,” Sheltra said. “However, knowing how things started and to be in this position is certainly a good accomplishment.

Hopefully we can keep the momentum going.”

Sheltra unofficially holds a five point advantage over Parker

Klingerman, who finished fifth in his No. 77 car after starting

in 19th place. Klingerman admitted his team had some miscues during qualifying but was satisfied with the top-five finish.

“During the practice session, we actually finished fourth, but we made the wrong adjustments when we were qualifying,” Klingerman said. “We made the car too loose and we should have tightened it up. We showed we

had a better car than during qualifying. For me being a rookie, this

was a lesson learned and hopefully we can do better in the future.”

n Contact sports reporter Corey Davis at 997-3111, ext. 44; e-mail

cdavis@yourdailyjournal.com