ANDERSON IN (May 24, 2015) – Before one of the largest crowds in recent memory, Chris Windom captured the 67th running of the Pay Less Little 500 presented by UAW-GM at Anderson Speedway Saturday in a classic shoot-out among three drivers.
The front-runners were nose to tail for the final restart on lap 460 and were never separated by more than a couple of car lengths.
But with 25 laps remaining, Windom started to pull away from David Steele and Kyle Hamilton to record his second Pay Less Little 500 presented by GM/UAW. He won in 2011.
Jacob Wilson recovered from an early flat tire to finish fourth followed by Shane Hollingsworth.
At the finish the top three drivers were separated by just 1.2 seconds.
With less than 100 laps remaining there were four drivers battling for the point with Mickey Kempgens holding the top spot over Chris Windom with David Steele and Kyle Hamilton both getting back on the lead lap on the 403rd circuit.
Windom slipped inside of Kempgens on lap 427 entering turn three.
From there Windom was challenged by Steele, who passed Kempgens on lap 431 with an inside pass coming off the second corner.
Kempgens was involved in an accident with the lapped car of Ryan Burdett on the back straight on lap 448, ending an impressive run for Kempgens.
The drivers that led through the first 161 laps, pole sitter Bobby Santos III and Caleb Armstrong were knocked from contention when the car of Brian Tyler lost an engine entering turn three.
Second year competitor Kyle Hamilton, driving for legendary car builder Bob East, took the lead during the first round of pit stops on lap 178 and led through lap 347 when he made his second stop.
Wilson’s bid for a third consecutive Little 500 victory took a serious blow on lap 37 when he had to make a green flag stop to change a left rear tire and lost a total of six laps in the pits.
The red flag came out on a lap 83 restart which took out Jerry Coons Jr., running fourth at the time; Shane Cottle, Aaron Pierce, Shane Hollingsworth, Jo Jo Helberg and Tony Elliott, all running in the top ten at the time.
Davey Hamilton Jr. won the Herald Bulletin Rookie of the Year honors driving to a sixth place finish after starting 20th.
