Sauter led the final 17 laps of the NextEra Energy Resources 250, and was leading when the a caution for a last-lap wreck came out, ending the race.

Defending Truck Series champion James Buescher spun Jeff Agnew on the final lap, which caused the caution that prevented Sprint Cup Series regular Kyle Busch from making a move for the victory. Buescher finished 13th.

Sauter said, “I was having flashbacks of last year,” when he was turned by race-winner John King. They always say you want to be second going into the last lap. It just didn’t work out that way. … I’m not going to lie, I was happy to see that caution come out at the end. Just a wild race. Speedway racing is just crazy. … I’m just ecstatic to be in Victory Lane.”

Busch finished in the runner-up position for the third time. Ron Hornaday, Justin Lofton, Jeb Burton, and Ty Dillon rounded out the top 5.

The race was pretty uneventful until the caution came when Scott Riggs lost an engine.

The next caution came when Brendan Gaughan attempted to squeeze between pole-sitter Brennan Newberry and German Quiroga in Turn 3. The trucks made contact and hit the outside wall, causing an accident that collected 13 trucks. Burton, Tim George Jr., John Wes Townley, Ryan Truex, and Jason White were among those involved.

It certainly was memorable.

Peters took the lead off a restart with 10 laps remaining to dash to victory in the NASCAR Camping World Trucks Series American Ethanol 200 Saturday night at Iowa Speedway. The win was the first of the season, allowing him to increase his season points lead to 12 over Justin Lofton.

“I love Iowa and I love going to places where our results are OK and turning them into a best finish,” Peters said. “Today was definitely a milestone in my career, I feel like, because I’ve never sat on the pole and never led like we did tonight to win the race.”

The Red Horse Racing driver claimed his first pole position of the season. He became the third trucks driver in four races to win from the pole.

Peters achieved it in dramatic fashion. A late wreck forced a seventh caution with less than 20 laps remaining to set up the final restart between Peters and veteran Ron Hornaday Jr. When Hornaday spun his tires slightly at the starting lineup, Peters moved ahead, never looked back and pulled away for his fourth career win.

The last caution was a welcome sight to Peters.

“We just launched really well, and got a really good restart and beat him to the corner for a good start into turn 1,” said Peters, who was determined to improve his restarts from the Kentucky Speedway race in June. “He couldn’t get by. I was sitting there praying that the caution wouldn’t come out.”

Peters exacted a little revenge from Hornaday, who snatched the lead from him on a restart with 33 laps to go, diving to the inside of both Peters and Johnny Sauter.

“He just came out of nowhere,” Peters said of Hornaday. “He’s always good on restarts.”

Hornaday was just the third leader after more than three-quarters of the race was dominated by Peters and James Buescher, who was vying for his third win of the season.

The pair traded leads, distancing themselves from the field. Buescher was in control when an unexpected accident eliminated him from contention and helped Peters.

Buescher blew his right-front tire, sending him into the wall coming out of Turn 2 on Lap 135.

“We’ll take it,” Peters said. “I felt like that he and I did have the stronger trucks. It was going to be decided by him or I so in the end I’m glad I’m sitting here talking to (the media).”

Peters lead 87 laps, which was four less than Buescher. He praised the work of his crew for producing a powerful Toyota Tundra.

“I can’t thank these guys enough for what we accomplished tonight,” Peters said. “Hopefully this is one of many more.”

Peters mentioned the importance of a victory to enhance his ability to contend for the points title.

“It’s nice to get the monkey off our backs and get to Victory Lane finally,” crew chief Butch Hylton said. “We’ve been working really hard to do that.”

Hornaday placed second for his best performance of the season. He was encouraged by the finish.

“We made some adjustments in the race,” Hornaday said. “We made it tight. It was just not good enough.

“That was a big leap and gain for the racing team and the new truck we just built. It shows a good sign we’re on our track.”

Matt Crafton, who won the Coca-Cola 200 last year at Iowa Speedway, was third, giving him four top-four finishes at the 0.875-mile track.

Sunoco Rookie of the Year leader Ty Dillon was the highest finishing rookie. Dillon, who had top-two finishes at Iowa Speedway in the ARCA Series in 2010 and 2011, finished seventh after opening the race in 15th.

Keselowski passed Dillon with two laps left to run second, 3.805 seconds behind Buescher. Dillon came home third, followed by pole-sitter Matt Crafton and Timothy Peters, who grabbed the series lead from Justin Lofton.

Johnny Sauter recovered from a pit road penalty to finish sixth, followed by Joey Coulter, Jason Leffler, Ron Hornaday Jr. and 19-year-old Kyle Larson, who was making his series debut.

Buescher drove the same No. 31 Chevrolet he drove to his first NCWTS victory at Kansas in April.

“I think this race especially — both the truck wins we have were won in the shop,” Buescher said. “This is the third time I’ve raced this truck, the second time I’ve gone to Victory Lane with it. . . . The truck was phenomenal.

“We unloaded a little bit off and made some changes right away in practice this morning, and the truck came to life pretty good. We worked on it throughout practice, and I knew halfway through the first practice that we had a truck capable of running up front, possibly a truck capable of winning.

“Then, in the second practice, we found some more speed. I’m so excited to be able to get (sponsor) Exide Batteries to Victory Lane, to lead that many laps and dominate like that.”

A three-car wreck on Lap 69, involving two-time series champ Todd Bodine, Lofton and last week’s Nationwide Series winner Nelson Piquet Jr. put Lofton’s points lead in peril.

With a strong run to the inside in Turn 1, Bodine dived beneath Lofton, broke loose and knocked Lofton’s truck into the Chevrolet of Piquet, who slammed into the outside wall. Bodine blamed Lofton for not giving him enough room.

“I thought Justin was blowing up,” Bodine said. “I caught him so fast — I didn’t know what was going on, if he got loose off of (Turn) 4 or what. I caught him so fast, thought he was blowing up, so I went under him, and, obviously, he wasn’t blowing up. . . .

“He’s got plenty of room outside — he’s got to learn to give some space here. When you get that close and that tight on somebody, you’re just taking all their air, and there’s absolutely nothing you can do about it.”

Both Bodine and Piquet retired from the race at that point, but Lofton was able to continue. Taking a wave-around under the sixth caution — called on lap 102 because of Tim George Jr.’s spin into the Turn 2 wall — Lofton regained a lap lost during repairs to his truck and salvaged a 14th-place finish to limit his damage in the standings.

Dillon took the lead briefly with a two-tire pit stop under that caution, but Buescher regained the top spot moments after a restart on Lap 108. All told, Buescher led 119 of 150 laps.

Peters leaves Kentucky with a four-point lead over both Lofton and Dillon, with Buescher in fourth place, nine points back.

The victory was the first in the series for Lofton, who arrived at the finish line .261 seconds ahead of owner/driver Keselowski, who was trying to score his first NCWTS win. Lofton took over the series lead by one point over Timothy Peters.

Todd Bodine ran third, followed by Jason Leffler and Ron Hornaday Jr. After the race Keselowski had a heated exchange with Hornaday, stemming from contact between their trucks on the next-to-last restart with nine laps left.
After a lackluster start to the race, when he quickly dropped from second to seventh in the space of three laps, Lofton began learning.

“I had had terrible restarts all night,” Lofton said after the race. “The truck was not bad on the very first start of the race — I just had that bad a (start) and fell back that far. But the stars aligned, I figured out what I needed to do, and the best thing is, I outsmarted him (Keselowski).

“I think I had some help from Ron Hornaday, when he and Keselowski got in a little battle. Once I got out front (with four laps left), I knew I was OK. There was a short amount of laps left that I knew I could stay out front. I surprised myself, definitely.”

Keselowski had just cleared Lofton for the lead entering Turn 1 on Lap 119 when Nelson Piquet Jr. caused caution for the second straight time when he pancaked his No. 30 Chevrolet against the Turn 1 wall.

But Keselowski lost the lead on the restart on Lap 125 of 134 when Hornaday, who lined up behind him, ran into the back of his No. 19 Ram. To Keselowski, the contact was unjustified.

“I came on the radio and asked him, ‘Hey, man, I’ll play it cool; just be nice and smooth, and we’ll both have great days,” Keselowski said of his communication with Hornaday before the restart. “Instead he decided to be a jackass and just run me over.

“And it cost him what would have been an easy second place, and then it obviously cost me the win, so we both lost out on the deal.”

For Hornaday, who scored his first top-five finish with Joe Denette Motorsports, time was running short with just nine laps left.

“They stopped and played jackrabbit,” Hornaday said of Lofton and Keselowski, “and somebody got into the back of me, and I just had to go, too. Sorry about that to him, but we’re all looking for spots — and it’s pretty cool for Joe Denette Motorsports to get a top five.”

Lofton held the lead when caution flew for the eighth time with four laps left for debris in the form of a bumper bar in the racing groove. Keselowski fell back on the restart and didn’t have time to catch Lofton before the finish.

Harvick crushed the rest of the field in Saturday’s Kroger 250, winning in seemingly effortless fashion by .953 seconds over Richard Childress Racing teammate Ty Dillon.

A caution for David Reutimann’s right-front tire on Lap 227 of 250 erased Harvick’s 1.4-second lead at that point, but after a restart on Lap 245, Harvick’s claim to the trademark grandfather clock trophy was a mere formality.

“Not a bad way to make our first truck start for RCR,” Harvick radioed after he crossed the finish line. Harvick led 248 laps, a series record.

James Buescher finished third, followed by Justin Lofton and Timothy Peters. Nelson Piquet Jr., Ross Chastain, Jason Leffler, John King and Jason White completed the top 10.

From 2008 through 2011, Harvick started 25 Truck Series races, all in his own equipment, and won 11 times. At the end of the 2011 season, however, the desire to start a family took precedence over NASCAR ownership, and Harvick and wife DeLana sold their Truck and Nationwide Series assets.

Some of Harvick’s truck equipment went to Eddie Sharp, some to Richard Childress.

Behind the wheel, it didn’t matter one bit that Harvick was driving a No. 2 Chevrolet fielded by his Sprint Cup Series owner.

First, Harvick won the pole for his season debut. Then he won the race, notching the 14th NCWTS victory of his career and his third at Martinsville.

Harvick was so dominant that, shortly after a restart on lap 165, he asked his spotter to relay a message to Dillon’s team. Harvick wanted Dillon to know that he was running at about 80 percent of his truck’s potential. “Tell him not to burn his stuff up (trying to catch us),” Harvick said.

“It’s been a long time since we’ve dominated like that and actually won,” Harvick said after the race. “We made a lot of changes over the offseason, moving teams to RCR, and this is what we’d hope for—to make what was a good truck team a better truck team.”

Harvick chose the outside lane on restarts to help ensure that Dillon, a rookie competing for the series championship, finished second.

“I knew we had a little bit better truck than what they had,” Harvick said, “but I didn’t want him to get hung on the outside. They’re racing for a championship, and it’s our job as the No. 2 team to go out there and help them and try to make sure they win the championship and we win races.”

King, who lost a lap early and regained it with a free pass, retained the series lead by one point over Peters and Lofton.

Jeb Burton, son of former Daytona 500 winner Ward Burton, was involved in a multicar wreck on Lap 235 but recovered to finish 13th in his series debut.

The first two came on rural short tracks in Virginia. The third was a shocker — Friday night’s improbable victory in the NextEra Energy Resources 250 at Daytona International Speedway.

It took three attempts at a green-white-checkered-flag finish for King to win his first NASCAR Camping World Truck Series race in his eighth start in the series and his first on a superspeedway.

King was in the lead in the third overtime when Joey Coulter’s Chevrolet flew into the catch fence on the frontstretch after James Buescher’s Chevy turned sideways from contact with the truck of Ron Hornaday Jr. Coulter walked away from the wreck.

The resulting caution froze the field and made a winner of King, who still seemed amazed at his accomplishment when he talked to reporters after the race.

“This is feature win No. 3 for me — in my whole career,” King said. “It’s unbelievable. I couldn’t imagine being here, and we’re here.”

A hard crash on Lap 104 — four laps into overtime at the 2.5-mile track — took out race leader Johnny Sauter, who turned into the outside wall in the tri-oval off the bumper of King, igniting a multicar melee behind them.

“Golly, I flat freakin’ wrecked him,” King lamented on his radio after NASCAR red-flagged the race to clean up debris from the wreck.

Five laps and an 11-minute stoppage later, after a torrent of reassuring words from crew chief Chad Kendrick, King was in victory lane. Timothy Peters, King’s Red Horse Racing teammate came home second. Justin Lofton was credited with a third-place finish, followed by Travis Kvapil and Jason White.

“All I know was, the closing rate was real fast, and I couldn’t get off of him,” King said of the contact with Sauter’s car. “I’m a rookie, and I’ve never pushed (another car in the draft) in my life, and this is my first time at Daytona Speedway or any superspeedway.

“I apologize to him from the bottom of my heart. It wasn’t my intention at all.”

A caution on Lap 61 for a crash involving John King, Cale Gale and Mike Skinner provided a window for drivers to make their final pit stops. The trip down pit road failed to break up the dominant combination of Turner Motorsports drivers Buescher and polesitter Miguel Paludo.

Nelson Piquet Jr., the third of the Turner drivers, took the lead soon after a restart on Lap 69, and the Turner Chevrolets ran 1-2-3 as the race closed in on the 75-lap mark. To that point, Turner drivers had led every green-flag lap.

Lap after lap they maintained that order, Piquet leading Paludo and Buescher, all three trucks hugging the yellow line at the bottom of the track until White led a surge in the outside lane and grabbed the lead from Paludo on Lap 84.

As the trucks approached the stripe on that circuit, Paludo’s Chevy turned sideways and slammed nose-first into the inside wall, bring an abrupt end to the Turner triumvirate.

White led the field to the subsequent restart on Lap 91, with Piquet in second, Sauter third and Buescher fourth. White stayed out front until Parker Kilgerman’s Dodge spun sideways on Lap 95, scattering the back half of the field and damaging the trucks of David Starr, Ross Chastain, Dusty Davis and Bryan Silas.

Notes: Ward Burton finished eighth in his first start in any of NASCAR’s top three series since 2007… Paulie Harraka, who triggered an early wreck, got five straight “lucky dogs” (free passes to regain lost laps) as the highest-scored lapped car. He finished 19th in his first start in the series.

He went on to stretch his fuel — running the entire 206 laps on one pit stop — and survive a green-white-checkered finish to win his third Camping World Truck Series victory in his Kyle Busch Motorsports Toyota.

Afterwards he said:

I wasn’t 100 percent aggressive on saving fuel, but I was 92 percent. There was concerns all around.

Top 5: Busch, Aric Almirola, Ron Hornaday, Skinner, and Justin Lofton.

Todd Bodine, Brad Keselowski, Timothy Peters, Miguel Paludo, and Matt Crafton rounded out the top 10.

Notables: Johnny Sauter (11th), Dennis Setzer (12th), Bobby Hamilton Jr (13th), Max Papis (14th), Austin Dillon (17th), Ricky Carmichael (19th), David Starr (23rd), and Elliott Sadler (26th).

Elliott Sadler and Timothy Peters were batting for second in the closing laps when Sadler hooked Peters into the wall. Peters headed to pit road for repairs. He recovered to finish 8th.

Sadler assumed second place for a moment, but hit the wall several laps later when his tire — presumably cut during his contact with Peters — gave way. He finished 26th.

Ron Hornaday spun and lost a lap but managed to recover, finishing third.

Austin Dillon had a rough night, getting together with Donny Lia 20 laps into the race and clay Greenfield 24 laps later. The damage knocked him out of contention. He finished 17th.

With two laps to go, Justin Lofton brushed the wall, then got into David Starr, sending him down the track on the frontstretch and into the inside wall. He bounced off the wall and headed back up the track into the racing line. As he slid towards the outside wall, Ken Schrader slammed hard into his passenger-side door.

As those two trucks hit the outside wall, Miguel Paludo made contact with Dennis Setzer causing Setzer to spin. Starr bounced off the outside wall and made contact with Ricky Carmichael and then Setzer. All drivers walked away uninjured, though Schrader appeared to limp as he exited his truck.

The race was red flagged for cleanup. Paludo finished ninth, Setzer finished 12th, Carmichael finished 19th, Starr finished 23rd, and Schrader finished 24th.