TERRE HAUTE, Ind. — Cole Whitt scored the biggest win of his career in Saturday’s 57th Hut Hundred at the Terre Haute Action Track. 
Although Whitt qualified second and led 67 laps of the USAC Mopar National Midget Championship event, he took advantage of a late-race red flag to pass Shane Cottle for the victory. Brad Sweet finished third, followed by Tracy Hines and Bobby East.
“This is one of the ones that you put a star next to on your schedule for sure,” the elated Whitt said. “It’s a pretty cool deal to be the winner of the Hut Hundred, there’s so much prestige. It’s just tough every time you come back here, there’s just more and more competition every time.”
Darren Hagen dived underneath polesitter Sweet to grab the lead in the first turn from third, but behind him, Cottle spun in turn two, collecting six other cars. One of those taken out was Jason Leffler, who noted, “A 100-lap race and they pile in there on the first lap. I thought we could do better than that. But I guess not.”
Whitt led the first 45 circuits handily in the Red Bull Bullet/Esslinger Ford midget, but while Sweet and Hagen battled for second, an angry Cottle was ripping through the pack.  In 30 laps, he was fourth, and just seven circuits later he took second. He later explained, “My teammate ran over me. I don’t know which one it was, but one of them did.” 
Cottle, in a third Chevy Spike from Tony Stewart’s shop, took the lead on a lap-46 restart, passing Whitt on the outside of turn four. His Chevy engine had been popping since the first green flag, and while it still had plenty of power, the miss may have kept the tires from spinning coming off the turns. 
Hagen spun on lap 63 and noted, “I just hit a hole and biked it up a little bit; it landed and snapped from underneath me.” 
USAC imposed a red flag on lap 76 to allow teams to refuel. Tires couldn’t be changed, but after Stewart’s team fixed Cottle’s engine problem, he lost some of his advantage and Whitt stayed on his tail. Two laps after the restart, Whitt nosed to the inside of four and outran Cottle off the turn. 
Coons caught Cottle, and was sizing him up for a pass, but Bacon dived inside of him in turn one and Coons spun. Bacon took second on the restart and challenged Whitt for the lead on lap 90, but slowed suddenly with a flat right front two circuits later. Cottle passed Whitt in turn three on lap 94, but Whitt battled back into the lead in the next turn. At the finish, he led by more than a second.
It was the fourth Hut 100 victory for car owner Keith Kunz, and Whitt explained that they tightened the car slightly under the red flag. 
“I don’t know really what he did,” Whitt said. “We were real good on side bite getting in and through the center of the corner, but we had to stop so much to get it to drive off real straight. I knew that if we could get it to drive off straight, then we were going to be dialed in and Keith knew exactly what to do and got it set in perfect.”
The summary:
Qualifications: 1. Brad Sweet, Kahne 49, 22.389; 2. Cole Whitt, Kunz 71, 22.563; 3. Darren Hagen, Nine Racing 9, 22.755; 4. Shane Cottle, Stewart 20s, 22.758; 5. Tracy Hines, Stewart 21, 22.771; 6. Bobby East, Klatt 4, 22.951; 7. Cole Carter, Carter 7, 22.992; 8. Brady Bacon, Kahne 99, 23.023; 9. Levi Jones, Stewart 20, 23.140; 10. Jerry Coons, Jr., Wilke-Pak 11, 23.263; 11. Jason Leffler, RFMS 32, 23.518; 12. Chad Boat, Boat 30, 23.572; 13. Brad Loyet, Loyet 05s, 23.591; 14. Dakoda Armstrong, C & A 7a, 23.691; 15. Brad Kuhn, Mentgen 07, 23.772; 16. Dustin Morgan, Kunz 67, 23.876; 17. Davey Ray, Sandy 16, 23.989; 18. Joe Liguori, Owen 28, 23.990; 19. Chase Barber, Barber 90, 24.097; 20. Ricky Ehrgott, Rev 1 8, 24.127; 21. Kody Swanson, Nine Racing 19, 24.217; 22. Justin Grosz, Grosz 39, no time.
Feature (100 laps): Whitt, Cottle, Sweet, Hines, East, Morgan, Hagen, Coons, Barber, Swanson, Ehrgott, Ray, Armstrong, Bacon, Kuhn, Liguori, Jones, Loyet, Carter, Boat, Leffler, Grosz.