After earning his first-ever ARCA pole, Cleetus McFarland led the early laps at Michigan before falling back through the top ten, and scrubbing the wall. He also had a sketchy moment, colliding with Thomas Annunziata as he came down on a three-wide situation.
It was Connor Mosack who took control after him, leading all the way to the Lap 35 competition caution. Cleetus had fallen back to tenth at that point, after starting from pole.
On the restart, Jake Bollman took the lead while a few cars slid sideways in the middle of the pack, but things stayed green. Soon after, Bobby Earnhardt went for a spin, triggering the next yellow.
The following restart was pivotal as Ruggiero took the lead from Bollman. Cleetus was battling in the middle of a three-wide situation when he and Ryan Vargas got tangled together. Vargas got tight in lifted, and with Cleetus right on his right-rear, there was no margin for error. The contact sent Cleetus up the track and into the wall, clipping Andy Jankowiak, who spun and collected Jason Kitzmiller as well.
That ended up being the final caution of the race, as the rain arrived soon after. With 57 of 100 scheduled laps completed, the event had crossed the halfway point and was official.
Ruggiero scores another ARCA win
Ruggiero, who is also a winner in the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series, now has three ARCA wins -- all this season.
"Yeah it was awesome, really proud of the No. 18 team, they work so hard," said Ruggiero, who started fifth. "This is such a great group of guys, and it's awesome to win here with my family and my mom and dad. It was cool that Gavan got to push me there at the end of the race and helped me get the lead. We executed on every restart, our car drove good, but I felt like we were a little bit behind on speed and still got it done."
Bollman finished second to Ruggiero, Gavan Boschele third, Mosack fourth, and Lanie Buice fifth.
Squirrel in the Top 10, while Cleetus "tore it up"
TROUBLE. Cleetus McFarland and Ryan Vargas make contact, and Andy Jankowiak gets collected 😬
— ARCA Menards Series (@ARCA_Racing) June 5, 2026
📺 FS2 | @MISpeedway pic.twitter.com/IHjrqTcpLs
Annunziata finished sixth, Isabella Robusto seventh, Will Kimmel eighth, Wesley Slimp ninth, and George 'Squirrel McNut' Siciliano earning a tenth-place finish.
Cleetus was scored in 14th place after the race was called, the last driver on the lead lap. He will also be running the Truck race at Michigan on Saturday, where he will give the command to start engines from inside his No. 4 Niece Motorsports Chevrolet.
"Well I went out there with the fastest hot rod on the track, as you know -- Pole Award. But I tore it up. I was tight, and it wouldn't turn left, so inevitably, I hit the wall. That jacked it up even worse -- things are vibrating, I got (a lot) of wheel in it, (a lot) of pedal in it, and I just can't do anything. It was really frustrating, especially starting off on the pole. You only go backwards and it doesn't feel good when cars are passing you. Nothing I can do."
On the accident, Cleetus added: "We were three-freaking-wide, maybe I should have let that guy have more room and raced another lap, versus bombing in three-wide, we all three crashed, the cars tore up again, I slammed it into the wall -- not good."
