Jeg Coughlin added to his growing resume with a victory in the 25th annual K&N Horsepower Challenge.

"Any time you win a race that only invites the best of the best it's pretty darn special," Coughlin said. "It certainly sets a great tone for this weekend and continues the momentum we've built over the first part of the season. We're going for our 60th career national event win tomorrow so we could really make this one of the all-time weekends."

Spurred on by a partial home state crowd, Coughlin, of Delaware, Ohio, was an underdog all day but used exceptional driving to claim the special race-within-a-race, which invites the top eight qualifiers from the previous 12 months to battle for cash prizes.

Jeg Coughlin added to his growing resume with a victory in the 25th annual K&N Horsepower Challenge.

"Any time you win a race that only invites the best of the best it's pretty darn special," Coughlin said. "It certainly sets a great tone for this weekend and continues the momentum we've built over the first part of the season. We're going for our 60th career national event win tomorrow so we could really make this one of the all-time weekends."

Spurred on by a partial home state crowd, Coughlin, of Delaware, Ohio, was an underdog all day but used exceptional driving to claim the special race-within-a-race, which invites the top eight qualifiers from the previous 12 months to battle for cash prizes.

"To do it here in Ohio makes it all the better," Coughlin said. "This race always used to be run in Englishtown, N.J., but they moved it here and that's okay by me. We have a bunch of family and friends here supporting us and it's really neat to give them something to get excited about. It's going to be wild winner's circle celebration."

In the final, Coughlin faced a familiar foe in Greg Anderson, but once again got an early jump -- .020 to .062 seconds -- and never looked back, screaming away to an easy win in 6.675 at 207.05 mph. Anderson encountered tire spin at the launch and couldn't recover enough to make a run at Coughlin, crossing with a resigned 7.322 at 161.69 mph.

"For us to run a 6.67 just now in the final round, in the heat of the day no less, is pretty stout," Coughlin said. "I'm not sure what happened to Greg but with the advantage we had at the start of the race I'm not sure he could have caught us any way."

This marked Coughlin's third K&N Horsepower Challenge win. He also claimed the trophy in 199 and 2000.  

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