Story by: Mark Rogers, Jr. ~ [email protected]

Lucama, NC(June 6, 2012) — For some racers, practice, practice and more practice is the charm. For others it’s that one bit or piece of confidence but how do you explain Deac McCaskill and his dominance at Southern National Motorsports Park? Maybe taking last season off to do some work and mentoring refired that competitiveness that at some point every racer will go through.

Whatever the case, it’s responsible for 8 wins out of 9 scheduled races and so much so that the track has placed a 2 grand bounty on him. Though placing a bounty is nothing new to racing, it’s who comes out to seek that bounty that matters. Drivers like Paddy Rodenbeck, Darrell Gilchrist, Hunter Devers, Jamey Caudill and Matt McCall all came to challenge for the win and the bounty. Along with a strong cast of SNMP regulars determined that on this night, nothing was going to be easy for Deac McCaskill.
Action got underway with practice that saw Deac McCaskill with the hot laps, along with Hunter Devers, Darrell Gilchrist, Michael Hardin and Brandon Brown that turned in good laps as well. One of the things discussed on how to beat Deac along pit road was winning the time trials at qualifying. But not so as McCaskill claimed pole and showed why he’s winning, just flat out speed! Michael Hardin posted a strong lap as well and will start to the outside of the pole sitter. Matt McCall, Hunter Devers and Jamey Caudill made up the top 5. Other notables with really good cars were Darrell Gilchrist and Doug Godsey. Now the talks shifted along pit road, do you go after Deac now or ride for a bit because this race is 150 laps long?

The pole sitter would have his say as the green would wave to a full field of Late Models and by turn 3, clearly has position along with the lead. Michael Hardin looks to be as good but settled for 2nd to follow the leader’s line. On back McCall, Devers and Caudill made up the top5 just as they qualified. After several laps, the field settled but taking notice was the leaders. In fact by lap 20, McCaskill and Hardin have built up at least a 10 car length lead nose to tail. While that was going on from McCall on back, the racing was a bit more intense as the battle for 5th between Jamey Caudill and Michael Rouse got hot. Finally though, Rouse was able to get position and drove through to claim 5th.

By lap 40, McCaskill and Hardin have built up a mammoth lead of at least a straightaway over the rest of the field. But that lead would go away when the caution would wave for the first time of the evening. Yellow comes out for the spinning car of Doug Godsey who appeared to be victim of some 3 wide racing, his night was done. So after a yellow then a red flag for clean up, the restart would take place on lap 66 were Mccaskill and Hardin once again set sail and left behind the rest of the field. Halfway point comes in this 150 lap feature with Deac McCaskill clearly in control but Hardin is not letting him go easy. Several times Hardin would take a look underneath the man with a bounty just to let him know he’s there. But Deac would slam the door down.

Lots of green flag racing and it didn’t take long for the leaders to encounter traffic to put laps on the rest of the field. Lap 120 would come and suddenly for Hardin, his rocket was beginning to drift back. The latter part of the race usually shows who used there stuff up and who was saving as Austin Self now makes his way into the top 5. Also, still running third showing some strength as expected was Matt Mccall who is clearly running down the ailing ride of Michael Hardin. Bad news would come for Thomas Burbage as his car sat parked by the hauler now and down for the night as well. Changes to the top 5 now as laps whine down, the charging cars of Matt McCall and Austin Self take 2nd and 3rd from Michael Hardin who has no choice but to fight for forth. Paddy Rodenbeck who kept the nose clean on his car now rides in 5th.

With just a few final circuits, Deac McCaskill from flag to flag, lap for lap would go on to win and best a full field of Late Models for a 150 laps at Southern National Motorsports Park. Second goes to the hard charging Matt McCall, then Austin Self with a well disciplined run. Michael Hardin survived brake failure to finish 4th after running Deac nose to tail for 120 laps and Paddy Rodenbeck claims the 5th spot with a good run. After the race, I spoke to Deac Mccaskill and shared with him how both McCall and Self was hoping for a late race caution or another 50 laps.

He stated, “Hardin ran me harder then what I wanted but I really wanted to lead, I just wasn’t going to give it up. There was a little more left if we had a caution I believe.”