ROBERSONVILLE, NC – Louis White scored the win in both of Saturday night’s Late Model features at East Carolina Motor Speedway while emotions were sour among several of the drivers who finished behind him.
White led wire-to-wire in both races but his biggest challenge came from Rusty Daniels in the second of the two races. Daniels, after having problems in the first race, charged through the field and had even passed White for the lead briefly while also challenging on several restarts, but White survived.
“When I looked after we had that caution, I saw Rusty [Daniels] behind me,” White said after scoring his second and third wins of the 2015 season. “I said ‘oh lord’. He didn’t run all the laps in the first race and I figured he’d have a little better tires than me. Rusty’s usually a pretty strong racer so I knew when I had him behind me I was going to have some trouble.”
Daniels went on to finish second in the second race after tire problems took him out of the first race.
“We used everything up getting to [Louis White],” Daniels said. “We’re tickled to finish like we did after starting last but we used her up getting to the front.”
While the second race was a battle, the first race was a runaway for White as he led every lap uncontested to beat Kenneth Mercer and Greg Edwards.
“Car ain’t pretty, she’s a little bit old, but we got a pretty decent setup on her tonight,” Mercer said of his runner-up effort. “If we had a little more forward bite, I think we would have had something for the leaders. We had a shot.”
Edwards finished third in his East Carolina Motor Speedway debut driving for JT Jackson and backed that up with a fourth place finish in the night’s second act.
“The car wasn’t quite there,” Edwards remarked. “We need to work on it. First time here, first time I’ve driven this car in a long time. I don’t know what [White and Daniels] had going on there. I best not say anything. I like those guys but brake checking and letting off the gas, he’s lucky he had somebody real nice when he wouldn’t go. We need to get these restarts rolling. Just straight restarts, we don’t need to play these games. That’s why you see those cars tore up back there.”
While 11 cars showed up to race, only 10 competed in the two races as Bradley McCaskill left the track after practice while fighting some insurmountable handling problems. White’s victory in the first race came over Mercer, Edwards, Jeff Shiflett and Thomas Burbage. In the second race, he beat out Daniels, Wesley Johnson, Edwards and Burbage.
Tempers Flare
Jeff Shiflett and Shelton McNair got into an on track altercation in the late stages of the first of two races leaving McNair miffed with Shiflett. Following the on-track incident that sidelined McNair, McNair attempted to exchange pleasantries and express his dismay toward last week’s race winner and the defending track champion.
“When I was inside of him, I think he bounced off the wall,” McNair commented. “He came down into me and tore my whole right side up. On the restart on the backstretch, everybody checked up and he came barreling on the inside and run all across the inside of me. It’s just like, we were hooked up tonight. I don’t know what his problem is but what goes around comes around I guess.”
Shiflett’s version of the events differed slightly from McNair’s version as would be expected on a Saturday night.
“In that first race, to be honest with you, after they wrecked me all up, the car broke loose and I ran into [McNair] on the back straightaway. Came in the pits, finished fourth and then realized that idler arm was broke on the car and I don’t even know how I managed to pull it off. What we did, we put it back together knowing that we had junk.”
RACE22.com’s Zach Evans contributed to this report.
Race Results
LMSC Twin Race #1
- #7 Louis White
- #24 Kenneth Mercer
- #67 Greg Edwards
- #01 Jeff Shiflett
- #9 Thomas Burbage
- #50 Haley Moody
- #72 Jeremy Bohne
- #J12 Wesley Johnson
- #M3 Shelton McNair
- #16 Rusty Daniels
LMSC Twin Race #2
- #7 Louis White
- #16 Rusty Daniels
- #J12 Wesley Johnson
- #67 Greg Edwards
- #9 Thomas Burbage
- #01 Jeff Shiflett
- #24 Kenneth Mercer
- #M3 Shelton McNair
- #50 Haley Moody
- #72 Jeremy Bohne
