Story by: Langley Austin ~ [email protected]
Fairlawn, VA(June 26, 2012) — The drama at Motor Mile Speedway has been building all season, but on a weekend when one rivalry was expected to explode, things took a different twist right around the half way point in the season.
Despite a track layout that doesn’t lend itself to the greatest racing, Motor Mile Speedway is a track that seems to loom with controversy season after season. This season there’s been one incident after another keeping the fans in the New River Valley area of Virginia on the edge of their seats. From Derrick Lancaster going after Craig Stallard in the season opener, things got off to an edgy start this season.
Lee Pulliam missed the first three races of the 2012 season due to his NASCAR suspension resulting from his post-race altercation with Philip Morris at South Boston Speedway last fall. His return was one of the most anticipated moments of the season, right behind seeing who would get wins on his home turf while he couldn’t come out to play. CE Falk picked up two of those wins, while Mike Looney won the other and while those two were picking up trophies, JR Motorsports driver, Josh Berry was busy racking up points.
Berry would pick up his first win in Pulliam’s return, after Pulliam looked to be on his way to a victory and cut a tire late in the race. Pulliam rebounded with two wins on a night of twin races and on this night, while he was driving away, another rivalry was born. Behind him, Lancaster was having his best run of the season in race one, when he went spinning off the front bumper of Deiny. The veteran retaliated in the second race and then commenced to a war of words.
The next night of racing saw Pulliam once again return to victory lane, his third win in a row, but during race two contact between he and Deiny ended with Pulliam and Lancaster crashed out of the race. Deiny would go on to win the race and while Pulliam was frustrated, Lancaster was the one doing the talking. Lancaster known for making good on his promises, has all, but assured everyone that he will get even with Deiny for the damage to his car.
The week in between this race and last weekends race was enough for Lancaster to play mind games with Deiny by putting Kelly Kingery, one of the most fierce competitors anywhere behind the wheel of one of his cars. Kingery, known for his take no prisoners style of racing was expected by many to be the driver who would pay Deiny back for Lancaster. The build up and drama heading into the weekend was at all time high as many expected fireworks between the Lancaster and Deiny or even Deiny and Pulliam.
With many expectations heading into the 150-lap race, the unexpected took place.
The pace laps would change the complexion of the night as Tommy Lemons, Jr., who had posted the fastest time had to come down pit road before the green flag to fix a throttle issue. That pit stop would result in him starting shotgun on the field. That was the first of many twists and turns that made the fans in attendance scratch their heads.
With Lemons starting in the back, Mike Looney moved up from the second row to lineup alongside Josh Berry. The two would race hard for the lead for the first circuit remaining side by side until coming off of turn four on lap two they colided and caused a major crash. Looney, Berry, Lancaster, Jonathan Smith, Austin Self and all three of the FDJ Motorsports entries(Dylan Lupton, Quin Houff and Craig Stallard) were involved heavily with only Smith rejoining the race competitively.
The crash effectively wiped out seven cars, most of which could have been contenders for a top five finishing position. And, through all the carnage, no one was really placing blame on anyone else as Berry and Looney, who started the crash admitted that it was “just a racing deal.” As the race resumed, Pulliam, who made it through the wreck unscathed assumed the point and remained there for much of a long green flag run that came following another wreck that wiped out more contenders.
The second wreck on lap 14 of the 150-lap race saw Deiny get into Rusty Skewes as Kelly Kingery and other cars piled in or tried to avoid the crash. Deiny would return to the race with only minor damage to his Kiker Motorsports entry, but Skewes would find his car was trashed. Kingery too was crashed in the incident and would be unable to continue. At this point, Lancaster’s team, who owned Kingery’s car was asking officials to park Deiny for his rough driving of Skewes, but the officials didn’t deem the crash to be intentional and Deiny soildered on. Even Skewes admitted that he didn’t know what happened and had nothing bad to say about Deiny following the accident.
Back up front for the restart that resulted in more than 120 green flag laps, Pulliam set sail, but soon found himself joined at the front of the pack by Lemons, who had avoided the crashes in front of him and was cashing in some due good luck to find himself back in second position. For the next 80-90 laps, Lemons hounded Pulliam, waiting for the veteran driver to make a mistake, but Pulliam never wavered and just when it looked as if Lemons had given up or rather his tires had, a caution waved over the field on lap 143.
The resulting restart saw Lemons lineup door to door with Pulliam and though most thought that Pulliam would just pull away again, he didn’t. Lemons stayed door to door with Pulliam for the final circuits with South Boston Speedway points leader, Matt Bowling stayed tucked in right behind them. On the final lap as Lemons slipped back slightly, Bowling made it three wide into turn three and as Pulliam went down to try and slow Bowling’s momentum, Lemons rallied on the outside and found himself door to door with Pulliam off of turn four.
The result was heavy contact between Pulliam and Lemons as the two desperately tried to be the first back to the finish line and as Pulliam came up, Lemons shoved him back down. The two banged fenders and rubbed as sparks flew and fans cheered on their favorite driver, but with momentum on the high side Lemons prevailed and took the checkered flag first by no more than the front fender. It was one of the most exciting finishes in Motor Mile Speedway history and coming out on top wasn’t the driver who everyone has come accustom to dominating, but rather a driver that hadn’t won at Motor Mile since 2009 and who had not won at all since March of 2010.
For Lemons the victory was exactly what he needed as the veteran Late Model Stock Car driver had fallen on hard times over the last few seasons, struggling to finish in the top five on a regular basis. However, this season the driver had begun to turn things around and with many second and third place finishes in his rearview mirror, now he could finally hoist a trophy.
For Pulliam it marks the first time he’s been beaten at Motor Mile Speedway in the last two seasons. In past races when he wasn’t the first driver across the finish line, he was either wrecked or had a mechanical failure to keep him out of victory lane. However, this time Lemons flat out, out drove the young driver. He lined up on the outside and kept himself in contention for the win until the final moment when he could pull ahead and take the victory. Pulliam certainly has seen that the competition has been catching up and now he’s got to be worried that at least one of them has passed him.
