ALTAMAHAW, NC :: RD Smith is feeling good about his chances in October’s Martinsville DuPont Credit Union (MDCU) 300 at Martinsville Speedway after winning the track championship at Ace Speedway on Friday night. Smith secured the championship, his first, with a fourth place finish in Friday’s Late Model feature race.
Smith scored four wins on the season at Ace Speedway against some tough competition, which included names like Barry Beggarly, Dustin Rumley and Jason York among others. Smith’s four victories and his championship left him satisfied as he prepared to turn his attention to Martinsville.
“I am extremely happy with this season,” Smith said. “The team has been doing a great job all year, especially my crew chief (Jerry Kendrick), he’s just done a great job all year and we made the switch over the winter to Darrell Poe engines and they’ve really proven to help our programs. It means a lot to win this championship as well. It was a tough field down there every week. Ace is a beating and banging track so you’ve got to bring it every week. There are no off nights where you can just ride. You’re trading paint every week pretty heavy.”
With the championship behind him, Smith now looks to Martinsville where he feels confident. Smith also recognizes that Martinsville and Ace have some similar characteristics and that could provide him with a competitive advantage he hopes to exploit on October 5th.
“I feel real good about Martinsville,” Smith remarked. “We used our Ace package last year and I thought we had a good car there and we’re significantly better this year so we’ve got high hopes going in. We feel like we’ll be really strong and a front runner.”
Last season, Smith made the field but was sidelined from competition due to mechanical problems during the race. This year, he feels like he should be good enough to be in the mix at the end of the race and, if he can be inside the top-five with 10 laps to go, well, anything can happen.
“We’d like to see a top-five realistically,” Smith explained. “We’d like to be a top-10 starting spot and top-five in the race.I think all you can ask for is to be in that group, top-five or so, when that last caution comes out and, at that point, it’s kind of a free for all. All you can do from there is get up on the wheel and hope you’re the one coming through the smoke instead of being the smoke.”
As for Smith’s 2014 plans, Smith says he’ll likely compete at Ace if everything remains “status-quo”.
“It’s right here in our backyard and I’ve got a young family so we don’t like to travel as much anymore.”
Smith’s four victories all came at Ace Speedway. One of those four wins came as part of a Moonshine Capital Promotions Series event back in August. The championship was Smith’s first career Late Model Stock Car championship.
