Randy Benson won Dillon Motor Speedway’s Late Model Stock championship in 2014, but he did so without winning a single race in his first season at the 4/10 mile South Carolina oval. Now, Benson can add a Dillon feature win to his collection, as he took home the checkered flag in last Sunday’s 60-lap feature.
Coming against a field of 21 Late Models, the victory was a hard-earned one for the defending track champion.
“I told them I would run harder this year than I did last year, because last year I was just learning the track,” said Benson, reminiscing on a conversation at the track’s end-of-season awards banquet in 2014. “So far it’s worked out good. I knew the competition was tough down there, but there’s a lot more tougher ones there this year.”
That increase in competition is partially due to healthy car counts at Dillon. Four of the six Late Model features at Dillon this season have included at least 18 cars, and both of their June events featured at least 20 cars.
“There were 21 [cars] this time, and 19 or 20 the time before,” Benson added. “There’s some big money down there, and they’re all good drivers too.”
Benson acknowledges that he is down on horsepower to some of his regular competition at Dillon, such as three-time feature winner Bobby Gower. However, he believes his team can continue to compete for victories in hopes of repeating last year’s championship.
“This car we’ve got, the longer we run, the better it gets. If we can keep the car like it is and don’t get it tore up, we can keep running at the front. We can get more wins, that’s what I’ll be shooting for.”
“It’s real hard to get off of three and four there, so that’s what I went to work on,” Benson said about his key to success at Dillon. “And now that’s what I’m best at. We’re still down on horsepower, but we’ve got what we’ve got working for us now.”
The triumph also snapped another winless streak for the veteran Benson. The victory was Benson’s first since 2009, when he was still running regularly at Caraway Speedway. Benson won the Late Model Stock track championship in 2007 and 2008 before temporarily down-scaling his racing efforts.
“2009 or 2010, my wife got sick with cancer. Then my daughter was playing softball and I kind of backed off of this to help her with softball, help get her a college scholarship.”
“I went at it, but not the way I needed to, money-wise. Economically, times were getting hard anyways. I ran at Caraway periodically, when I could.”
Benson dedicated the win to Rusty Harpe, one of his former competitors at Caraway. Harpe was the 2000 Limited Late Model champion at Caraway, and Benson has fond memories of racing against Harpe at the Sophia, N.C. facility. Harpe tragically passed away in 2007 in an accident at his home.
“We were both short on crew, but we ended up running against each other for the championship,” Benson said about their time against each other at Caraway. “They’re having that memorial race up there at Caraway Saturday, so it meant a lot to win this one.”
Caraway Speedway honors his memory with the Rusty Harpe Memorial each season. This year’s Harpe Memorial, scheduled for this Saturday, July 4, will feature a 171-lap Late Model race and 150 laps of NASCAR Southern Whelen Modified Tour action.
Dillon Motor Speedway will return to action the following weekend on July 11, headlined by the Late Model Stocks and a $2,000-to-win event for the Mid-Atlantic Street Stock (MASS) Championship Series.
