Bobby McCarty mounted a late charge to score the victory in the Hampton Heat 200 at Langley Speedway on Saturday night.
When polesitter CE Falk and Nick Smith made contact racing for the lead with 10 laps to go, that opened up the inside lane for Bobby McCarty. After getting the lead, McCarty never looked back en-route to the biggest win of his career.
“I didn’t know what to expect,” McCarty said after the race. “This is my first time coming here. I definitely relied on Timothy [Peters] for a lot of stuff. He gave me a lot of information. I can’t be prouder of this crew. They worked so hard, never quit, busted their tail in the heat and we played a smart game. I rode and rode and rode and, when Smith and Falk went up the track coming out of four, I saw the door and took it and we set sail from there.”
The victory at Langley on Saturday was McCarty’s fourth of the year and his first at Langley.
Falk had the dominant car in the race, leading the first 188 laps but ended up finishing in third, behind Brenden Queen. After the race, he was disappointed with the result, but took his third-place finish in stride.
“We had a really good car,” Falk said. “Philip [Morris] pushed us pretty hard in the beginning but I was just driving my own race. Those guys were falling back and I thought I made some good adjustments at the break but we must have over-adjusted a little bit. We just pushed the right front tire off. Pushed it about 10 laps early. This no. 40 car is one the best cars I’ve ever had during the Heat. If we had two tires at halfway, it might have been a different deal, but that was the race and congratulations to Bobby. That’s what happens in big-time auto racing.”
Nick Smith finished in fourth while North Carolina driver Justin Carroll finished fifth.
Bobby McCarty is the fourth non-Langley regular to win the race, joining Lee Pulliam (2015), Peyton Sellers (2013) and Matt Bowling (2012). The Hampton Heat 200 was also the second of three races in the Virginia Triple Crown, which concludes on September 23rd in the first primetime ValleyStar Credit Union 300 at Martinsville Speedway.
NASCAR Whelen All-American Series racing returns to Langley Speedway next weekend with a 100 lap Late Model Stock Car race headlining the event.
Unofficial Results
- Bobby McCarty
- Brenden Queen
- CE Falk
- Nick Smith
- Justin T Carroll
- Greg Edwards
- Timothy Peters
- Casey Wyatt
- Justin S Carroll
- Terry Carroll
- Austin Thaxton
- Peyton Sellers
- Stacy Puryear
- Dean Ward
- Sam Hunt
- Philip Morris
- Cody Carlton
- Nick Smith
- Eddie Johnson
- Danny Edwards
- Mark Wertz
- Cameron Bowen
- Peyton Sellers
- Grayson Cullather
- Bubba Johnston
- Matt Waltz
- Macy Causey
- Thomas Marks
- Paul Green
- Maddy Ryan Mulligan
- Craig Eastep
