Story by: Langley Austin ~ [email protected]
Copper Hill, VA(November 7, 2012) — The wheels of silly season spin rapidly this time of year in the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series, but it also turns just as rapidly in Late Model Stock Car racing.
Frank Deiny, Jr. announced on his Facebook page this week that he was being replaced in the Kiker Motorsports #5 ride for the final two races of the season. Deiny has driven the Kiker Motorsports car for the last two seasons full time at Motor Mile Speedway and in the bigger races across the region. Deiny has been the only drive for Kiker Motorsports since the fall of 2010, when he replaced Brandon Dean.
Dean, that season had won the track championship at Motor Mile Speedway after Dean and team owner, Travis Kiker had teamed with Deiny. Deiny, who in addition to driving also operates FDJ Motorsports, began giving Kiker and Dean support on their car as well as changing over the front clip to an FDJ Motorsports clip. That was around mid-season and by seasons end, Dean had finally broke through with his first win and won the championship.
Deiny hopped behind the wheel of one of the Kiker team cars at Ace Speedway and a brake failure in qualifying sent him hard into the outside wall. It killed the car, which was the second Kiker car tore up after Dean crashed at Martinsville, a few weeks earlier. With both cars hurt, Dean was out of a ride for the Myrtle Beach 400 and Deiny had to get one of his own cars that had been a part of his rental program together to drive with sponsorship from Kiker Motorsports.
Deiny won that race in an epic battle with his team car driven by Justin Johnson and thus began a full-time relationship with Kiker Motorsports team owners, Travis and Eddie Kiker. Dean didn’t return to the seat of the Kiker entry in 2011, despite winning the championship and Deiny was their full time driver. Dean attempted to run his own team early on in the season, but finances seemed to get in the way of operating his own family owned team.
Deiny on the other hand drove to a single race win at Motor Mile Speedway, a feat that he duplicated in 2012. With only three wins to their credit and not seriously being challengers during two seasons that have been dominated by Sellers Racing affiliated cars, their relationship was coming to an end. Deiny was eyeing a move to the NASCAR K&N Pro Series East and Kiker was looking to get his team back to the level it was during the 2010 season.
Deiny made his first East Series start a week ago at Rockingham Speedway, where he placed 18th. Kiker, who was a sponsor on the East car turned his focus to rekindling 2010 magic. Still with a good relationship with Dean, he turned to his championship winning driver. Dean will pilot the Kiker Motorsports #5 ride at Myrtle Beach Speedway in the Myrtle Beach 400 next weekend as well as in the Thanksgiving Classic at Southern National Motorsports Park on Thanksgiving weekend.
Though Deiny and Kiker have split for now, neither seem to harbor ill feelings toward one another.
“Travis and Eddie Kiker have been nothing, but good to me,” said Deiny in a phone interview. “We’ve had some success and some struggles together over the last two seasons, but hopefully this isn’t the last time we work together. They are planning to be a big supporter of our East program for next season and I’m glad that we’re able to remain good friends.”
Kiker echoed those sentiments.
“Frank Deiny was a good fit for our program for the last two seasons,” said Travis Kiker. “We’ve grown a lot as a team with his help. We’re sad to see that time come to an end, but sometimes you just have to make a change to see where things are headed. We’re still going to support Frank if we can in his endeavors.”
Kiker is also excited about getting back together with his former driver and hopes to pick up where they left off.
“We won the championship with Brandon (Dean) in 2010 and then things changed on his side and ours. Now we’ve got a chance to work together again and I think we’ll pick up right where we left off. Brandon is a very talented driver and we’ll have two races here at the end of the season to see where our program is together with him in the driver’s seat.”
Dean and Kiker will be ready to tackle Myrtle Beach, but Deiny, who has cars of his own, will be missing in action. The race will have to roll off without Deiny, who is a four time winner of the Myrtle Beach 400.
“I hate we’re going to miss Myrtle Beach,” Deiny said. “That’s a race that over the years, I’ve had a lot of luck in. Winning it four times was a lot of fun, but without a sponsor, it wouldn’t make sense for us to go down there. To be ready for that race it takes a lot of tires in practice and you have to be ready to go after it down there.”
While Deiny sits this one out, Dean and Kiker are certainly hoping to make some noise right out of the gate when they get to Myrtle Beach.
“We know that Frank has built us some of the best cars in the business,” continued Kiker. “So we’re going to go down there and see what we can do in what’s probably the second biggest Late Model race of the season.”
