SOUTH BOSTON, VA :: After a long week of torrential rains and threating skies, Mother Nature finally gave way and provided a beautiful day for racing at South Boston Speedway. The entry list saw 18 Late Models for the Bojangles Late Model 150 to do battle on the famed and historic 4/10s mile oval. Coming into Saturday’s feature, Lee Pulliam was the points leader riding on a seven win season at South Boston Speedway. Pulliam is also leading in the national points as well and showing no signs of lying down. Bobby McCarty and Dustin Storm are other notables in the season long points race are doing well but where is Phillip Morris?
Morris, who was showing fourth in points coming into Saturday’s feature, was absent from competition just two weeks ago and would be absent again this week. Unknown as to the exact circumstances but rumors are consistently being said that the four time National Late Model champion claims that because of the lack of speed, he’s reevaluating his race program. Mind you now, rumors are just what they are, rumors. It’s hard to imagine that orange, white and blue #26 not being on the track giving fits to the younger talent. Especially at a track that has named its Victory Lane after you when you’re not even retired from racing such as South Boston Speedway has.
None the less, racing moves on and Peyton Sellers showed the fastest speeds during practice which was a great sign in getting back to Victory Lane. Dennis Holdren, Timothy Peters and of course, Lee Pulliam showed to have speed as well. Last time Timothy Peters was racing a Late Model at South Boston Speedway was just 3 weeks ago and won that event but that was also the night that Lee Pulliam had tire failure and nailed the outside wall. CE Falk made his South Boston Speedway return leading the season points at his home track at Langley Speedway and sitting 6th in the National standings. He was definitely here to do just one thing, win.
Qualifying goes down and posting a very impressive lap was Timothy Peters which should be worthy of the night’s pole. But then came Lee Pulliam who would best Peters effort by a mere .066 thousandths of second to claim the pole for the Bojangles Late Model 150. Green flag would wave for 18 Late Models and wasting no time was Pulliam jumping to the lead. But on lap three, a huge wreck over in turn two involving Bruce Anderson, Dennis Holdren, Austin Thaxton, Josh Oakley and Dustin Storm would bring out a caution. While most were able to return to action, Oakley and Storm would not as the damage to their rockets was too severe. Bobby McCarty, who was also involved, was done as well.
Racing action resumed and this time from the outside, Timothy Peters would power his way to the lead. Lee Pulliam would follow as the two were nose to tail. Making moves and looking racy was Peyton Sellers and CE Falk who was running solid in 3rd and 4th in the grid. For the next several laps, Pulliam stalked the ride of Timothy Peters showing that at any time he could pass. Probably reminded of the 150 lap race from his spotter, Pulliam would instead wait for the right time to pass Peters who was not slow at all being the leader. Then on lap 37, one slip from Peters going into turn 1 and Pulliam drove his machine in and cleared Peters out of turn two for the lead.
From that point in the race, that was the last time Pulliam would ever see the bumper of a competitor unless he was lapping them. Lee Pulliam would win for the 8th time of the season and extend his points lead in that series at South Boston Speedway. Other impressive showings were the efforts of Peyton Sellers who started 6th, finished 2nd and at one point may have been the fastest car. The best dogfight of the night was for the 5 spot between Ronald Hill and Bruce Anderson who was door to door, beating and banging each other while keeping it clean. That battle lasted nearly 60 laps before it was decided by the checkered flag in favor of Anderson.
While it seems every track has its man to beat, McCaskill at Southern National, Falk at Langley, Pulliam is definitely the man to beat at South Boston. The lap three crash took out the closest competition to Pulliam and it has all but secured another track championship. However, somebody has got to step up their game if there is to be another winner in 2013 at South Boston Speedway. Maybe now’s the time to consider a bounty on Lee Pulliam at South Boston Speedway? My fear is that with the championship looking very grim for the other competitors, why race is there’s little chance to win? Why not go somewhere else? Hope that doesn’t happen, guess will see on June 8th when they race again.
