FLORENCE, SC :: What a weekend of racing it was around the region and throughout the county. A weekend where several underdogs would go on to excel and quite a few big name stars would suffer though a rough weekend.
Let’s start at the Langley Speedway in eastern Virginia. Langley in the past few years has been known as CE Falk’s personal playground. Falk has won three track championships in the last four years and if the first two races where any indication, he’s well on his way to a fourth. But, this weekend, things didn’t go as planned for Falk and he wouldn’t fare well in Twin 75 races on the newly repaved track.
Instead, a relatively unknown Matt Waltz would lay claim to not only one win, but both wins on Saturday night. Waltz had the dominant car throughout the day and qualified on the pole with a blistering 15.501 second lap time. Dude Gibbs, the veteran driver would start second in the first race.
Dean Fogleman hasn’t won a race under Brad Allen at the Ace Speedway. That changed on Friday night when Fogleman would best a 14 car field to pick up his first victory since 2008. Fogleman would top Dustin Rumley for the win.
Fogleman’s had a fast car during the first two races and thinks he’ll be a contender for weeks to come. If that’s the case, Ace Speedway may just have themselves a championship battle for the ages between the young Rumley, Fogleman and the veteran Barry Beggarly.
It’s not often you classify a NASCAR Camping World Truck Series guy as an underdog, but in my eyes, Timothy Peters has to be one. Peters hasn’t run a Late Model but once in the last three years, and that was at Martinsville in 2011.
Saturday night, Peters would knock off two of the biggest names in this day and age in the Late Model Stock world, Lee Pulliam and Philip Morris. While Pulliam had problems with a tire going down, Morris hasn’t been on his game at South Boston like he’s known to be.
And last but certainly not least, I’m sure you’ve seen the finish of the Aaron’s 499 from Talladega SuperSpeedway. It’s no secret that David Ragan and David Gilliland both scored arguably the biggest upset win in NASCAR history, but for Ragan, who finished second to Kyle Busch just a week ago at the Denny Hamlin Short Track Showdown, it’s no surprise he ended up in victory lane. All three of his wins have come on the restrictor plate tracks
For the South Georgia native, who grew up running Super Late Models throughout the southeast, Ragan has once again thrust himself into the limelight, atleast for a little while.
While I’m sure weekends like this aren’t going to come about often, it was nice to see some fresh faces in victory lane for a change. Hopefully things will work out more often than not and we’ll continue to have new faces show up in the racing world.
Let us know in the comments below what was your favorite upset moment of the weekend. We’d love to hear your thoughts and opinions as well.
