On a night when most of the crowd came to see NASCAR stars Kevin Harvick and Chase Elliott, the three greats of Southern Super Late Model racing put on a show that encouraged them to return in the future.
Bubba Pollard won the Busch Light 100 at Five Flags Speedway, but had to pass Casey Roderick and hold off Stephen Nasse to do it.
With the exception of December, when the likes of Wisconsin’s Ty Majeski and California’s Derek Thorn join them in threatening to win the Snowball Derby, both the Southern Super Series races and the Snowball Derby are contested at The Big Three.
Pollard, who was fourth fastest in the time trials, was forced to start eighth due to a rearrangement of positions, but made methodical progress. Meanwhile, Roderick started third after posting the second-fastest time in qualifying and took the lead from Dylan Fetcho six laps into the race.
From there, with only a mid-race breakaway slowing the race, Pollard had to close the gap but also not wear out his rear tires in the abrasive Florida half-mile. Pollard arrived with 30 laps remaining and needed 11 laps to catch Anthony Campi Racing’s No. 26, but passed him with 19 laps remaining and pulled away.
Pollard has now won a record 25 Blizzard Series races, the four spring and summer regular-season races at Five Flags that pave the way to the Snowball Derby.
As he crossed the finish line, he thanked his team and told them how much he appreciated them and that he really wanted this one.
As?
“Oh, a lot of things,” Pollard said after clarifying the technology. “Some personal things. We’ve really struggled a little bit down here, hit and miss in a place that I’ve always considered home and grew up in, and that makes it special.”
Pollard said he realized from the green that he had a winning car.
“It shows,” Pollard said. “I knew from the start and restart that I had to get past those guys like Harvick and then Cole, because with this tire you lose track position and with everyone being so close, you have to be aggressive.
“I knew I needed to do that, but I didn’t know what we had. You never know. I knew we would get the yellow card of the competition at 50. So I calmed down with 15 to go in the first half and saved a bit. I got aggressive again and then once I got the lead I was just praying there was no caution.
“Before that, I knew I needed to put pressure on Casey because Nasse was coming and I needed to put him between us and then I was able to get away.”
But then again, 25 regular-season wins at a track where all the greats have come at one time or another, including Elliott and now Harvick. William Byron has won here. Daniel Hemric. John Hunter Nemechek. All the local legends like Augie Grill, Mike Garvey, Eddie Mercer, Roderick and Nasse.
“It means I’m getting older and I’ve been doing this too long,” Pollard said. “It’s very important because this place shaped me as a racer. I learned how to compete here and against the people who competed here. So to have a lot of success means a lot.”
Nasse had to drive from tenth position and that, in the end, made the difference for him.
“Bubba had a good car tonight,” Nasse said. “We just had a bad place in qualifying and that really left us behind. There were a lot of good cars tonight. Everyone was able to hold the bottom quite well. It was difficult to get around them.
“I was able to advance pretty well there and I thought I would have a chance. I guess I only had Bubba left. Good job for those guys. We’ll just have to work on it. “We have a pretty good car.”
And for Roderick, it was more of the same, a season filled with plenty of podiums but still looking for his first win of the season.
“Close, very close,” Roderick said. “I feel like we made some great strides in practice this week, working on some of the things I’m feeling. We’re starting to cut really well on the front end, but something’s happening later in the race, and when the car lands in the corner … and it wasn’t the problem we’ve been having, getting free, but I needed to cut better because I was losing the right rear end, later in the race, on entry.”
Again, Roderick leads the ASA national standings and the Southern Super Series standings, second in Blizzard points behind Nasse, so it’s not like they’re bad.
“We’re not doing badly,” he said. “Second and third are not bad, but we have them under control and we need to get a win. Everyone at ACR, Team Platinum, works so hard and I’m looking forward to getting them to Victory Lane.”
From a performance standpoint, neither Elliott nor Harvick had a track day to remember. Elliott said his car was “loose, loose, loose” and that caused him to go from the lead to a lap down before the mid-race break. He finished 16th and off the lead lap. Harvick finished 13th in his Super Late Model debut, but the final two days were a lesson.
“These cars are a lot of fun,” Harvick said with an emphasis that suggested he meant it. “The best thing about tonight was that the track was packed. That’s really what we want to do, race with the grandstands full and good cars, too.”
What did you like about the car?
“It’s fast,” he said. “You burn the rear tires when you’re not doing well. I want to race these guys because I really like these racers. I also like our CARS Tour and Late Model Stock guys, but I really like Bubba Pollard and Casey Roderick. This is my idea of fun right now. And yeah, we struggle a little bit, but I also need a project like this, something to work on and get better at this stage of my career, and I’m going to get better racing against the guys because they’re the best at what they do.
Busch light night at 100 races
Five Flags Racetrack
June 28, 2024
Keynote USA
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