NASCAR Whelen Southern Modified driver L.W. Miller
picked up his first career victory Sunday evening at
Motor Mile Speedway, doing so in rather convincing
fashion as evident by his 11-second margin of victory
over Jay Foley.
"I don’t know whether I’m
more excited or more tired because we ran another race
this weekend before this one," Miller said.
"This was a great weekend for me and my team. This
is the most dominant car I’ve ever had before. This
car was just on a rail tonight, plus the Motor Mile is
just an awesome track and a beautiful facility.
"For about the first 50 laps,
I was just riding around trying to figure out how
everybody else was running and how hard they were going
at it. I drove up to the leaders just to make sure I had
something for them when it was time to get down and
really go racing. I was able to run Jay Foley down and
get around him. After awhile I was just pulling away and
had such a good car that the only thing that was going
to hurt me was a caution."
From that point on, it was simply
a matter of Miller pulling away from his other
competitors en route to the victory as the final 115
laps were run without a caution.
"We got to lead some laps and
that’s something I haven’t been able to do for
awhile," Foley said. "Our car was really good
and I’m just tickled to death to come out of here with
a second-place finish. Early in the race I was just
trying to find a pace to run so I wouldn’t use my
tires up. I just didn’t have enough for L.W. Miller
when it counted."
Rounding out the top-five behind
Miller and Foley were Jason Myers, Brian Pack and Junior
Miller.
"I love this," Myers
said. "After the year I’ve had so far, to finish
third means the world to me. I’m tickled to death with
this Foley Racing Engine we had in the car. For two of
the top three cars to have Foley motors says a lot about
how good a motor Jay and his guys build. I really
don’t think me or anybody else had anything for L.W.
Miller. I’ll take third and be happy with that."
Brian Loftin won the Bud Pole by
setting a Motor Mile track record when he circled the
.416-mile short track at a speed of 102.016 mph. After
the qualifying redraw, Loftin started sixth with the
front row made up by Jason Myers and Foley. On the
initial restart, it was Foley jumping out to the early
lead until Loftin’s luck ran out on Lap 25 when he
spun and made slight contact with the fourth turn wall.
The second yellow flag of the race
was thrown on Lap 47 for a harmless spin involving Jay
Hedgecock, while the third caution was thrown when Joe
Lucas looped his Chevrolet in the third turn.
At the halfway mark – or Lap 100
– the top-five consisted of Foley in the lead,
followed by L.W. Miller, Myers, Junior Miller and Tim
Brown in fifth. One lap later, Miller shot past Foley to
take the top spot and become the second – and
ultimately the last – leader of the race.
The Top 10 was completed by Ted
Christopher, Burt Myers, John Smith, Tim Brown and Gene
Pack.
The NASCAR Whelen Southern
Modified Tour returns to action June 30 at Caraway
Speedway in Asheboro, N.C.
