With just four Late Model Stock starts under his belt, Ben Rhodes headed to Hickory Motor Speedway (NC) to compete in the prestigious Dwight Huffman Memorial event on Sunday, October 16th. After qualifying second, Rhodes was being patient at the beginning of the 177-lap event, but was spun on lap 19, and after getting collected in another incident, on lap 71 his car was damaged too much to complete the event.
On Friday, Rhodes in the #4 car and the Fat Head Racing team hit the track for practice. After a successful day at the track, the team returned Saturday for the final few practice sessions prior to qualifying.
“We were able to get the car handling really well during the practice sessions,” said Rhodes.
Rhodes was second to hit the track for the qualifying session in the early afternoon and was able to hold the top spot until very late in the qualifying session, getting bumped to second by a track veteran.
“We were really hoping to hold on to the pole position, but starting outside pole is not bad spot,” explained Rhodes. “The car was great during the run and hopefully I will be able to get a pole soon.”
On Sunday, Rhodes strapped into his machine, ready for 177 green flag laps of racing. With scheduled breaks at laps 100 and 150, Rhodes and the team discussed strategy before the event. Patience was the key, but not everyone in the 28-car field had the same approach.
“This race is a long race,” said Rhodes. “Lee McCall (crew chief), Jamie Yelton and I talked about just pacing ourselves for the first 100 laps of the event. So when the green flag dropped, that is what we did.
“The car was a little tight, but we were pretty good there and just let a few guys go so we could settle in. Unfortunately someone wasn’t as patient, which caused us to get spun out early.”
The lap-19 incident caused a red flag for clean-up, which involved many cars. Rhodes’ car had nose damage, but after work by the Fat Head Racing team, he was able to continue. Starting from the rear of the field, Rhodes drove back to just outside the top 10 before being swept up in an incident that ended his race at lap 71.
“A lapped car ahead of us bounced off the wall and caused us all to stack up damaging my car too much to continue.”
Even though he was out of the race, Rhodes was still able to smile about his weekend.
“The end result isn’t what we were wanting, but we had a great weekend at Hickory. We almost got the pole position in our fifth Late Model event against veteran drivers and champions in the Late Model world. I have to thank Lee McCall, Jamie Yelton and the entire Fat Head Racing team for their effort. I am really looking forward to racing the UARA Series at Newport next weekend.”
Rhodes was awarded the Hard Luck Award of the event.
Next up for Ben Rhodes is the UARA-STARS Late Model Stock event at Newport Speedway (TN) on Saturday, October 22nd.
Watch a video interview with Ben Rhodes after the race. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yAX3NcPKwHM