Casey Roderick added another guitar to his collection on Saturday night, winning his third North/South Super Late Model Challenge at the Nashville Fairgrounds Speedway.
This was a big win for Roderick in his pursuit of the ASA Southern Super Series championship. Roderick entered the night with a 63-point advantage over Matt Craig, but still searching for his first win of the season.
What better place to check the box than the Nashville Fairgrounds Speedway? Along with two previous wins in the North/South Super Late Model Challenge co-sanctioned by the ASA/CRA Super Series and ASA Southern Super Series, Roderick is also an All American 400 winner and a former Pro Late Model track champion at the Fairgrounds.
“It feels good to come back here and get a win," said Roderick. "It’s been a while since a Super win. What an awesome day. We worked really hard in practice, just getting the feel I need. We’ve been searching that feel everywhere we go. We’ve been so close, but just hadn’t pulled it off yet."
While Roderick won by nearly two seconds over Stephen Nasse, he had to cautiously approach the closing laps. The handling was starting to go away on his No. 26 entry, partially due to how much strain he had placed on the right-front tire of his car.
“I started feeling that right-front go," said Roderick. "I had really good drive all night. I think that saved us. That right-front was seeing some abuse. I was hanging on there for the last 10 laps, just trying to keep it on the bottom. Any time I got up about half a lane, it took off on me.”
Nasse qualified 11th and charged through the field to finish runner-up to Roderick. The trend of qualifying poorly and racing to the front may be exciting for Nasse's fans, but Nasse shared his frustration with that pattern after the race.
“We’ve got to get better at qualifying," said Nasse. "I’ve got to do better qualifying. Starting so far back is what’s killing us. I feel like we had one of the better cars. I just had to push my right-front a little more than I would have liked trying to get through the field. Just like Pensacola, it took longer to get through than I was expecting it would take. They made me work for it.”
Nevertheless, he tipped his cap to Roderick on scoring the elusive first win of the season.
“Casey has been runner-up, third, on the podium, hasn’t been able to pull off that win. I know how that feels, so congratulations to those guys. We were a little bit off, but everyone did such a good job.”
Bubba Pollard paired up with Ricky Turner and the Fr8Racing team for Saturday's event. He believed they had a chance to compete at least for the second spot in the final rundown, but playing it safe on restarts cost him in the long run.
“ I can’t thank these Fr8Racing guys enough, Ricky Turner, all of them for giving me an opportunity to go race and giving me a good race car," said Pollard. "The driver didn’t do his part tonight. I wasn’t aggressive enough on those restarts and lost too many positions. We had a long run car, and we knew that. I didn’t do a good job putting us in position. I cost us a shot at, at least, a second-place finish.”
In the Pro Late Model 100 lapper, Dawson Sutton took the lead with 12 laps to go from Hunter Wright and pulled away for his second win of the season at the Nashville Fairgrounds. Sutton went on to finish fourth in the Super Late Model feature, with Dylan Fetcho rounding out the top five.
The next event on the ASA Southern Super Series schedule takes the tour back to where the season began, Cordele Motor Speedway. That event is scheduled for August 10, leading into the points finale at Five Flags Speedway on September 28.
ASA/CRA Super Series teams head to Anderson Speedway next in an event co-sanctioned with the ASA STARS National Tour, the signature Redbud 400 on July 20.
Story from Racing America
-Photo credit: Jason Reasin
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