Chuck
Chamblee picked up his 4th win of the season
in the Huntsville Speedway Challenge Series
Friday night. Chamblee used a different
strategy than his normal one, playing it
cool rather than trying to make something
happen, waiting on the race to come to
him.
By virtue
of his win last week, Chamblee sat out
qualifying and started on the tail end of
the field for the 100-lapper. Mark
Wright would turn a lap of 12.745 seconds to
take the pole position. Wright and
Josh Berry would bring the field to the
green flag to begin the race. Wright
moved out to the lead into turn 1, followed
by Berry and Dan Sponsellor. Wright
maintained a comfortable 10-car length lead
by lap 23, but the yellow flag would come
out on that lap to slow the field for an
accident. All but Berry would pit.
On the
restart on lap 29, it was Berry now leading,
followed by Wright and Chamblee. The
top three would pull away and race nose to
tail for the next 10 laps. Berry
however would get loose out of turn 2 on lap
40, prompting Wright to go to the outside of
him down the backstretch. Wright could
not clear Berry though and ended up getting
hung out on the outside, allowing Chamblee
to take over the #2 spot. Louie
Robinett would also slide by Wright for the
3rd position. Chamblee was all over
Berry for the next 8 laps, until Berry once
again got loose, this time in turn 1 and 2,
spinning out of turn 2 and allowing Chamblee
to slip by for the lead. Wright and
Berry would pit under the yellow flag, but
Chamblee had decided that his pit crew were
done for the night and elected to remain out
for valuable track position.
On the
lap 54 restart it was Chamblee leading,
followed by Wright and Berry. Chamblee
and Wright would pull out to about a 10
car-length lead over Berry for a few laps,
but Berry then began to close the gap.
By lap 70 it was once again a three-car
battle for the lead. Hard racing
continued between the top 3 until lap 81,
when finally Berry was able to get under
Wright down the back stretch to take over
the 2nd spot. On lap 84 though, as the
leaders were lapping by the #47 car of Bobby
Rafuse, Wright and Rafuse would touch down
the backstretch, getting Wright loose.
Wright would hit the wall hard in turn 3 to
bring out another caution. Berry and
Robinett would pit again. Wright would
also pit for repairs and return to the
track. But Robinett's streak of bad
luck would bite him again as he ran over a
jack coming to his pit stall, causing severe
damage to the rear suspension of his #30
Chevrolet. Robinett would be finished
for the night, and lost valuable points in
the championship chase.
Wright's
luck wasn't much better, as he and Rafuse
once again made contact on the lap 91 with
Wright spinning again. This set up a
final 3-lap shootout between Chamblee,
Berry, and Johnny Robinson.
On the
restart on lap 97, Chamblee put as much
distance as he could on Berry using a quick
restart. Berry would catch Chamblee
though as the white flag came out, setting
up the top two cars for the closest finish
of the season. Chamblee would edge
Berry by a scant 0.13 seconds to take the
win. Finishing 3rd was Johnny
Robinson, followed by Bobby Rafuse and Mark
Wright, rounding out the top 5 finishers.
Chamblee
had this to say in Victory Lane after the
race: "I'm so proud of my team
tonight, they told me to just play it cool
and get a good finish tonight. Well I
did, and it worked. I want to thank
Josh and Mark for racing me clean tonight,
they were faster and had several
opportunities to make it rough on me but cut
me some slack. It was a really fun
race tonight even though we had to race hard
there at the end. We want this
championship pretty bad, been trying 5 years
now to get it. Tonight's win should
help that effort a lot."
