Skylar Marlar
Skylar Marlar had been on the brink of winning a touring series Super Late Model feature race on numerous occasions throughout his career and finally on May 23rd in a Southern All Stars event at Tennessee National Raceway in Hohenwald, Tenn., the young driver broke through to earn that sought after trophy. And the victory proved to be quite a relief.
“That felt like getting 10,000 pounds off my shoulders,” Marlar declared in an interview with InsideDirtRacing.com. “We’d been close several times, and had several good runs, but just never got it done. Finally, everything went my way. I told my guys that was probably the easiest race I ever drove. It was just one of them deals.”
Marlar understands the difficulty in winning Super Late Model races. As a result, he and his PPM Racing Products team will relish this result. At the same time, there is now a desire to go out and get the next win as soon as possible.
“In racing, the competition is so tough and everything’s got to go your way,” Marlar explained. “You’ve got to have a good car and you’ve got to have a good crew. Everything just went our way that night.
“I’m more glad to win for my car owners than for myself,” the driver continued. “If I could get a few more wins this year, that would tickle us. I’d like to get into the North/South 100, that’s a goal. I’d just like to get in the dang show because we’ve been close every year, but we just can’t seem to get in it.”
Marlar’s No. 11 machine is owned by the Hamby brothers, who build their PPM Race Cars out of their Rockwood, Tenn. shop.
Marlar flanked by brothers Ricky and Randy Hamby of PPM Race Products
Along with winning his first Super Late Model race, Marlar accomplished another goal in that he beat older brother Mike to the checkered flag that night.
“I’ve joked around with him for a long time and said ‘Man, if I ever do a slide job on you and pass you on the white flag lap, I’m probably going to retire’,” the younger Marlar said with a laugh.
The older of the Marlar brothers had wondered, “Why me?” to which Skylar would jokingly reply, “Because you’re my brother.”
While it did feel good to better his highly accomplished brother, Marlar realizes the importance of his family ties.
“It felt good to beat him, but he helps us out a lot,” the 29-year-old driver pointed out. “It’s hard with him being my brother because he’s tough for anybody to beat. That makes it a little tougher on me, but it’s not bad. I enjoy racing against him and we’ve got a little brother(Cameron) who I enjoy racing against too.”
Marlar’s No. 11 machine
While this may have been Marlar’s first touring series Super Late Model triumph, the Winfield, Tenn. native has visited Victory Lane numerous times before in other types of racing, whether it be in Modified Dirt Cars or the Limited Late Models built by the legendary C.J. Rayburn.
“We used to win fifteen or twenty modified races a year,” Marlar recalled. “And even in my first year in a Late Model, I drove C.J.’s stuff and did a lot of local racing and it was twelve or fifteen races a year. But when you get to racing against the guys we race against now, it’s tough to get one. That might be the only one we get this year or we might go on a hot streak, hopefully, like Davenport or Weaver. We’d like to get us a few more this year because that would be good going into next year.”
Marlar and his team do not follow a particular series. So how do they determine when and where they want to race?
“Whatever is closest,” he answered. “We go to Smoky Mountain a lot, and Boyd’s, here at 411 a couple of times a year, and Ponderosa. We like to go to Florence. Just anywhere a couple or three hours from the house. These guys have their shop and they’re busy and I’ve got a car lot and I’m busy so we just go whenever we can. We’d like to race full-time, but that don’t pay the bills.”
