Pierce being hugged by his father Bob(photo from Pierce’s Facebook page).
On Wednesday night, the bigger racing world came to realize what the Dirt Late Model world has known for a few years now. And that is the fact that 18-year-old Bobby Pierce is an excellent race car driver.
The Oakwood, Illinois native finished second in his NASCAR Camping World Truck Series debut in the ‘Mud Summer Classic’ at Eldora Speedway in one of the more thrilling races that series has seen in some time. Another young driver with a background in dirt racing, Christopher Bell, won that race but it was Pierce who seemingly stole the show with his mastery of the half-mile track while driving for a previously unsuccessful team.
Pierce had just recently been crowned as the UMP Summer Nationals champion. That is a Dirt Late Model series which typically contests thirty or so races in the span of just over one month throughout the Midwestern region of the United States.
Here are a few facts that will help put Pierce’s run in perspective:
By setting fast time in qualifying, Pierce became only the fifth driver in the history of the Camping World Truck Series to perform such a feat in his first ever series start. Furthermore, by winning the first qualifying race of the night, the ‘Smooth Operator’ became only the sixth driver to start from the first spot on the grid in his first CWTS event.
Pierce was driving the No. 63 truck owned by Mike Mittler. That team has been in existence since the beginning of the CWTS in 1995. In a total of 212 previous starts, it had never recorded a top-5 finish. As a matter of fact, that truck had only placed in the top-10 once prior to Wednesday evening at Eldora.
The No. 63 truck Pierce drove at Eldora(photo from Pierce’s Facebook page)
And before chalking up the MB Motorsports team’s lack of success to less-than-talented drivers, consider that star competitors such as Carl Edwards, Brad Keselowski and Jamie McMurray have sat in that seat multiple times. It was Edwards who posted the team’s previous top-10 back in 2002 when he placed 8th in a race held at the Kansas Speedway.
Pierce led 39 of the 150 laps run in Wednesday night’s race. MB Motorsports had only led a total of 22 laps over the course of its entire existence before Pierce’s effort.
Pierce’s listed earnings for the Eldora race were $27,697, for what was essentially a one day show. He won $25,000 for his championship in the UMP Summer Nationals, which lasted for a month.
Pierce’s Late Model
