Cory Hedgecock earned his first Super Late Model race at 411
Cory Hedgecock has won a number of Limited and Crate Late Model races around the east Tennessee region in recent years. But coming into Saturday night’s action at 411 Motor Speedway, the Loudon, Tenn. driver had never finished first in a Super Late Model event. By the end of the night, that statistic had changed.
Hedgecock established himself as a favorite for the win early on when he set fast time in qualifying on the Seymour, Tenn. track with a lap of 13.550 seconds. Also locked into the feature starting lineup via time-trials were David Crabtree, Tommy Kerr and Mack McCarter.
Mark Vineyard and Ryan King won the two heat races that were used to set the remainder of the starting grid for the main event.
At the start of the 40-lap feature, Crabtree took advantage of his outside front row starting spot to grab the early lead with Hedgecock, Kerr, King and McCarter giving chase. The top-3 cars quickly broke away from the pack and looked as if they would settle the issue among themselves.
A lap 6 caution came out when William Overbey crashed hard into the outside wall in turn two. On the ensuing restart, Kerr muscled his way around Hedgecock to take second as Crabtree continued to show the way.
Another caution came out just one lap later, which allowed Hedgecock to regain the runner-up position on that restart. Still, Crabtree was able to pull away to a slight advantage while his two closest pursuers waged war for second several car lengths in arrears.
The final caution flag of the night waved on lap 13 when Steve Smith slowed in turn two. On this restart, McCarter would move around King to claim fourth while the top-3 again broke away from the field.
Crabtree looked to be in complete command as he sliced through traffic while maintaining his advantage over Hedgecock and Kerr through the middle stages of the event.
However, the No. C5 machine slowed suddenly and pulled off track with a trail of fluid leaking from underneath the car on lap 30. Hedgecock then inherited the lead with Kerr just behind.
Over the final laps, Kerr was able to close the gap but was never in a position to seriously challenge for the top spot as Hedgecock took the checkered flag to score his first Super Late Model win and collect the $3,000 first prize.
Feature Finish: 1. Cory Hedgecock, 2. Tommy Kerr, 3. Mack McCarter, 4. Ryan King, 5. Jason Cardwell, 6. Chad Ogle, 7. Brian Smith, 8. Bobby Mays, 9. Jeff Neubert, 10. Scott Gardner, 11. Rusty Ballenger, 12. Johnny Ridings, 13. David Crabtree, 14. Dennis Barton, 15. Steve Smith, 16. William Overbey, 17. Mark Vineyard
