Philip Thompson
Philip Thompson is no stranger to Victory Lane in this area. The Knoxville driver has scored wins in his Classic car at the Tazewell Speedway and the 411 Motor Speedway as well as other locales in east Tennessee. But the young talent recently made his way to the unfamiliar grounds of Pennsylvania to add even more victories to his totals.
A relatively small number of tracks employ the Classics division in east Tennessee. As a result, Thompson and his team decided to go on the road to ply their skills against drivers in other parts of the country.
“There’s a group of guys up there in Pennsylvania, Maryland and northern Virginia area who race Classics,” Thompson pointed out in an interview with InsideDirtRacing.com. “They have a little series and I think they have five or six tracks they go to up there. Last year we tried to get a little deal together where they would come and race with us and we’d go up there and race with them, but everything kind of fell through. We had been wanting to get up there and race with them to see where we stood against different competition. We had a couple of weeks off here so we just decided to take off and go.”
After making the eight hour journey to the Susquehanna Speedway Park in York Haven, PA, Thompson put his No. 24 machine on the dirt oval bearing resemblance to Maryville’s Smoky Mountain Speedway. The track has a 4/10 mile layout and counts Classics as one of its regular divisions.
Thompson, however, was spared from the burden of driving the hauler to the track, but he was very much involved in the preparation of the truck and equipment prior to the long adventure.
Thompson’s Classics ride.
“I’ve got to say a special thanks to my car owners Richard and Sherri Bell for letting me do this,” Thompson explained. “Sherri actually did most of the driving. Normally we just throw the car on there and a jack and a couple of the tools we know we’re going to need on a weekly basis. But going to an out of town race, and that’s probably the first time I’ve ever raced more than two hours from home, we had to take more spare parts and made sure we had plenty of tools. We had to double check to make sure we had everything in case something crazy happened.”
Thompson made the trip so he could test his skills against other drivers in that class. This was not necessarily a special race offering big purse money.
“Actually the payout was pretty similar to around here,” the driver said. “They consider themselves a club instead of being competition based. It’s more like a group of buddies who get together and race. They have a rule that if you’re not part of the club, you have to start at the back for three races. They made us start last in the heat race and last in the feature among the nine cars, but we won both races.”
Thompson believes he accomplished the goal he most wanted to achieve. He also believes the experience gained will serve to benefit him in the future, not only in his Classic car but also in other ventures.
“It was definitely a great experience to learn from because I was put into an environment that I’m not used to. I learned a lot as the race went on, and the longer the race went, the faster I got.”
Thompson drove this Late Model in the Southern Nationals race at Tazewell
The plan is in place for Thompson to race a Late Model on a regular basis next season. He has in fact driven one of those machines a couple of times this year in relief of injured James Kelso.
“Next year we’re planning on racing a Late Model, probably starting in Sportsman, so hopefully this experience will translate to travelling around doing that,” Thompson declared. “Maybe we can do a couple of crazy trips like that in the Late Model.”
