EASLEY, S.C. – Bob Root continued his roll in the Southeast Limited Late Model Series Daytona1 Challenger Division, taking his second-straight series victory on Saturday night at Greenville Pickens Speedway with a wire-to-wire performance.
Root led every one of the event’s 50 laps from the pole, weathering a brief side-by-side challenge from Amber Lynn on a lap 20 restart and going on to win by 1.667 seconds over Lynn in the end.
“The car was excellent tonight,” Root said in victory lane. “It’s a good group effort. I want to thank Anthony for having this division down here; maybe one time we’ll be able to beat some of those young kids (in the Pro division).”
“Amber and Lexi (Gay) are two pretty good racers and they both ran well today,” he added. “It was a little tense there on that one restart, but we were able to hold on and do what we had to do to win today.”
Root led the field to the green flag from the pole position, but had to weather two cautions for crashes on the initial start before a lap was able to be completed.
After the race did get underway, Root held the lead over division points leader Thad Moffitt until the race’s third caution flew on the seventh round, when the red flag flew after a hard crash for Anthony Miller and Daniel Alvarez in turn two.
Following cleanup for fluid from Alvarez’s machine, the race resumed and saw Moffitt drop from second to sixth on the restart as his car struggled to get back up to speed. However, Moffitt dug his heels in and methodically worked his way back forward, taking fourth from Phillip Peters on lap 14 and was third when the fourth yellow of the night flew on lap 19 for Lexi Gay’s stalled machine in turn two.
By halfway, Root had powered away to a big lead over Lynn, with Moffitt stalking the white No. 2 and sitting just a car length back through the early stages of the second half.
Though Moffitt tried lap after lap, he could not find a way by and the order of the top three remained unchanged before a caution with 10 laps to go set up the night’s final restart.
The game-changing caution came out after Lexi Gay spun entering turn one and made slight contact with the outside wall, but did nothing to slow Root’s momentum, as he held off Lynn over the final 10 lap dash to the checkered flag.
Moffitt was third ahead of Phillip Peters and Gay, who rallied to complete the top five.
The Daytona1 Challenger Division will conclude their season with a 50-lap feature at Myrtle Beach Speedway on Nov. 11.
