Port Royal – Matt Parks of Three Springs drove the race of his career to score the $5,000 victory in Thursday night’s 40-lap Appalachian Mountain Dirt Late Model Speedweek Series feature at Port Royal Speedway.
And all he had to do to pick up the win was hold off current speedweek point leader and two-time series winner Austin Hubbard of Laurel, Delaware, for the final 34 circuits.
Parks started the race on the pole and led the first five laps over Dan Stone of Thompson before fifth starter Hubbard motored into second.
From that point to the finish, Hubbard threw everything he had at Parks’ racer and in fact drew even on more than one occasion only to see Parks pull away to a slight lead running the outside groove of the racetrack.
In all, Parks withstood a total of six restarts with the lead, holding off Stone on the first two and Hubbard for the balance.
Amid lapped traffic with 17 laps to go, Parks began pulling away from Hubbard only to see two of the aforementioned restarts take place within the last four circuits, taking away the advantage he had built up within the final 10 laps.
Hubbard, the winner the previous two nights at Williams Grove and Lincoln Speedways respectively, settled for second.
Stone was third followed by Vic Coffey and Jamie Lathroum, who pitted with a flat tire on the fifth lap before roaring back through the field.
Sixth through 10th went to Scott Haus, Jason Covert, Kenny Pettyjohn, Derek Byler and Tim Wilson.
Heats for the 40-car field went to Lathroum, Coffey, Dylan Yoder and Jeremy Miller. Twin B Mains went to Terry Naugle and Jerry Bard.
Jeff Rine set fast time by turning in a lap of 20.049 seconds.
Tim Krape appeared headed to the 77th pro stock win of his career at the oval in the 15-lap main for the division to close out the night.
But he suddenly pitted during the final laps, giving way to Dan Berry for the checkers.
Brian Towsey was second followed by Keith Garman, Devon Frye and Josh Angle.
Twin heats were taken by Dave Brouse Jr. and Krape.
Feature Finishes: June 9, 2011 –
Late Models, 40 laps: 1. Matt Parks, 2. Austin Hubbard, 3. Dan Stone, 4. Vic Coffey, 5. Jamiek Lathroum, 6. Scott Haus, 7. Jason Covert, 8. Kenny Pettyjohn, 9. Derek Byler, 10. Tim Wilson, 11. Mitch Hack, 12. Terry Naugle, 13. Dylan Yoder, 14. DJ Meyers, 15. Chris Casner, 16. Jeff Rine, 17. Gary Beward, 18. Kerry King, 19. Jerry Bard, 20. Andy Haus, 21. Mike Lupfer, 22. Nick Dickson, 23. Bob Dunn, 24. Jeremy Miller.
Pro Stocks, 15 laps: 1. Dan Berry, 2. Brian Towsey, 3. Keith Garman, 4. Devon Frye, 5. Josh Angle, 6. Jason Schmidt, 7. Lucas Bryner, 8. Harold Ranck, 9. Tim Krape, 10. Garrett Grman, 11. Scott Landis, 12. Shawn Miller, 13. Jim Palm, 14. Hayes Mattern, 15. Dave Brouse Jr,, 16. Dave Bowsman, 17. Nate Fisher