Knight gets first career Fastrak Racing Series victory at Volunteer Speedway

Knight gets first career Fastrak Racing Series victory at Volunteer Speedway By Robert Walden Volunteer Speedway Media/Public Relations BULLS GAP, Tenn. (Sept. 2, 2016) — The Labor Day holiday weekend marks the unofficial end of summer, and actually Friday night at Volunteer Speedway had the distinctive feel of fall in the air for opener of the Carnesville, Ga.-based Fastrak Racing Series Dirt Late Model 13th annual East Coast Rumble tripleheader. The tripleheader features three consecutive nights of racing, at three different tracks, and in three different states, with Volunteer Speedway getting things started with a $2,000-to-win show. Racing action then moves to Tyler County Speedway in Middlebourne, W.Va., paying $5,000-to-win on Saturday, Sept. 3, and then concludes on Sunday, Sept. 4 at Wythe Raceway in Rural Retreat, Va., for a $3,000-to-win event. The series driver accumulating the most points over the three nights of racing will earn the Heavyweight Champion Belt. Cla Knight of North Augusta, S.C., came out swinging in round one to capture his first career Fastrak Racing Series Dirt Late Model victory, holding off Pierce McCarter and Bryson Dennis for the win. “Man, this win here tonight is what not only myself but our race team has been working so hard for,” said a smiling Knight after climbing from his car on the front straightaway in victory lane to cheers from the crowd. “We’re racing against stiff competition on the Fastrak Racing Series Dirt Late Model tour and we’ve had several top five finishes and come awfully close to winning a race, but we just hadn’t been able to close the deal. This is so awesome to finally get our first win.” Philip Thompson was overall fastest qualifier of the 24 entries from three groups of time trials with a quick-time of 13.100 seconds. Thompson also won the first heat, while Benji Hicks and Jensen Ford respectively won the second and third heats. Hicks jumped out to the lead at the start over Thompson, Knight, Ford and Forrest Trent. Trent got into Ford between turns one and two on the second lap to trigger a wreck involving several cars, with Trent, Ron Parker, Brandon Umberger and David Smith seeing their race end early with significant damage, while others continued on with bent sheet-metal. Also while under caution, leader Hicks headed into the pits with right-front suspension damage to drop him from contention. Off the double-file restart Thompson powered ahead of Knight, Ford, McCarter and Walker Arthur. Knight got around Thompson for the lead just a couple of laps after going back green, and unfortunately for Thompson his strong run would end on lap 8 when he suddenly slowed and entered the pits off turn four. With Knight in command out front, behind him the racing was intense between Ford, McCarter, Arthur and Matt Henderson. Ford was fighting an ill-handling car plus had no front brakes following his early race incident with Trent, which allowed the trio of McCarter, Arthur and Henderson to get past him. Arthur dropped...