NASHVILLE, TN — On Friday afternoon, Josh Williams was visiting kids in the Monroe Carell Jr. Children’s Hospital at Vanderbilt. The following evening, he was across town visiting Fairgrounds Speedway Nashville’s Victory Lane, celebrating his first ARCA win.
The victory was a long time coming for the driver from Port Charlotte, Florida, who is also one of the most popular and philanthropic in the ARCA Racing Series. On Saturday, a fast car, a racetrack suiting his driving style and as he told Short Track SCENE, “the cards falling into place,” conspired to give Williams and his family-owned team their first checkered flag. Williams had made 82 previous ARCA starts, including a runner-up finish at the Nashville Fairgrounds last year.
“We really focus on long runs,” Williams, 22, said post-race on Saturday, still clutching the neck of the unique acoustic guitar trophy presented to all Fairgrounds winners. “On these old wore-out racetracks our cars are really good on old tires. We try to make our car a race car and not just a qualifying car.”
The 5/8-mile Fairgrounds track has not been paved since 1996, playing right into Williams’ style and crew chief Danny Johnson’s setup calls atop the pit box.
Williams qualified 13th for the Music City 200. He bided his time throughout the early portion of the event and had cracked the top five by lap 75. When the caution flew a few circuits late he took four tires on lap 84 while a variety of other competitor changed two. Each of the event’s four cautions fell in just the right way to allow Williams to slice through the field and finally overtake Brady Boswell on lap 160 for the lead.
Williams was clearly the car to beat as he maneuvered through lapped traffic the rest of the evening, putting all but the top five at least one lap down by the conclusion of the race.
Although he was still basking in the spoils of victory, and the smoke and rubber had barely dissipated from his burnout on the frontstretch, Williams lit up when asked about his work with children’s hospitals.
He said that he first got involved working with sick children thanks to the Team Anya Cale program, which kicked off at Daytona last February. A decal on Williams’ car and the ubiquitous hashtag #BeatLeukemia in support of the young Florida leukemia patient soon brought Anya’s story to light throughout the ARCA garage and elsewhere. Williams and his team soon began to branch out to hospitals across the country, hoping to provide well wishes and entertainment for sick kids across the nation.
“We wanted to spread the warmth from the team to more than just one person and try to reach out to kids of all ages,” Williams said. “Everywhere we race, and places we don’t, we still try to go to the hospital to visit and bring the car and stuff like that.”
“Musselman’s Apple Sauce is a really big help,” he added. “They give us donations as far as apple sauce and funds to get us to these places and help the children out.”
Each child also creates a custom handprint that will be integrated into a special wrap which will ride with Williams later this year at the Kentucky and Kansas Speedways.
Incidentally, Saturday’s win was not Williams’ first victory at the historic Nashville Fairgrounds. In 2005 he won a race on the facility’s infield ¼-mile track. That day he was competing against the likes of Bubba Wallace and Ryan Blaney for a victory en route to winning the Bandolero Bandits national championship.
“It’s kind of cool for us to come back here and get the win in the big car,” Williams said.
It was a perfect weekend all around for Williams and his No. 6 team. Sometimes the stars really do align.
Music City 200 Results
1. Josh Williams
2. A.J. Fike
3. Brian Finney
4. John Wes Townley
5. Bret Holmes
6. Brandon Lynn
7. Sheldon Creed
8. Christian Eckes
9. Chase Briscoe
10. Bo LeMastus
11. Scott Reeves
12. Tom Hessert III
13. Matt Kurzejewski
14. Clayton Weatherman
15. Brady Boswell
16. Shane Lee
17. Kevin Thomas Jr.
18. Thomas Praytor
19. Dylan Martin
20. Mike Basham
21. Alx Danielsson
22. Rick Clifton
23. Dustin Knowles
24. Kyle Weatherman
25. Cole Williams
26. Eric Caudell
27. Travis Swaim
28. Brian Keselowski
29. Kyle Plott
30. Brad Smith
31. Ed Pompa
32. Mike Senica
33. Ray Ciccarelli
34. Barry Layne
