The Hampton Heat 200 came down to another Langley Speedway slugfest between Brenden Queen and Connor Hall.
They both nearly threw it away and gave it to Peyton Sellers.
In the end, Queen was able to get the last slug in and drove away to win the biggest race of the season at his home track for the second year in a row and third time overall.
The paint trading started inside of the final 30 laps. Neither Queen nor Hall gave an inch, as has been the case with each other for the better part of a half decade, and it didn’t matter who was on the offensive or the defensive end.
It started innocuously enough, bobbling on corner exit or pinching on corner entry, which led to slight contact at first. Then again, a little harder, for both parties.
A series of restarts decided the race, both Hall and Queen driving hard into corner entry to move each other and nearly allowed Sellers to win it from both. Their spotters got into an argument during a caution as well.
Hall took it back right before another caution slowed the field with six to go.
Hall took the bottom, Sellers took the bottom and Queen took the top. They once again traded paint and Queen then drove right into the back bumper and did not lift to complete the decisive pass for the win.
“It was a great run and Nelson Motorsports brought an incredible race car but it’s hard to turn when you can’t,” Hall said in reference to the shoves on corner entry.
“I don;t know what’s going to be going on in the future but I’m sure there will be some good racing to watch.”
Queen said he wasn’t going to be denied after how they raced each other in the CARS Tour race.
“We all know what happened in the CARS Tour race and I wasn’t going to let it happen again,” Queen said. “So when he ran me up the third groove, it was on after that. I gave him the bumper the way he gives them to me. I didn’t spin him but I allowed him to run me up and I lose second there and I wasn’t going to lose this race this time.”
Again, they nearly gave it to Sellers.
“We’ll take that because Langley hasn’t always been good to us,” Sellers said. “Congrats to these guys, they were racing like idiots but it was a good show for the fans.”
Dale Earnhardt Jr., making his track debut, finished fifth and said he enjoyed the racing so much that he would come back. This race was also the second leg of the Virginia Triple Crown that Hall (2.0 average finish) leads Sellers (3.0 average finish) ahead of the Martinsville 300.
Matt Weaver is the owner and founder of Short Track Scene. Weaver grew up in the sport, having raced himself before becoming a reporter in college at the University of South Alabama. He also has extensive experience covering NASCAR, IndyCar and Dirt Sprint Cars.
