Burt Myers inadvertently gambled and the house won.
The two-time NASCAR Southern Modified Tour champion and nine-time Bowman Gray Modified track champion gambled by accidently failing to pit throughout the duration of the South Boston 150.
It nearly worked, too
Myers started the race from the seventh and inherited the lead from Tommy Catalano when he pit on Lap 56. For the next 73 laps, Myers paced the field.
Myers and the No. 1 team had an overall plan to come down to pit road at least once during the 150-lap feature. The team planned to come down pit road for fuel and tires, but radio communication hindered that plan. If it wasn’t for the final two cautions, Myers believed he could have left South Boston with the race win.
READ MORE: Recap and results from South Boston
“We really were going to come in with 25 to go,” Myers said.
“We were talking on the radio and didn’t realize that pit road had opened. We kind
of made our own bed there. Had we not had those last couple of cautions, I think
we still had them beat. It is what it is. There is nothing to hang our head
about.”
Myers has not raced at South Boston Speedway since 2016 with
the NASCAR Whelen Southern Modified Tour. With the unified modified tour
returning to South Boston, Myers felt that it was not the South Boston Speedway
from 2016. As the race went on, he could feel some of the characteristics of the
old racing surface.
“It might have South Boston on the wall, but this is not
South Boston,” he said. “As the race got going, you felt some of the
characteristics of South Boston where you can lean on your right front, come in
the gas early but not hard to let the car role.
“I think the things that helped me a little bit was how it bottlenecks coming off of the corner. I was able to pin some cars down under lapped cars. Maybe that was some experience of racing here before, but it was a whole different place. I sure did love it.”
READ MORE: Greedy Tommy Catalano can’t capitalize on pole
With two strong showing at Myrtle Beach and South Boston, Myers finds himself third in the points standings for Eddie Harvey’s Ideal Racing, but he doesn’t expect to compete for the championship. However, he feels like he as something to prove next weekend at Thompson Speedway Motorsports Park.
“Well, I don’t know about championship contender because of that little place nestled over in Winston-Salem (Bowman Gray Stadium) which is where I’ll be in the summer,” he said. “Lord willing, we will be at the Icebreaker. We have something to prove there too.”
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