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Kyle Hall Comes Up One Spot Short In Frustrating Race At The Summer Shootout
Lowe’s Motor Speedway (NC) over the years has produced some of the best finishes in racing. The NASCAR All-Star race held in May is home to many of those close finishes, some of which come as a result of last lap wrecks and contact on the track. One such case was in the All-Star Open in 2006 when Brian Vickers made contact with Mike Bliss on the last lap causing Nemechek to spin and Vickers taking the win. NASCAR allowed Vickers to keep the win, and in most cases throughout the history of the sport, they haven’t taken a win from a driver when contact puts them into victory lane.
This week in the driver’s meeting for the Summer Shootout Roger Slack, Director of Competition at Lowe’s Motor Speedway, let the drivers know that moving someone out of the way for position, even on the last lap, would not be tolerated under his watch. If contact between two drivers occurred in this manner, he would penalize the driver using the “move” tactic.
Kyle Hall started from the fourth position and patiently settled in and ran his race up front, trying to steer clear of the slick spots from earlier rain showers and speedy-dry on the track from incidents in other races. Ty Dillon did the same thing as Hall up front, trying to simply survive before going after the win in the final laps.
When the laps wound down, Hall started putting pressure on Dillon for the win. The two drivers raced nose to tail over the final few laps with Hall trying to make a move by for the win, but was forced to settle in second due to Dillon’s defensive driving and Slack’s track rules.
“I don’t know,” said Hall. “They talked to us in the driver’s meeting about not bumping, but I guess it is ok for him to run me into the grass every time I tried to go underneath of him. I tried to pass him clean every chance I had at him. I never touched his bumper. I would pull up alongside of him coming down the front stretch and the back stretch and he would run me all the way down into the grass. I knew if I would have hit him they would have black-flagged me and put him back in front.
“They try to tell us they are preparing us for NASCAR but they do not even have the same rules. The said in the driver’s meeting to give room and be patient. I was patient the whole time and I was just hoping he would give me room. I guess he thinks that because he is some young kid that everybody knows no one is going to do anything about it.
“Second place is an awesome finish, but we definitely had the car to beat.”
Kyle Hall will return to Lowe’s Motor Speedway in Concord (NC) Tuesday, June 26th, for the third round of the Summer Shootout in his Legends car. But first, Hall will head back to Old Dominion Speedway (VA) Saturday, June 23rd in his Late Model Stock Car. Hall won his first LMSC race at Old Dominion last week, and this week tries to repeat the feat.
Kyle Hall was fast at Lowe's Motor Speedway (NC), but was forced to settle for second place.
