Story by: Langley Austin ~ langley@RACE22.com

Radford, VA(May 16, 2010) -- Two weeks ago FDJ Motorsports had a coming out party of sorts as Wayne Ramsey and Justin Johnson split the twin 100-lap features that made up the nights races for the Late Model Stock Car division.

This week, there was a different group celebrating in victory lane as, Philip Morris took his Jim Dean Motorsports team to victory lane for the third time this season. Morris dominated the first two races of the 2010 season, before the tracks mandated weight rule added fifty pounds to his racer and thus slowing down the three time NASCAR National Champion. Morris could have easily used that as an excuse for losing the first of the twin races to Wayne Ramsey or being run over in the early stages of race number two, but he didn't.

Morris instead put his nose to the grindstone, worked hard on his car preparing it for another battle, this week again featuring twin races. Defeating Morris only makes he and his team work harder and makes them that much better and he proved that in qualifying as he claimed the pole by nearly two tenths of a second. Morris turned a 15.77 with outside pole sitter, Rusty Skewes turning a 15.92, it was a major difference in qualifying, but how was Morris' car going to hold up in the race?

Morris and Skewes would lead the field to the green flag with Tommy Lemons, Jr. qualifying a strong third and Brandon Dean turning in the third best lap. Jerame Donley, who was hoping to put his early season bad luck behind him would turn in the fifth fastest lap with Kelly Kingery starting sixth in his best start of the season. Rounding out the top ten qualifiers in the 27-car field would be Richard Boswell, Wayne Ramsey, Mike Looney and Kris Bowen.

Morris would flex his muscle from the drop of the green flag and show the field that without the fifty pound penalty, he would be the man to beat. However, Rusty Skewes was hoping to become the next FDJ Motorsports driver to go to victory lane and after racing to the outside of Morris, he did a crossover move and put his car on the inside of Morris, but a caution would take away the run that Skewes had. Behind them it was all out warfare for positions throughout the field and that hard racing would bring the field to a stop and quickly.

Richard Boswell competed in his first races of the season two weeks ago in the twin features and he wasn't having any luck as he was involved in a tussle with Brandon Dean that took away any chance at a top five or ten finish. Turn the page to this week and Boswell was just hoping that he could get through the twin races with his car in tact and a solid finish to boot. Boswell could hope all he wanted, but keeping his car in tact would last all of two laps as he got ran over from behind by Mike Looney as the two raced through the third and fourth turns.

Looney went to make a move under Boswell and as he did cars ahead of them began to stack up and before Looney could back out of it he had slammed into Boswell and rode all the way up on his door and nearly in the car with the JR Motorsports driver. Boswell nor Looney was happy about the contact as both had hoped to come away with solid finishes, but neither driver was able to be fully up to speed after the incident.

"(Mike)Looney got into the back of me and drove all the way up to my door and up on the side of my car," Boswell said as he pointed to a tire mark on the roll bars just above and in front of his seat. "I don't know what happened, I guess he wanted to win the race on the first lap," laughed Boswell.

Looney admitted he just made a mistake.

"I told him, I wasn't trying to kill him," Looney joked after the race. "I just got down in there and went to go under him and someone ahead of him bobbled a little and he backed out, just as I was getting into the gas. It just happened and I hate for both of us, because I know we had a good car and could have easily got a top five out of it tonight."

A couple of other cars got involved in the incident including Kenny Brooks and Kris Bowen, who both were able to continue running. Once the green flag waved over the field once again, Morris flexed his muscle and drove away from Skewes, who was left to fend off Lemons for the second position and throughout the field once again there was racing all over. Up toward the front Lemons was pressuring Skewes for second while Donley was pressuring Kingery for fifth, Wayne Ramsey had begun his slow charge to the front and Derrick Lancaster, who had a terrible qualifying effort was trying to find his way inside the top ten.

Positions were changing hands throughout the field, but one thing that remained the same through a long green flag run after the early incident was Morris' domination and no one was even getting close despite Morris having trouble with some lapped traffic. The next caution would wave over the field as Brad Foy gets turned and hits the backstretch wall hard, destroying the front clip of his car and possibly totally destroying his car, but he wasn't the only one with severe damage from the incident.

After Foy got turned and hit the wall, Donley, who has had terrible luck this season already goes to check up from the incident and the car behind him gets into him just enough that the young drivers turns hard into the inside wall. Donley's car was also destroyed as the car will certainly need a rear clip as well as some other repairs, but a member of the team said that the car was like totaled with damage to the center section of the chassis. Donley's luck so far this season has been terrible, but hopefully he'll be able to get this car fixed or get another car in time for the next race on June 5th.

Once this incident was cleaned up, which took an extremely long time and ran off many potential green flag laps from the race, the race resumed with Morris out front again. Lemons this time would start behind him and hoped maybe he could have a shot at racing the three-time NASCAR National Champion for the lead, but Morris was too good on this night and pulled away once again. This time it would be a green flag run all the way to the finish and Morris would pull away for his third victory of the 2010 season on his home track against a stout field of competitors.

With Morris taking care of business out front, Lemons finished second unchallenged and Ramsey, who has started eighth, made it up to third position as they crossed the finish line. After starting second and looking poised to challenge Morris for the win, Skewes fell back to fourth and finished there, just ahead of Kingery, who claimed his second straight top five finish. Dean had a great first outing in his brand new Pistone LTO chassis and finished a strong sixth with Adam Long racing up from his 11th place start to finish seventh ahead of Andrew Thomas, Daniel Pope and 19th place starter, Derrick Lancaster.

The Limited Late Models were also on hand for a 50-lap feature race and a familar face was starting from the pole position in Roger Parrish. Parrish, who was disqualified from the last Limited Late Model race due to a rules infraction involving shocks, was back with legal shocks and still managed to start from the first position with Matt Taylor lining up to his outside. Completing the top four starters was former and defending champion, Anthony Barnes and Mike Dailey.

At the drop of the green flag it appeared that Parrish may jump out front and get away as he has so many times in the past, but as he raced to the inside of Taylor, he got loose and had to check up allowing Taylor to assume the top spot. Taylor would lead the race up until a crash involving Rusty Gaspard would red flag the field and while stopped a thunderstorm would hit the track and rain began falling. The rain was hard and heavy for a few minutes and after looking at the forecast the track officials decided not to attempt to dry off the track and cancelled the remaining laps of the Limited race as well as the second Late Model Stock Car feature.

What would have happened in race number two? Would Morris have been just as dominate and took home his fourth win of the season? Would Lemons have finally broke through for his first win after leading many laps in the last race and cutting a tire late and then finishing second in the earlier twin? Would Ramsey have put FDJ Motorsports back in victory lane again this week after the team dominated last weeks twins? Would Rusty Skewes finally have got the win he's been so close to this season? Would Kingery have used his top five start to take his car to victory lane? Would Brandon Dean have broke through for that elusive first win?

Those questions and more will never be answered, but one question that was, was how Morris would return from being defeated and run over in the last twin races. He answered that question by exacting revenge on the field, destroying them in qualifying and proving once again why his name should be at the top of the list of the All-Time Greatest Late Model Stock Car racers.

Late Model Stock Car Results:
1 - Philip Morris #26
2 - Tommy Lemons #27
3 - Wayne Ramsey #42
4 - Rusty Skewes #41
5 - Kelly Kingery #57
6 - Brandon Dean #5
7 - Adam Long #3
8 - Andrew Thomas #96
9 - Daniel Pope #81
10 - Derrick Lancaster #25
11 - Jeff Oleen #48
12 - Jamie Byrd #15
13 - Kenny Brooks #54
14 - Bob Davis #19
15 - Mike Looney #47
16 - Dewayne Howard #37
17 - Buster Carroll #45
18 - Preston McGhee #7
19 - Dennis Holdren #2
20 - Michael Velliens #10
21 - Michael Kidd #49
22 - Richard Boswell #72
23 - Jerame Donley #4
24 - Kris Bowen #80
25 - Brad Foy #50
26 - Andy DeFilipis #95
27 - Scott Lancaster #29