Radford, VA(June 14, 2009) -- Tommy Lemons, Jr. makes it two in a row and three for the season at Motor Mile Speedway in an impressive drive from sixth to win the ATK 150.

Lemons has become the new face of Motor Mile of sorts in the wake of his three wins in the last four races on the 4/10 mile track following what looks to have be a huge struggle for early season dominator and two-time NASCAR National Champion, Philip Morris. Morris found himself buried fourth on the starting grid with an impressive field of more than 30 at Radford, VA track and things only got worse from there.

Lemons success in this 150-lap race came with an up hill battle from the start as he placed sixth in time trials and found himself behind some of the biggest names in the business starting with pole sitter, Frank Deiny. Two-time and most recent UARA-STARS Series race winner, Matt McCall was lining up on the outside of the front row with three-time track champion, Chad Harris third, Morris fourth and USAR Pro-Cup regular, Caleb Holman starting fifth.

The field for the nights racing action was a very diverse one as another UARA-STARS Series regular, Richard Boswell was making his first appearance of the season after his last start at Motor Mile in July of 2008 saw the youngster lead flag to flag for the win over Morris. Boswell was starting tenth and a few spots ahead of him was four-time Langley Speedway winner this season, CE Falk, who was making a rare appearance at Motor Mile. Thomas Hartensveld, a former UARA-STARS Series regular, who hasn't made a start in 2009 due to the economy was making his first appearance of the season with Brandon McReynolds crew chief, Nick Hutchins helping out on his weekend off, he started 12th.

The field of 30-cars was set and it looked as if the race was going to be one of the best of the year anywhere with some of the toughest competition you could find and things got going in a hurry. The green flag waved and McCall flexed his muscle first diving deeper into turn one than Deiny and taking the lead off the start. Deiny fell in line in second with Harris third and quickly Morris appeared as if he was having trouble. Morris slipped behind Lemons to fifth position just ahead of Holman.

It wasn't many more laps before Morris began to slip a little more after a brief caution on lap eight as he quickly slipped to 11th in the running order, then outside of the top twenty before appearing to have cut down a tire. Sparks showered from his car as the caution came out and Morris backed his car from turn one to his pit stall, which is the last before the end of pit road on the front stretch. Morris returned quickly, but then had to hit pit road for repairs on lap 51. He returned to the track on lap 68 and remained out there, but many laps down for the remainder of the race.

Meanwhile there was plenty of racing going with Lemons making his way past Harris quickly and putting himself into the third position, but he wasn't the only driver on the move as Boswell had charged from his 10th starting position to fourth after he gets by Harris as well. Boswell and Lemons would find themselves near each other for the rest of the race as these two would eventually become the battle for the lead.

Lemons then muscles his way past McCall as two make it three wide with Lemons in the middle pushing McCall up the track as they made their way past a lapped car. Quickly after he completed the pass for second the caution waves and at this point the top five runners are; Deiny, Lemons, McCall, Boswell and Harris.

Deiny's lead however comes to a grinding halt literally as he has a tire going down about the same time as Lemons makes his move by for the lead. Deiny brings out the next caution as he's forced to stop on the track to get to pit road and make repairs and as McCall tries to fend off challenges from Boswell, who races door-to-door with him for second. The caution puts Boswell behind McCall and Lemons for the restart, but Boswell doesn't stay there long as he makes the move to second on lap 104.

Lap 109 brings out yet another caution as Derrick Lancaster goes around collecting Jordan Pennington and Adam Long, who had an impressive top ten start, but slipped back early and never recovered. Lancaster's spin came just a handful of laps after he had got into Jason Merriman and turned him around for ninth position. In the five laps in between Boswell taking over second and the caution waving, he had been charging toward the back bumper of Lemons and it looked as if these two would have a great battle to the finish.

Boswell continues to mount a challenge on Lemons for the lead over the next thirty laps before a lap 142 caution came out and slowed the field once again. Lemons found himself in a familiar position with just a handful of laps left he would have to hold off a hard charger in second position only this time it wasn't Morris, a familiar foe, but rather a hard-nosed racer making a rare Motor Mile appearance.

Lemons though did what he's done twice already this season and got a great restart only to have Boswell close in on him for the position and race along side him several times for the lead. But, just like he's done twice already this season he drove his guts out and held off Boswell in a very close finish for his third win of the season.

For Lemons it was his second win in a row and with problems for Morris and Deiny in this race the 86 point deficit he came in here with was certainly closed up. Lemons was followed to the finish by Boswell, McCall, Holman and Harris. As of press time for this story the finish of the race wasn't available, but we hope to update the results sometime on Sunday.

Notes:
Mike Looney continued to have a black cloud hanging over his head as he blew his fourth engine in ten days according to the veteran driver. Looney and his team blew an engine on Wednesday while testing at Motor Mile and then popped another engine tonight. Looney and his team are hoping they can get their engine program straightened out before the next race on June 27th.

Shaun Mangum didn't qualify good, didn't look good on the track and didn't finish very good. It was certainly not what he and his team had become used to, but it wasn't like they simply missed the set-up, they think they have a problem with the rear end. Mangum struggled in testing on Friday and that struggle continued, but they are going back to the drawing board this week to try and pick themselves back up.

Thomas Hartensveld's first race of the season looked more like a roller coaster ride than a race as the young driver brought his brand new Marlowe Racing Chassis to the 4/10 mile speedway for the first time. Hartensveld had a tough week as the crew chief he was going to have on the pit box this weekend called him Wednesday and informed him that he wouldn't be able to come to the track leaving him wondering if he'd even be able to make his first start as planned.

UARA-STARS Series driver, Brandon McReynolds crew chief, Nick Hutchins stepped up to help Hartensveld and came to the track with the young driver. Hartensveld qualified 12th after working hard on the car all day and after slipping back early in the race, they made a pit stop and Hartensveld rallied to finish 10th. A great run considering he's been sitting on the sidelines just watching races for the first three months of the season and he'll be back on June 27th to see if he can improve on his top ten finish.

Kelly Kingery was making his second start of the 2009 season at Motor Mile Speedway in his own car after losing his ride with Bob Unzcer from last season. Kingery, who has already collected a win at Franklin County Speedway this season struggled throughout the race with the setup, but feels like he'll be much better on June 27th.

Kenneth Brooks blew his engine in practice and then jumped behind the wheel of Tommy Lemons, Jr.'s backup car to make a couple laps for points. Brooks came into the race 14th in points and will likely remain there as the 15th and 16th place points guys were not in attendance on Saturday night.

For another perspective check out the Roanoke Times story from the race ... CLICK HERE