BUSTI, N.Y. (Sept. 19) — Max Blair of Centerville, Pa., has dominated Stateline Speedway all season long. That didn’t change with the arrival of the World of Outlaws Morton Buildings Late Model Series on his home turf.
The 29-year-old standout simply brushed off the national invaders Thursday night, controlling the action from start-to-finish on his way to his second career WoO triumph in the evening’s 50-lap feature at the third-mile oval.
A winner eight times (six Super and two Crate Late Model) and the track champion in both division this season at Stateline, Blair was perfect in the mid-week event. He set set fast time, won a heat race and drove off the pole position to lead the A-main from flag-to-flag for a $10,000 victor’s check.
“We don’t get to run a lot of these (WoO) races,” Blair said in victory lane after climbing out of his family-owned XR1 Rocket car amid a throng of family and friends. “I still can’t believe it. Believe me when I tell you, nobody here knows just how much this means to me.”
Making just his third WoO start of 2019, Blair never missed a beat at one of the tracks where he cut his racing teeth. He was never seriously challenged during his march to the checkered flag, though three-time WoO champion Darrell Lanigan of Union, Ky., did close in late in the distance as Blair battled slower traffic before finishing 1.797 seconds behind the winner.
Outside polesitter Dave Hess Jr. of Waterford, Pa., placed third in his family-owned machine. Less than a half-second behind Hess in fourth place at the finish was runaway WoO points leader Brandon Sheppard of New Berlin, Ill., who battled from the 10th starting spot to fourth by lap 23 but couldn’t climb higher, while former WoO regular Chub Frank of Bear Lake, Pa., started and finished fifth.
Blair drove away from the pack early in the race to build an edge that exceeded four seconds before the race’s lone caution flag flew on lap 22 when David Scott of Garland, Pa., slowed with a flat tire. He stretched his advantage back to over two seconds until he came upon slowed traffic, allowing the sixth-starting Lanigan, who reached second place with a lap-13 pass of Zebulon, Ga.’s Shane Clanton, to make the feature interesting.
“In clean racetrack I felt like we were pretty good, and then when we got in them lapped cars,” said Blair, whose previous WoO appearances this season came during June’s Firecracker 100 weekend at Lernerville Speedway in Sarver, Pa. (he finished 22nd in a preliminary feature and didn’t qualify for the finale). “Boy, I just got boxed in for a long time. Dad (Blair’s father Robbie) was telling me … every lap I was looking up, his hands were getting closer and closer together (signaling that Lanigan was closing the gap), so when (the slower Brent) Larson messed up that little bit into (turn) three that one time I knew I had to get around him right there.
“Once I did that, and then I got by Ryan (Scott) and them guys on the other end (of the track), I felt like somebody would’ve had to been really, really good to roll around me at that point.”
Nevertheless, Blair didn’t relax for a second during the closing circuits.
“Trust me when I tell you,” Blair said, “I was counting down the laps.”
Lanigan, 48, wasn’t able to mount a significant bid for lead, but just being within a reasonable distance of Blair down the stretch gave the veteran a pick-me-up. He’s winless in his return season as a WoO regular and experienced a frustrating period of struggle for much of the summer’s second half, but Stateline was his third straight WoO top-five finish — a definite sign of improvement.
“We found some stuff after Knoxville (last weekend’s Lucas Oil Late Model Dirt Series-sanctioned Nationals at the Iowa track), went home and cut on the frame and put some bars in it,” said Lanigan, who matched his season-best WoO finish of second he previously achieved in the June 22 Firecracker 100. “It definitely seemed like it helped it tonight anyways. We had a good piece. Just drawing the 6 didn’t help us any.
“We’re close now. You could get to the guy out there and it was just super hard to pass. I’ll take that as bad as it’s been here lately.”
The 34-year-old Hess was less than a second behind Lanigan at the finish after running in third place for virtually the entire distance. He only briefly fell to fourth for laps 11-13 before trying in vain to make the top lane of the track work late in the race.
“I could see that traction was out there (on the outside) early,” Hess said. “We were a little bit harder tire than Max I think and it took a little bit to get going, but on that long run (to end the race) I think we had something. I just didn’t know what to do and that high side was getting a little used up. It was great to hang on to third with all the good cars that were there.”
Blair, meanwhile, savored becoming a two-time WoO winner.
“We’ve got a couple big races the next few days at Eriez (Speedway in Hammett, Pa.) so hopefully we can keep this momentum rolling,” said Blair, whose first WoO triumph came on June 20, 2017, at McKean County Raceway in East Smethport, Pa. “I have a little bit of a feeling I’m gonna have a headache tomorrow (after celebrating his victory), so some Advil is probably gonna be in store.”
Before cracking open some beers in the pit area, however, Blair thanked all his backers who made the win possible, including his father.
“No. 1 my dad … I can’t thank him enough,” Blair said. “He literally quit racing so that I can do this. We put our all into this. We give it everything we have, and sometimes I guess it shows. I’m really proud of how this year’s went.”
Stateline’s WoO event marked Blair’s amazing 40th overall feature win of 2019, split between 25 Super Late Model and 15 Crate Late Model victories. (He also won the Uncle Sam 30 non-qualifiers’ race at the Firecracker 100.) The majority of his checkered flags have come on his home circuit — a combined 27 wins at Stateline (nine) and Eriez (18 divided evenly between Supers and Crates) — but he’s won at 10 other tracks as well and is rolling toward the Zimmer’s United Late Model Series points title.
