Swainsboro Raceway
Smith hoping Swainsboro can help him snap skid
By Kevin Kovac
World of Outlaws Late Model Series
Clint Smith
Maybe a World of Outlaws Late Model Series event in Clint Smith's home state will be the tonic he needs to bust out of a frustrating victory drought. Smith, 45, of Senoia, Ga., couldn't pick a better place to snap a nearly two-year-long winless streak on the national tour than Swainsboro Raceway, which hosts the WoO for the first time ever Saturday.
"I'd love to get it done at Swainsboro," said Smith, who is winless in his last 78 starts on a series that he has followed as a regular since 2004. "We don't get a chance to run Outlaw shows close to the house very often, so we're looking forward to it."
Of course, no one should mistake the 3/8-mile Swainsboro oval as a home track for Smith. The speedway is more than 160 miles southeast of his shop, and he hasn't entered more than a handful of races per season there since he frequented the track for a couple years in the late '80s while driving for a south Georgia car owner.
What's more, Smith has won features at Swainsboro, but not in more than 15 years. He also hasn't visited the track since promoter Paul Purvis completely resurfaced it two years ago with over 450 truckloads of deep red clay, so he'll effectively be experiencing new territory at the May 1 event.
"I've heard it's a lot different now from when I ran there last," Smith said. "(The surface) used to be hard, but now it's more of a soft-tire (compound) type place with the new clay. It's supposed to be like Screven (Motor Speedway in Sylvania, Ga., where the WoO visited last month) and Brunswick (Georgia's Golden Isles Speedway).
"Everything I've heard about the new surface tells me (Saturday) should be a good race. I think it'll be a place we'll feel comfortable at."
Smith's confidence entering Swainsboro's 50-lap, $10,000-to-win program obviously comes not from his knowledge of the track but rather his resurgence on the WoO this season. Sitting behind the wheel of Rocket Chassis cars for the first time since '04, he's much more competitive than he was during a disappointing 2009 season — he had a best finish of third and won just a single heat race en route to placing a dismal ninth in the points standings — and appears ready to score his first tour win since June 17, 2008, at Port Royal (Pa.) Speedway.
In fact, March 27 at Lone Star Speedway in Kilgore, Texas, Smith recorded a solid second-place finish. It was his best outing since his triumph in '08 and provided proof that he was indeed progressing.
"I was getting to where I didn't like racing, so (a runner-up finish) helps us get back to more of an even keel," Smith said after his morale-boosting run at Lone Star. "I feel like I'm racing with these guys now."
That wasn't the case for much of Smith's last two seasons on the WoO trail. His program was sterling in 2007 — he won four times and finished a career-high third in the points race after leading the standings for nearly half the season — but he hasn't been able to recapture that magic. Last year was especially difficult for Smith, who managed just four top-five finishes on the tour.
"Me and my crew chief Darrell Cooper worked tremendously hard and we threw everything we could at it," Smith said. "But when you get to chasing your tail like a dog, before long you're going in circles. That's kinda what we got into at mid-season. It was frustrating to work so hard and not get any results, but the competition level is so tough out here with these guys, if you're not at the top of your game you're in trouble."
As the lone WoO regular driving a GRT chassis, Smith found himself at a disadvantage last year. He decided to join the bigger pool of travelers in the Rocket Chassis camp late in the 2009 season — thanks to sponsorship from Ernie Davis, who fields the cars that defending WoO champion Josh Richards of Shinnston, W.Va., runs in many non-Outlaw events — and the results have been encouraging.
"We got teamed with Mark Richards and Rocket Chassis and now we've been getting more information than we had been getting," Smith said. "We're working with Mark and the other (Rocket) drivers, including my best buddy Tim Fuller. Our shock program with Integra has really picked up, my motor program has stepped up with RaceTek and I've got a new crew man — Brad (Baum), who used to be with Chub Frank — helping Darrell and getting all my tires done, so we're more ahead of the game this year."
Smith currently ranks 10th in WoO points, 134 points behind co-leaders Richards and 2006 champion Tim McCreadie of Watertown, N.Y. But he thinks his points status doesn't quite tell the story of his improvement this season.
"We've been qualifying so much better this year," said Smith, who owns 11 career WoO victories. "I think we really had it turned around (last month during a trip to Ocala, Fla., and Screven), but we had the motor issues that set us back and hurt us in the points. If we can get rid of the bad luck and start knocking out some top fives, we can get this points deal turned around."
