ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Monday, August 5, 1996 TAG: 9608050152
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: B-6 EDITION: METRO
DATELINE: RADFORD
SOURCE: CHAD WILLIS STAFF WRITER
Salem's Clay Highberger captured his second victory of the season Saturday in the New River Valley Speedway Wade's/Valley Rich 100 Late Model Stock race.
Highberger, who earlier this year ended an eight-year drought with a victory in the Commonwealth Concrete 100, won his second race in six weeks.
Highberger qualified fifth with a time of 16.69 seconds (89.73 mph), 11 one-hundredths of a second behind pole-sitter Tony McGuire, but quickly worked his way to the head of the 20-car field.
Taking advantage of a first-lap spin by McGuire, Highberger moved into second place behind Chad Harris. Highberger took the lead when he forced Harris high on lap 35.
"We came together a little in turn 1, but it was just racing,'' Highberger said of the pass.
Highberger used the next 35 laps and some lapped traffic to build a 1.55 second cushion over Philip Morris.
"The car changed a little on us in the middle of the race and I had to adjust,'' Highberger said. "My crew was just telling me to run my line and everything would be all right.''
Morris closed the margin to two car-lengths with 10 laps remaining, but Morris said chasing Highberger was more than his car could handle.
"We were tip-toeing it out there trying to run with Clay,'' Morris said. "I was just burning the tires up too much. We really needed a caution to catch him tonight ... unfortunately, we didn't get one.''
For Highberger and Morris, Saturday's results capped off a long week where each had to repair structural damages sustained to their cars in last week's Kroger/WDBJ-7 250 televised race.
"We're happy with the finish,'' Morris said. "We had to run our oldest motor tonight because we damaged the other one pretty bad last week. We just tried to return to some kind of baseline we could work with.''
Tink Reedy, Tim McGuire and Scott Millington rounded out the top five.
In the Limited Sportsman division, Eddie Walls (Woodlawn) held off Kenny Montgomery for his third win of 1996. Walls slipped by points leader Tam Topham on lap 29 and held off the field over the final 10 laps for the win. Jay McCray finished third, fending off Topham at the finish.
Christiansburg's Tommy Allie won his track-best 12th race in a row and 14th overall in the Pure Stock division. Randy Taylor placed second and Anthony Hall took third.
Ray Sowers (Floyd) continued his winning ways in the Mini Stock class, taking his third consecutive victory and his sixth overall in '96. Marty Moore ran second and Kevin Snyder finished third.
In a special running of the Virginia Old Timers division, Monk Tate took the win in the 25-lap event. Thomas Tatum and Cotton Mason rounded out the top three finishers.
LENGTH: Medium: 58 lines KEYWORDS: AUTO RACINGby CNB