FASTRAK Racing Series
Southeastern Touring Series down to one last race
Southern/Smokey Mtn/Mid-East at Lavonia Oct. 16th & 17th
Lee Cooper leads the field to green at Lavonia 2009

Carnesville, GA (Sept. 30, 2009) - The FASTRAK Southeastern Touring Series racers will get one more chance to make a difference in the Southern/Smokey Mtn/Mid-East Regions Championship run for 2009. Lavonia Speedway had to postpone the Georgia State Championship until Oct. 16th & 17th due to heavy rains leading up to and lasting throughout the originally scheduled weekend of Sept. 18th & 19th. Now with the Pro Late Model Nationals completed this past weekend, it’s all about one race for the Regional Crown.

Lee Cooper from Greer, SC dodged a bullet at Wythe Raceway when his upper water hose blew off and the water got under the tires and he made contact with Wythe’s turn 2 wall at the onset of practice Sunday. But, the FASTRAK family came to his aide as the team said later, there were lots of other team’s crew members asking what was needed before Lee could nurse the car back to the pits.

“AES Racing, Steve Cooke and the gang really came to my rescue. They had spare parts and so did Jim Baggerly, Encompass Solutions, my sponsor last year, he came to my aid,” said Cooper via phone from home while working on the race car. “My crew, Ricky Howard, Gregg Perry, my dad Tim Cooper and my wife, Morgan ran everybody nuts looking for the parts we needed. Plus, there are two others that I need to thank, Dan Brewer and Larry Blankenship, jumped in on the car and worked throughout the night after the wreck for me and they were just there to watch the races.” 

The monumental efforts help Cooper to a 3rd place finish in the end and may be seen later as the effort that won the Touring Series Championship as he leads the points chase, having not won a Touring race in 2009 and even missed the Princeton event.

Meanwhile, David Smith of Inman, SC was battling his own problems with a fuel pump problem and only one practice session to work on the issue before his B-main appearance.

“Just never could get the fuel pump to act right,” said Smith. “It would run fine for a few laps then cutout and pick back up, so it took us a little while to figure out it was the fuel pump. And there were no second chances at Wythe, so we missed the Feature and we are very disappointed.”

Smith’s bad luck opened the door for Woodruff, SC’s Owen Osteen to make up some ground. Osteen would finish 4th in the feature and gain several points in the chase for the Touring Championship. Osteen, moved into second, 12 points behind leader Lee Cooper. Several other top-10 finishing positions are in question as we head to Lavonia for the final Southeastern Touring event. The Georgia State Championship will give several hard driving teams the opportunity to win two Championships in one night if lady luck falls their way.

For the time being, Chris Steele, Gene Nasworthy, Ron Parker, Kenny Peeples Jr, Donald Brasher and Hunter Peacock will keep fans on the edge of their seats as they battle it out to see who gets a top-10 finish in one of the toughest Touring Series in the nation. The Southeastern Touring Series is very tough, just look at the results. It has seen 6 different winners this year, but only two of those are even in the Top-10.