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10/20/2014 |
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DAVIS WINS
SOUTHERN MOD TOUR ROOKIE HONORS
Georgia Native Is
2014 Sunoco Rookie Of The Year Award Winner |
When a driver makes a switch from a full-bodied
stock car to a modified car, one of the best things
he can do is partner up with an established team to
help him with his learning curve of competing in a
drastically different car.
Dawsonville, Georgia, native Spencer Davis made the
wise decision to team up with Hillbilly Racing and
veteran car owner/crew chief David Hill and it paid
immediate dividends in the NASCAR Whelen Southern
Modified Tour as Davis won the 2014 Sunoco Rookie of
the Year Award.
“One of the best things we did was compete with
David and his Hillbilly Racing team,” he added. “I
might have been a new driver, but the team has years
and years of experience, and have won races and
championships and they know how to get it done. They
were able to use notes from previous races at tracks
to set the cars up to help me each week and that is
a big advantage versus me being a new driver with a
new team and we all are learning for the first time
together. They gave me a car ready to go each week.
That was big in helping me with my transition.”
While Davis was adjusting to the car, he relied
heavily on the expertise of Hill and the established
team to ease Davis into racing the ‘ground pounders’
full-time.
“This past season was definitely a learning curve
for me,” said Davis. “Coming from a late model
background you have to adjust to racing cars that
have no fenders, bumpers and nerf bars that you can
use when racing and also wider tires These cars have
a lot of power and the tires are so different than a
late model.”
Hill previously mentored late model driver Daniel
Hemric when he made 12 starts for the team between
2010-2012 and Davis thinks that made his transition
smoother than anticipated.
“David has coached a late model driver before with
Daniel and I think that made my first year with him
that much easier,” Davis said. “We really hit it off
this year and I look forward to racing with him and
the team again next year.”
Davis finished the season with seven top-10 finishes
in 14 races on the southern tour and ended up ninth
in the final standings which made the 15-year old
driver happy. Davis also made four starts in the
NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour and finished with
back-to-back top-10s, highlighted by a season-best
seventh-place showing at Thompson Speedway
Motorsports Park this past Sunday in the season
finale.
“When we started the season I struggled a little
bit, especially in qualifying,” Davis added. “I got
better at that as the season went along and that
really helped us as we had a little bit of a dip
midway through the year.”
It came down to the season finale at Charlotte Motor
Speedway for Davis to outdistance fellow Sunoco
Rookie of the Year contenders Joe Ryan Osborne and
Bobby Measmer Jr..
“We had a decent lead but I didn’t really feel good
about being able to win it until we got to Charlotte
and realized Joe wasn’t going to be able to race
that night, then we knew we had it locked up,” Davis
said.
Osborne suffered a wrist injury at Caraway Speedway
the week before and was unable to compete in the
final race of the season.
Davis finished the year with five Sunoco Rookie of
the Race Awards and outdistanced Measmer by 10
points in the final rookie standings (127-117).
Davis is ready to celebrate his 2014 Sunoco Rookie
of the Year for the Whelen Southern Modified Tour at
the NASCAR Touring Series Awards on Dec. 13 in the
Charlotte (North Carolina) Convention Center at the
NASCAR Hall of Fame.
He is also ready to get back on the track with Hill
and the Hillbilly Racing team in 2015.
“We don’t know exactly which tour we will race with
full-time, but we do know we will be racing together
next year and I am really excited about that because
I feel like we are only going to get better,” said
Davis. |
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Source: Tim Southers / NASCAR
Posted: October
20, 2014 |
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