B.J. Robinson at least showed what his Black Diamond Race Car is capable of during Friday night’s Rio Grande Waste Services Wild West Shootout presented by O’Reilly Auto Parts program at Vado Speedway Park.

The Bossier, La., racer had been upset-minded upon outwitting the sport’s hotshoe in Bobby Pierce on the initial start of the 30-lap feature, rocketing into open track and leading the first four laps. But that’s all the limelight Robinson enjoyed in the fourth-round miniseries event.

Once Pierce kicked into high gear around the top, the searching Robinson could now see what’s made the Oakwood, Ill., superstar and eventual race winner so formidable of late.

“And not just him. When you show up to races like these, they’re all good,” Robinson said. “There’s not many bad cars here. I was just trying to move around and not be married to one spot, see if I can find the line that’s fastest. When you’re leading, it’s hard to determine which line’s the best, especially here because it moves around a lot.”

Robinson hung onto second through lap 15, and then his race unraveled four laps later. Doing his all to cling to sixth place, Robinson got bent out of shape entering turn three and plugged his front end over the cushion. The left side of his nose caved in and Robinson then rounded the frontstretch considerably slower than those charging behind.

On lap 24, Robinson pulled off and took his 21st-place finish to the trailer with the outlook of trying again on Saturday.

“Got into the corner a little too straight and knocked the bumper down in the dirt,” Robinson said. “That was pretty much it.”

Up to that point, Robinson had been feeling sporty in his new Black Diamond machine, one of three in the field repping the brand this week along with Clayton Stuckey and Kyle Beard.

“I was pretty good. This new car has had speed ever since we’ve been here,” Robinson said. “Just driver error both of the nights we raced. First night, we were pretty decent, run second in the heat, then got pinched down and knocked the bumper in the dirt. I was done that night.

“A couple nights ago, I didn’t qualify very good. Got buried and the track wasn’t racy then. We’ve been working hard trying to get that going. Hopefully we can build on that.”

Robinson now has finishes of 24th, 16th and 21st at this week’s Wild West Shootout.

“If you look at our feature results, you’d say a C,” Robinson said. “But our car has shown speed. I just made some bad decisions and driver errors. That’s why we come out here to race. I get to race seven days in a row at the same racetrack; get some laps on a new car. We have three of them here.”

Being an employee of Stuckey Enterprises, which builds Black Diamond Race Cars, Robinson obviously has great investment in the chassis brand he’s proudly repping at the Wild West Shootout. According to Robinson, his Black Diamond machines have a new twist this year.

Well, it’s not exactly new — “We’re revisiting cars from 2018 and ’19, what worked really well then,” he said — but in terms of freshness of style, it can be considered as such.

“We’re trying to build a notebook so we can go forward for this year and sell some more cars and try to get some more back out there on the national tour,” Robinson said. “I think that’s why you see the torch being passed around. Rocket’s been dominant for years, and they’re still good cars.

“I would say, when you look out there, there’s five major chassis builders that build any cars to large amounts. It’s just a big circle. It was Rocket. Now it’s Longhorn. It used to be Barry Wright and MasterSbilt.

“In 2015, we had a lot of good guys in them and we’re trying to get back to that point.”