When a track has been around as long as Hickory Motor Speedway has, the records at that track are rarely broken. But, on the night that “The Birthplace of the NASCAR Stars” celebrated its 72^nd birthday, Katie Hettinger broke one of those records.

Hettinger scored the win in the first of two 40-lap Late Model Stock Car features, her fourth win of the 2022 season. But, more importantly, that win makes Hettinger the all-time winner among females in the 72-year history of Hickory Motor Speedway with five career wins, Hickory Motor Speedway officials confirmed to FloRacing on Thursday morning.

She had to hold off a hard-charging Landon Huffman, the current Late Model division points leader. Huffman gave her a bump entering the final corners, but Hettinger was able to hold on to get the win.

“It feels so awesome,” Hettinger said in victory lane. “We really wanted to do that this year, so I’m really glad we were able to do it.”

This isn’t the first time Hettinger has broken a record at Hickory, either. The Michigan native became the youngest female to win a feature at Hickory in September of 2021 when she won a 50-lap Limited Late Model race at 14 years old. She backed that up two weeks later by becoming the youngest female to win a Late Model Stock Car feature at the track.

This year, the 15-year-old driver has four wins at Hickory behind the wheel of a Matt Piercy-owned Late Model. She even swept the twin-40s at Hickory in May, earlier this season.

Hettinger isn’t the only woman to find victory lane at Hickory this season either. Annabeth Barnes-Crum scored a win in early April, coincidentally holding off Hettinger to do it. Between the two of them, a quarter of the 20 races held this season at Hickory have been won by women.

Virginia Triple Crown Is Anyone’s To Win After Hampton Heat

Now that the middle leg of the Virginia Late Model Stock Car Triple Crown, the Hampton Heat 200 at Langley Speedway, is in the books, the championship is still anyone’s to win.

After the chaotic South Boston 200 earlier in July, which was won by part-time NASCAR Camping World Truck Series driver Corey Heim, the lead was held by Jacob Borst. Borst knew that Langley, a place where he didn’t have many laps, would be his biggest hurdle if he was going to claim the championship. It turns out he was right.

Borst followed up a second-place run at South Boston with a 30^th-place finish Saturday at Langley due to mechanical issues.

As a result, enter everyone else.

Jared Fryar dominated the second half of the event and went on to score the victory, moving him to the third position in points with an average finish of 5.5 between the two events.

VIDEO: Jared Fryar Stays Cool To Win Hampton Heat 200

Ahead of Fryar sit Mason Diaz and Mark Wertz, who both have an average finish of four. Wertz is the Triple Crown points leader following the race at his home track because he holds the tiebreaker of the higher finish, a second-place run behind Fryar at the Hampton Heat.

But now that leads us to the Triple Crown finale, the ValleyStar Credit Union 300 at the legendary half-mile paperclip known as Martinsville Speedway. Anything can (and usually does) happen on the tight confines of Martinsville.

For the top three in points, Martinsville hasn’t really been too kind. Wertz has an average finish of 36 in eight attempts. He’s failed to qualify four times, including his last two attempts in 2017 and 2021. Wertz’s best finish at Martinsville was a 27^th-place run way back in 2003 when the driver he’s tied with in points, Mason Diaz, was just three years old.

That brings us to Diaz, who hasn’t fared much better. Diaz has a DNQ on his stats sheet in 2016, his first attempt at the ValleyStar 300. Since then, Diaz has finishes of 21^st, 42^nd, and 33^rd, good for an average finish of 32.

Now let’s take a look at Fryar. The grandson of two-time Snowball Derby champion Freddy Fryar has done pretty well since making the transition from Super and Pro Late Model racing to Late Model Stock Car racing. Fryar has won a championship with the CARS Tour in both the SLM and LMSC divisions, but when looking at Martinsville specifically, it looks as though Fryar might have the advantage, though his sample size is much smaller.

Fryar has made two Martinsville 300 attempts. He failed to qualify in his first attempt in 2017, though he was still just getting his feet wet in LMSC racing at the time. His second attempt, last year, went much better. Fryar finished fifth. Fryar will also have the tiebreaker over his competitors due to his victory at Langley.

What we know for certain is that Martinsville, on September 24 is going to be wild in more ways than one.

Summer Showdown is Preston Peltier’s Personal Playground

Evergreen Speedway in Monroe, Washington held its biggest race of the season this past weekend, the 200-lap Super Late Model Summer Showdown. The event attracts the best drivers in Super Late Model racing west of the Rocky Mountains, and even some of the best from the East Coast sometimes too.

HIGHLIGHTS: 2022 Evergreen Summer Showdown 200

And yet, even with the high-caliber level of talent in the field, the event is dominated by just one driver, Preston Peltier. Peltier, who is originally from North Carolina, but now calls Colorado home, held off Bakersfield, California’s Derek Thorn by 1.585-seconds to score the win.

Saturday’s victory is Peltier’s fourth in the Summer Showdown. In fact, Peltier has won four of the last five Summer Showdowns. Oh and by the way, there’s only been 10 Summer Showdowns run in the history of the event.

Another astonishing fact is that while Peltier has four wins in this event, no other driver even has two. That’s right, Peltier is the only driver to win the Summer Showdown on multiple occasions. Pete Harding, Jay Sauls, Cameron Hayley, Bubba Pollard, Tayler Riddle, and Owen Riddle are the only other winners throughout 10 installments of Summer Showdown history.

National Championship Update

NASCAR Roots On FloRacing This Week

Friday

6:30 p.m. ET – Dirt Modifieds at Autodrome Granby

8:30 p.m. ET – NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour at Claremont Motorsports Park

Saturday

5:30 p.m. ET – Baldwin/Evans/Jarzombek Memorial 77 at Riverhead Raceway

5:30 p.m. ET – Late Models and Modifieds at Jennerstown Speedway

6:30 p.m. ET – Winged Sprint Cars at Berlin Raceway

7 p.m. ET – Open Wheel Modifieds at Langley Speedway

7:50 p.m. ET – Modifieds and Sportsman 100 at Bowman Gray Stadium

8 p.m. ET – NASCAR Late Models at LaCrosse Fairgrounds Speedway

8:30 p.m. ET – Eve of Destruction at Meridian Speedway

9 p.m. ET – Winged Sprint Cars at Evergreen Speedway