After 11 years of heartbreak, Bobby is finally a Prairie Dirt Classic winner! His first PDC win came in dramatic fashion. He started 24th Saturday night in the 34th running of Illinois’s marquee event at the Fairbury (IL) Speedway. He methodically worked his way to the front, and by lap 33, he was in tenth. When the cross flags were shown to the field at the halfway mark in the 100-lap World of Outlaws Series race, he was sixth. While running fourth with 40 laps to go, he dove to the inside of a lapped car and clipped the left rear of the third-place competitor, resulting in Bobby spinning. He had to restart back in 19th place and do it all over again. His exciting rally to the front appeared to be over, and another year of bad luck in this race continued. Would he have enough laps to make it back to the front again?
His motto has always been “refuse to lose,” and boy did he live up to that. He mounted a stirring rally, as the crowd went crazy, and reached second with five laps to go. Could this finally be the year that he joins his dad, who won the PDC a record five times, on the winners list? Yes, it is! Bobby was not going to be denied again. On the final lap, he powered past the leader on the backstretch and slid down in front entering turn three. And for the first time in his career, Bobby is a Prairie Dirt Classic champion! “That’s the first time I’ve gotten emotional for a race,” Bobby said in PDC victory lane. “I wanted that pretty bad. It means everything. Somebody above us is helping us out there. Just an awesome car. I definitely had to take more chances than before. I’m not in the tight points battle, and I thought about that early in the race. When I spun with 40 laps to go, I thought I lost the race because I should’ve been more patient. It took dicey moves to get to the front. To come back from that, this means everything.” Bobby’s proud dad joined him in victory lane. “This ranks right up there with the World 100,” Bob said. “We got to do that together. Finally, the Prairie Dirt Classic after all this time. Yeah!” As Bobby’s webmaster since the beginning of his career, and Bob’s webmaster before that…this one means the world.