Bubba Pollard Completes Mobile ASA Southern Super Series Sweep

Bubba Pollard completed the ASA Southern Super Series sweep of Mobile International Speedway on Saturday night, winning the CraneWorks 100 at the Alabama half-mile.

Pollard first took the lead on lap 14, then held off a challenge from Cole Butcher shortly after the halfway break. Even a caution with 11 laps to go for Chase Pinsonneault's No. 14 coming to rest on the race track could not deter the Senoia, Georgia driver, as he stormed away on the ensuing restart for his 41st career ASA Southern Super Series win.

"We just have a good car here," said Pollard. "This place just fits my driving style. Between here and Pensacola, this is where I grew up racing. You've got to have good race cars and good people behind you. We've had a rough go at the beginning of the year here, but we never give up.

"We've been working hard to get better, and I think we've got a pretty good race car. We tested at Pensacola on Thursday and it was pretty good. I'm really happy with it."

Butcher briefly took the lead on lap 58, but Pollard pulled off a crossover move to reclaim the lead. That was as close as anyone got during the second half of the race to challenging Pollard, as Butcher faded to seventh in the final rundown and Pollard crossed the line nearly one second ahead of Matthew Craig.

"I was sitting there trying to ride a little bit. He still wanted to go," said Pollard. "I figured, what the hell, we'll just let him go and cross him back. Once we took off there a couple of laps and he fell back, I knew he was going to have to save to outrun me. We kind of saved there just enough. We had a good race car. It was still good at the end. We could do about anything we wanted to."

Matthew Craig finished second after falling to the rear early in the race. While he didn't plan to ride near the rear of the field to save tire when the 100-lap race started, it quickly became his backup plan after being stuck on the outside lane with a line of cars passing him early.

"I didn't really plan on going to the tail, but, you know, whoever was in second got to my inside and I was going to let them go by," said Craig. "Then I realized they were tight, trained-up on the bottom. I was like, well, next option is go to the back and ride, save tire.

"The car was really good. We had a lot of speed. It's just really hard to pass. I can run a car down. Once I'd get within a car length, it'd just get so tight with aero and stuff."

In the closing laps, Colby Howard passed Anthony Campi Racing teammate Carson Brown for the third spot. While his car wasn't perfect, it had plenty of speed late in the race to finish on the podium.

"We had some brake issues," said Howard. "It looks better coming from the back to the front than from the front to the back, so that's what we did. We went to the front. I don't know if I really had anything for Bubba. If we got a couple more laps and not had to pass so many cars, I think we had something for Matt, maybe. Bubba was in his own world, it looked like.

"Not the best past couple of races for us. You know, we're happy with third."

Brown finished fourth, while Dustin Smith rounded out the top five at his home track.

The next event for the ASA Southern Super Series is a doubleheader at Cordele Motor Speedway on September 5-6, the second and third events of the track's Super Fest series.

-Photo credit: Daniel Vining

CraneWorks 100 Unofficial Results