Bobbie Tumbleston, III Survives Chaotic New Year's Bash for Third Victory

Bobbie Tumbleston, III added to his resume in the New Year's Bash presented by AirPure Technologies on Sunday night, surviving the chaos to claim his third victory in the event at Dillon Motor Speedway.

Tumbleston led nearly every circuit of the 100-lap contest, crossing the finish line ahead of Alby Ovitt and Josh Way. On a night where countless competitors fell by the wayside and only eight drivers out of 32 started on the lead lap, Tumbleston escaped the fray to add a third New Year's Bash victory to his collection.

Tumbleston is now a three-time New Year's Bash winner, surpassing Jeff Melton for second on the all-time wins list in the event. Only Gary Ledbetter, Jr., with six, has more wins in the annual Street Stock event at the South Carolina facility.

"I look forward to this race every year," Tumbleston told Racing America in victory lane. "I try not to run too much in the summertime. I like coming to race with Ron [Barfield, Dillon Motor Speedway owner]. He looks after the Street Stock guys, gives them plenty of practice. He does an affordable tire situation.

"A lot of these racetracks, they only look after the Late Models. When you show up, if you ain't got a Late Model, you don't get any practice. All of the cars this week, if they didn't get enough practice Friday, I don't know. I was tired of practicing Friday. Hats off to him and his family for giving us a track to race on."

Despite his dominance, Tumbleston is still working to improve his car, feeling vulnerable on long runs. Getting tangled up in an incident during Sunday's Carolina Mini Stock Challenge feature encouraged Tumbleston to make the most of his short-run pace after qualifying on the pole.

"This car is a short-run car at the moment. We'll give it some time and see what we can figure out with it. I ain't going to give up on it. I think it's a hot rod, for sure.

"Going into this race, I wanted to lead as much as I could. In the four-cylinder race, I tried to save tires and a car blew up in front of me and I got into the wall. It didn't work out for me. I tried to lead. Whether I used too much tire or not, I don't know if that would have helped my long run or not."

Nearing the final laps of the race, several contenders rose to challenge Tumbleston. However, a lap 70 incident while Tumbleston battled three-wide with Melton and Jeff Sparks collected the latter two drivers, as well as fourth-place Easton Brewer.

"I did not have the car to win tonight, I don't believe," said Tumbleston. "Jeff Sparks turned it on and Jeff Melton turned it on at the end. Unfortunately, bad things happened for them. I feel bad for Jeff Sparks. I feel like every year he comes here and brings a hot rod and gets torn up. Jeff Melton's got a new car. I feel bad for Jeff Melton, too."

The aggressive racing raised the ire of Sparks and Melton.

“I started seeing that on every restart, I was better than Bobbie for, like, a lap," said Melton while interviewed on RacingAmerica.TV. "On that one [restart], he got up the track and him and Sparks got together. I went in there three wide to go ahead and try to make the pass. I guess he didn’t like it. We come down here, and he sticks us three wide going down in here and wrecked us all.

“It’s Bobbie, man. He’s got a temper. I thought we were having a good race. I kind of waited and waited, you know, being patient. When he got up the track, I went for my move and I had it, but he didn’t like it.

“I’m friends with Bobbie. He races hard. He refuses to lose, that’s why he wins so many races. I wish he hadn’t stuck us three wide, we could have run the last 20 something-laps or whatever and had good racing.”

“I looked at the replay. It looks like we come over here in three and four, and, [expletive], I was clear," said Sparks. "My spotter was saying, ‘Come on down, come on down.’ This [expletive] runs everybody clean up the racetrack. We bottled up off of four. He had a good car. There was no reason for that.”

While Tumbleston was clearly dismayed by the accident, he noted that there was no contact between himself and Melton in the incident

"At the end of the day, you can look at the replay. I didn't touch [Melton]. There was a gap between my right-front and his left-rear quarter-panel. I do get aggressive sometimes, but I'm not going to take two innocent cars out over that.

"Would I give Jeff Melton a bump-and-run or move him out of the way? Yeah. He didn't wreck me. I'm not going to demo derby him. With that being said, the thing that happened down here, that's not a good outcome. A lot of equipment and a lot of money got torn up. I am thankful I wasn't involved in it."

Had it not been for that incident, Tumbleston acknowledged it very well could have been Jeff Melton winning his third New Year's Bash, or Jeff Sparks taking his elusive first win in the event.

"I don't know if I could have outrun Jeff Melton, for sure," said Tumbleston. "Jeff Sparks turned it on there at the end. Them boys rode. I don't know how much tire they saved. It might have been one of them to win it. It's hard to say.

"Jeff Sparks might have been about to clear me on the outside, to be honest with you. He was really good on the outside. A lot of people can't get around here on the outside, I can't. I don't know what the outcome would have been, but I don't think I had the long-run car to win.

Tumbleston won his first New Year's Bash in 2021, and claimed his second victory in another dominant showing. Only Ledbetter, Jr. had previously won back-to-back New Year's Bashes, with victories in 2012 and 2013, as well as 2019 and 2020.

-Photo credit: Zach Evans

16th Annual New Year's Bash Unofficial Results