WHEATLAND, Mo. – Robbie Reed’s goal was set early in the season, after he bounced back from a poor opening-night run at Lucas Oil Speedway and won the week-two Pitts Homes USRA modified feature.
Even though that was his lone trip to victory lane, Reed was a mark of consistency en route to his first Lucas Oil Speedway track championship.
Reed used three second-place finishes and seven top-five runs to finish 62 points ahead of runner-up Jason Pursley.
“We kind of set out a goal to race for it early in the year,” Reed said. “It was kind of an accomplishment to get it done. There are a lot of good drivers that come through there. A lot of tracks you go to, you’re racing the same guys every week. There’s good cars and good drivers from different series that come through there every week.
“I feel like we really did something by winning that championship.”
Reed, from the mid-Missouri town of Mexico, made the most of his decision to become a regular at Lucas Oil Speedway for the first time.
Driving a new Vanderbuilt Race Car, Reed said a key was maximizing the most of the bad nights, even if those were few and far between.
“On your bad nights, you have to get every position you can when running for something like that,” Reed said. “We were able to do that.”
Not only did Reed capture the track title, he looked good doing it. He took home the Best Appearing Race Car Award at the speedway’s postseason banquet.
That included all four Big Adventure RV Weekly Racing Series divisions and was selected by track photographer Kenny Shaw and the track staff.
“For all the cars that come through there, that was a pretty cool deal,” Reed said. “I wasn’t expecting that.”
Reed said he’s always taken a lot of pride in how his race car looks, even his work vehicles at his recycling business, Central Metals. But he praised crew member Derek “Dirk” Keith, in particular, for keeping the race car looking sharp.
“Dirk takes is really into it; he goes over and above with the looks of the car and keeping it up,” Reed said. “He takes a lot of pride in it.
“They do a lot for the team,” Reed added of Dirk and brother Buddy Keith, along with Dale Test. “They probably are more into racing than I am. I probably wouldn’t get to go do it as much without their help.”
Following one more race, later this month, Reed said work will begin on refurbishing his two race cars for the 2020 season. He plans to go after another championship at Lucas Oil Speedway and said the best might be yet to come.
“I’m kind of (eager) to run it again down there,” Reed said of the Vanderbuilt car. “We’ve got a really good car that’s dialed in now. We’re two-for-two in wins since getting it dialed in and haven’t go to run it at Lucas Oil since the season ended so early down there. I think we really have something to take there, now.”
What did he and the team figure out? With a laugh, Reed declined to be specific.
“It’s just working a lot better. It’s driving off the corners,” he said. “I can’t really say what we’ve done. It’s kind of a secret. But we’ve got it working better than we had it all year.
“We sure had a lot of seconds down there. I wish we had the car that we have today, then. We’ve have had more wins down there.”