Catchfence

Abingdon, Va. – Late- race pit strategy brought Caleb Holman home with a seventh place finish Saturday afternoon at Rockingham (NC) Speedway. Holman stayed out when most leaders came back down pit road to take tires with 25 laps left remaining in the Smith International Trucks 150.

After being outside of the top 10 the final practice Holman, being the consistent qualifier he is, ran a solid lap of 24.261. That would place him second on the starting grid to Joey Gase who ran a 24.199.

“After winding up 14th in the last practice we came in and decided to change a ton of stuff on the car, which worked out in our favor,” said Holman after qualifying.

At the start of the race Holman jumped out front leading the first few laps until J.P. Morgan took over from there. Holman would slip back a few more spots, but remained within the top five throughout the first half of the race.

On lap 65 a debris caution came out and most of the leaders tore down pit road for fuel. Holman gained one spot, and restarted fourth.

The caution flag flew once again on lap 87 for Brian Keselowski, who took a hard hit into the turn one wall. Again, all the leaders came down pit road for tires, except for Matt Lofton who only took gas and won the race off pit road.

Holman gained two spots on pit road and restarted eighth on lap 96. By lap 100 Holman had raced his way back up into the top five, but then began to slip back to sixth when the car started getting tight.

“Towards the end of the race when the sun came out we started getting tight and was just pusing up the track. Then when others came back down pit road and got four additional tires we were confused. I guess they made that call after the race had started and some teams didn’t receive the message. We had no other choice than to stay out and just get what we could get. I knew we couldn’t hold off the guys who had stickers on,” said Holman during post race.

Holman brought the Food Country USA Dodge home in the seventh position, despite the adversity he and the team had to over come throughout the weekend.

Up next on the schedule for the USAR Pro Cup Series will be Langley Speedway in Hampton, Va. on May 28, 2011.

- Henderson Motorsports Press Release