AUTO RACING: Pierce rolls into Gateway Dirt Nationals

Marvin Holman Marvin., Commercial-News, Danville, Ill.
·3 min read

Dec. 1—OAKWOOD — After a historic season with the UMP Late Models, Oakwood racer Bobby Pierce is focusing on finishing a tremendous year.

Pierce won his fifth UMP Late Model season title, a feat no racer has done before. He also won the UMP Summernationals title for the fifth time, now just behind six-time champion Billy Moyer.

"Following the Hell Tour (Summernationals), you pick up season points and any World of Outlaws race, you get points as well and I won a few of those races," Pierce said. "It all adds up. You know where you are at, but you don't know what you might be at. We had a pretty dominant year and two years in a row, we have had some great success."

For Pierce, who started racing at the old Vermilion County Speedway and raceways across the state as a kid, fulfilling some massive feats

"As a kid when you start out with anything, you start out with dreams and hope they turn into reality one day," Pierce said. "As you get older, it becomes your business, you are driving to make it work and you forget about taking a step back and looking back at everything."

He also had to follow in the footsteps of his father, Hall of Fame racer Bob Pierce, who helps him on his crew.

"I have to thank my dad. Without him getting me into the sport, I don't know what I would do and to all my sponsors because it takes a lot," Pierce said.

While most racers in the area have parked their cars for the winter, Pierce has kept rolling. He repeated as champion of the Duel in the Desert in Las Vegas a couple of weeks ago and won $40,000.

"A lot of people say they go to Vegas to win. A lot of them say the casino, but I won mine at the racetrack. It was really cool to go back there and defend the title was our goal," Pierce said. "It seems the offseason is short because we have the Gateway Nationals and we have the Wild West Shootout in January and racing at Daytona on February and before you know it, the next season is ready to start."

The Gateway Dirt Nationals start today and will run through Saturday at the Dome of America's Center in St. Louis. While Pierce has won the late model title there in 2017 and 2018, a win this weekend would bring a perfect ending to the season.

"It carries so much different energy than your usual race. If you put 900 horsepower cars in a building, it is going to get intense. The vibes are crazy," Pierce said. "With late models, it seems there is always a big race every weekend and its good for the sport. If we can go to the dome and win, it would mark the end of one of my best seasons racing."

As for next season, Pierce will be making a change as far as chassis that he hopes can bring more titles.

"Next year, I will be switching to a new chassis — Longhorn Chassis out of North Carolina," Pierce said. "My dad is still going to build modifieds and will always help out. It is still my own team, but we just will have different cars. It is the same car racers like Tim McCready and Kyle Larson race.

"It is not like we don't need a change, but we are making it for the future and we hope to create a great relationship for them. It could take me some time to get adapted to a different car."