Chase Purdy Performs at Greenvile Despite Late Race Misfortune

Chase Purdy was on his way to a career best finish, contending for the win on Saturday night at Greenville-Pickens Speedway in the NASCAR K&N Pro Series until a late-race incident eliminated him from contention. After the incident and other obstacles throughout the weekend, Purdy still fought back to an 11th place finish.

 

Purdy and the David Gilliland Racing crew unloaded a brand new racecar for practice on Friday morning and disaster struck before things had much time to get started. A piece of lead ballast fell off of another car immediately in front of Chase and, unable to avoid it, he clobbered the weight and destroyed the front of his racecar. The DGR team was forced to unload a backup car for the duration of the weekend, the same car Chase ran in his K&N debut at New Smyrna.

 

After changing over the setup and making practice runs, Chase settled into his machine and clocked in the 14th fastest qualifying lap. Once the green flag dropped, the long run speed built into the No. 17 Bama Buggies Toyota was evident. Purdy methodically worked his way up to fourth and was attempting to pass another competitor when that competitor’s teammate made contact with him, spinning Chase’s Toyota and forcing a caution with just six laps to go. A lap down from the incident, Chase fought back to 11th at the checkered flag.

 

“I really hate it for my guys that we were forced to a backup car after the primary ate a piece of lead from another car,” Chase said after the race. “That put us behind from the get-go, as we got no practice on Friday and only a couple of runs on Saturday. Once we got racing, we got up to seventh by halfway and quickly got up to fourth. Unfortunately, we got wrecked at the end of the race. I didn’t do anything wrong, I believe, so it was kind of a bad deal. I’ll forgive, but not forget, if you know what I mean.

 

“The good news is I get to spend some time with my family and hangout with them over the Easter break this week,” he continued. “I’m really pumped about Bristol in two weeks and it’s going to be awesome. It’ll be my first time there and I’ll get to experience a lot of aero things I’ve never had to experience before.”

 

The 125-lap NASCAR K&N Pro Series race at Bristol Motor Speedway is on Saturday, April 22, following the NASCAR Xfinity Series event. The race is also Chase’s next scheduled event; he will not be piloting a super late model for any contests between now and the Bristol race.

 

For more information on Chase Purdy, visit his website at ChasePurdyRacing.com and follow him on Facebook (@ChasePurdyRacing), Twitter (@ChasePurdy12) and Instagram (@chase_purdy).