Pietro Fittipaldi Wins Fall Brawl At Hickory Motor Speedway

Pietro Fittipaldi smiles in victory lane after winning the Fall Brawl at Hickory Motor Speedway Saturday night. Photo by Sherri Stearns

Lee Faulk Racing and its youngest driver, Pietro Fittipaldi have been inching closer and closer to that elusive first victory of the season. With one race left on the schedule, everything came together and the team pulled off what may be the biggest win in the history of Lee Faulk Racing, as Fittipaldi won the 200 lap Fall Brawl at Hickory Motor Speedway in Hickory, NC.

“This is the biggest race of the year and the biggest win of my career,” Fittipaldi said. “I cant thank my team, Lee Faulk Racing, and all my sponsors enough for their support. We fought through adversity all season even when the odds were against us and we won when it counted the most.”

Rain would cancel most of practice on Friday and Saturday of the event this past weekend, forcing teams to go straight to qualifying mode. Fittipaldi would qualify fifth in the 22 car field with a time of 15.407.

This was a decent effort and it would not take long for Fittipaldi to make his move to the front.

“The first 100 laps we were just trying to work our way into position and save our left side tires the best we could knowing we would get two new right sides at the halfway break,” Michael Faulk said of the game plan this past Saturday.

At halfway, Fittipaldi had moved from fifth into the third position. David Garbo Jr. and Austin McDaniel traded the lead back and fourth in the first one hundred laps as well as the first 30 laps of the second segment.

Fittipaldi made his move past McDaniel for second spot with about 75 laps to go in the race. He would then run right on the rear bumper of Garbo Jr. where he would stay until a restart with about 40 laps to go in the race. Fittipaldi restarted on the outside front row and kept his momentum up on the high side to get by Garbo Jr. He then started pulling away from the field opening up a 7 car length lead on second place.

All was going well until a caution flew at the end of the race resulting in a green,white,checkered finish.

Fittipaldi was able to hold of a late race charge and pull away by four car lengths on the last lap to win the 2012 annual Fall Brawl 200 lap event.

In other action, Shane Lee scored the victory in the Limited Late Model feature.  Jeremy Pelfrey came home second, followed by Brandon Setzer, Roger Pitts II, and Brandon Atkinson.

Gregory Austion came home with the win in the Renegades feature.  Carroll McKinney, Darren Dickinson, Daniel Moore, and Dillon Crouch rounded out the top five.

Up next at Hickory Motor Speedway is the Rev-Oil Pro Cup Series on Oct. 20.  Visit www.hickorymotorspeedway.com for more information.

Hickory Motor Speedway – Hickory, NC
Fall Brawl 200 – Sept. 29, 2012