ARCHDALE, NC (September 29, 2008)- Earl Pearson Jr. and the Bobby Labonte Racing Team competed at the famous Knoxville Raceway in Knoxville, IA this past weekend in the Lucas Oil Knoxville Late Model Nationals. In Thursday's night qualifying and preliminary events Earl would blister the Knoxville Raceway track record in qualifying breaking the old track record by 8 tenths of a second turning a new track record lap for dirt late models at 16.621.

Earl would start 12th in his heat race and advance to finish second place earning the pole position for the 25-lap $7,000 to win feature event on Thursday night the first of the three night event. Earl would suffer a broken rear rotor and brake caliper during the middle stages of the feature and would limp his car to a 13th place finish. On Friday nights preliminary event Earl would try to improve on his overall points position for Saturday's 100-lap $40,000 to win feature event.

Earl would struggle all night with the setup on a very slick track and finished a disappointing 16th in Friday nights 25-lap $7,000 to win main event. Earl earned enough points from Thursdays night's preliminary event to earn the 7th starting position for the 100-lap feature event on Saturday. Earn would quickly move into the top 5 early in the event running as high as 4th place during the early stages of the 100-lap feature. But track conditions would change over the course of the event and Earl would find the handling on his Mastersbilt chassis going away after the halfway mark of the race.

Earl would use a couple of cautions during the later stages of the feature to come in and make a few chassis adjustments and change tires to hopefully improve the handling on his car. Earl would fall back as far as 18th after making a couple of pit stops during caution periods.

Earl's chassis adjustments would help his car as he started passing cars for position in the late stages of the race. Earl would mange to get back into the top ten with a 15 laps to go and advanced a couple of more positions in the final five laps to finish 6th in the final run down of the 100-lap feature event.

"We were very confident after Thursday night's heat race that we had a good car to contend for the win. Then we broke the rear rotor and brake caliper and it tore some other stuff up in the rear end that we think might have affected the handling of the car the rest of the weekend. We were able to make some adjustments in Saturdays 100-lap feature and managed to get a good 6th place finish after falling back deep in the field early. It was great to set a new track record at Knoxville and to know that we hold the track record at Eldora for the World 100 and now Knoxville Raceway both in the same year is pretty net. We just would have really liked to have won both of those events to go along with the new records. Overall it was a good weekend or us and great to race again at Knoxville Raceway in front of a huge crowd and their great facility", stated Earl

Earl and the Bobby Labonte Racing Team would like to thank all their sponsors in 2008 for their support including LifeLong Locks, Lucas Oil, Mastersbilt Race Cars, Larry Wallace Engines, Mopar, Sunoco Race Fuels, Allstar Performance, Tiger Rear End, BERT, Butlerbuilt, Hyperco, SHY, Wilwood, Woodward, TWM, Dyers Top Rods, Weld, Hoosier Tire, PRC, Wrisco, Sparco, Bell, Mechanix Wear, Oakley, Cheerios, Coke, Dunn-Benson Racing Supply, ASI Racewear, WRT Web Designs, The Decal Source, Rick Schwallie Photography and WD Enterprises.

For more information about LifeLong Locks and the strongest locks on the market today, visit www.lifelonglocks.com. For more information about Earl Pearson Jr. and the Bobby Labonte Racing Team visit their official website at www.bobbylabontemotorsports.com.



Have an opinion on this story? E-MAIL KARNAC to send a letter to the editor!