That was the hope of Matt Carter, a Denver, North Carolina, resident who competes weekly in the Late Model division at Hickory (North Carolina) Motor Speedway.
"I don't have a sponsor as we speak, so I'm looking for somebody to back me next season," Carter said. "If I were to make the race and have a good showing, maybe that will catch somebody's attention and they'll look at me in the future."
For Wayne Grubb, bragging rights are what it's all about.
"I don't care about the money. I really don't," said Grubb, whose brother, Kevin, competes in the NASCAR Busch Series. "It's an ego thing because you get all the bragging rights because no matter where you go, people are pointing at you and saying, 'That's the guy who won at Martinsville.' To be able to do something like that would be awesome."
Chad Kendrick, of Durham, North Carolina, called Martinsville "the Mecca for Late Model stock car drivers." He said, "If you had to weigh the ego part of it versus the money side of it, I'd say the ego part would come out on top. If you can simply qualify for this race, you're definitely one of the top Late Model drivers in the eastern part of the country."
Qualifying
Once Saturday practice wrapped up, things started to get interesting, with the 130 drivers trying to grab one of the 20 confirmed starting positions in Sunday's race. The other 90 drivers would have a long Saturday night trying to figure out how to make their car a little better for one of the four Sunday heat races that would set the remainder of the field.
Once all was said and done with qualifying, Frank Deiny Jr. stood atop the charts with his fastest lap of the afternoon at 89.241mph to edge fellow Virginia driver Brandon Butler, who finished second fastest.
Butler, the defending Atlantic Seaboard champion from the NASCAR Weekly Racing Series, was pleased with his runner-up effort that allowed his team to get his car into race trim a day before the main event.
"If a guy comes here and does well, people are going to take notice," Butler said. "This is really our first big money race of the year, but it's also our biggest of the year because of all the prestige and notoriety that comes along with this race. When you look at some of the past winners of this race, you'll see some pretty good names."
The Late Model race at Martinsville is something many of the top drivers in NASCAR-Mark Martin, Mike Skinner and Elton Sawyer -have competed in while working their way up the ranks.
"If you're into Late Model racing, you can't help but show up at Martinsville and try to give it a shot," said Wade Day, a resident of Tennessee who races at New River Valley Speedway in Radford, Virginia. "There's a lot of prestige that goes along with this race. If you can win at Martinsville you can win anywhere. A lot of Winston Cup and Busch Series drivers have proven that and competed in this race.
Race Day
A beautiful sunny afternoon with a cool breeze in the air created perfect conditions for the 300 laps of racing action ahead. The first 100 laps were for drivers who failed to qualify a day prior. Because of the sheer number of cars, four 25-lap qualifiers were held with only the Top 5 advancing to the main 200-lapper.
Heat races can get wild, and fenders often get wrinkled. With only a few laps to make it to the front, the racing at the back of the field was spectacular, especially for the fans who liked to see the myriad of wrecks that caused the 100 laps to last almost 211/42 hours. Taking victories in those heat races were Lee Blaker, Dennis Setzer (a regular on the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series), Wade Day and Brad Brinkley.