This Saturday night at North Carolina’s Hickory Motor Speedway, a legend and pioneer of NASCAR and short track racing will be honored and remembered with the 47th running of the Bobby Isaac Memorial 150.

In order to understand the importance of this race to Hickory Motor Speedway, you must first understand who Isaac was. That story began just up the road from the now legendary 3/8-mile oval in Catawba, North Carolina where Isaac was born. Eventually, he began his racing career at Hickory and became one of the many NASCAR stars to be born at the Hickory Motor Speedway.

Isaac went on to win the 1970 NASCAR Grand National championship and score 37 NASCAR Cup Series race wins.

After Isaac abruptly retired from full-time NASCAR Cup Series competition in 1973, Isaac returned to the short tracks. On August 13, 1977, Isaac pulled out of the Winston 200 Late Model Sportsman race at Hickory, climbed out of his car and collapsed on pit road due to heat exhaustion. Isaac would tragically pass away later that day due to a heart attack caused by the heat exhaustion. Isaac was 45 years old.

Ever year since then, Hickory Motor Speedway has held the Bobby Isaac Memorial Late Model Stock Car race, and it’s become the biggest race of the season at Hickory for Late Model competitors.

This year’s race is a 150-lap race, and it is the penultimate race of the season. This race is also the third of four races in Hickory’s “playoff” format to determine a champion, now in its second season.

Entering this week’s race, Tyler Matthews holds a slim eight-point lead over Kade Brown. Michael Bumgarner is third in points, Clark Houston sits fourth in points, and defending track champion Landon Huffman rounds out the top five.

Recent winners of the Bobby Isaac Memorial include Ryan Millington, who has won the last two Bobby Isaac Memorials in a row, Sam Butler, Sam Mayer, Ryan Repko, Josh Berry (2014 and 2017), R.D. Smith, and Jake Crum dating back to 2014.

Race fans that cannot make it to Hickory Motor Speedway on Saturday night can watch the Bobby Isaac Memorial 150 live on FloRacing with a FloRacing subscription. Fans can join FloRacing by clicking here.