One year ago, Kyle Campbell was involved in a crash at crash at Hickory Motor Speedway that he didn’t think his family-run team would be able to come back from. Amazingly, they made it back to the track a month later, but their car was never the same as Campbell struggled to finish in the top 20 his next three races. 

The rest of the 2023 season was a struggle with Campbell scoring just three top-10 finishes the rest of the way until they called it quits for the year in August. 

Fast forward to this weekend and Campbell’s fortunes could not be any different. Campbell came out swinging at the CARS Tour Pro Late Model season opener on Saturday at North Carolina’s Southern National Motorsports Park. Campbell qualified fourth, which was four positions better than his best starting spot in 2023, and proved right away that he’d be a contender for the win Saturday.

And that he was, as he muscled the lead away first from Kris Wright, and then again on a late-race restart from Kaden Honeycutt. Campbell drove away from the field late to score a very emotional first victory.

“This means so much,” Campbell said in victory lane. “Last year, second race of the year, we wrecked and we didn’t know if we were going to be able to come back. We had so many people help us. But this thing was bad fast. I’ve never driven a car that good. I don’t even know what to think right now.”

Campbell said the key to the win was being able to get by Honeycutt as quickly as he did after losing the lead on that late restart.

“I kind of thought the restart would be called back. I’m not too worried about it obviously right now, but I felt like he went before the line on my outside anyway,” explained Campbell. “I mean, he raced me clean. I did what I had to do. I got under him in turn three. I’m never going to destroy another guy’s car. I know I can barely afford to fix this one if I wreck it, so I’m never going to hurt another man’s opportunity to win the race, but I just did what I had to do.”

Honeycutt ended up slipping to third on the exchange as Jimmy Renfrew was able to sneak by and finish in the second position. Tristan McKee and defending champion Caden Kvapil completed the top five.

The CARS Tour Pro Late Models are back in action just over a month from now on Saturday, April 6 at Hickory Motor Speedway, which will be the first Late Model Stock Car/Pro Late Model doubleheader of the 2024 season.

The CARS Tour Late Model Stock Cars get their 2024 season kickstarted next Saturday, March 9, also at Southern National Motorsports Park. 

As always, every CARS Tour event can be seen live on FloRacing as part of a FloRacing subscription. Fans can subscribe to FloRacing by clicking here. 

CARS Tour Pro Late Model At Southern National Unofficial Results