Billy Decker Has Sights Set On Fourth Straight Highbank Holdup
Billy Decker Has Sights Set On Fourth Straight Highbank Holdup
Billy Decker is aiming for his fourth straight victory to open the season at the High Bank Holdup at Fulton Speedway.
By Mandee Pauch
Going into his third year in the Page Trucking No. 91 big block modified, Billy Decker is looking to clinch his fourth straight Super DIRTcar Series opener, the Highbank Holdup, at Fulton Speedway in New York on Saturday, April 28.
With track championships under his belt at Fulton Speedway, the Mike Payne Racing driver is no stranger to the 3/8-mile, high-banked oval.
Watch the 2018 Highbank Holdup LIVE on FloRacing
“I think Fulton is a good place to race,” Decker said. “There’s regular nights where it’ll have too good of a cushion or the top or the bottom will be too dominant. It’s usually the extra distance events that get interesting because, if you’re going good, you can get to the front. It’s a really fun place to race.”
Billy Decker Scores Third-Straight Highbank Hold-Up Win at Fulton https://t.co/9r9jxwwGiF pic.twitter.com/ohn5dd3T5I
— Dirt Track Digest (@DirtTrackDigest) April 30, 2017
To be able to collect three straight series openers at Fulton Speedway is no small accomplishment. So, what’s the secret to Decker’s success?
“The stuff that we apply to the race car seems to work well there,” Decker noted. “It seems like there’s more and more competition nowadays, but we haven’t done anything different in the last four years. Whatever we won with three years ago is the same thing we won with last year and it’ll be the same deal this year. Until we get beat, we aren’t going to chase our tail.”
Like most drivers in the northeast trying to gain that extra edge over the winter, the veteran driver out of Unadilla, NY, is confident with their package and is ready to get the season underway.
“We didn’t change much over the winter,” he said. “Last year we beat ourselves up a couple times with those coil cars but we’re going to stay true to what we do. We’re going to keep doing what we’ve been doing.”
For their third year together, Decker and car owner Mike Payne will once again follow the series full-time in 2018.
“Obviously, there’s some language discrepancies in the beginning with a new team,” said Decker, regarding their first year together. “It was tough deciphering between what Mike saw and what I described. That was a big learning curve for us, but last year seemed pretty solid for the second time around.”
Coming short of the ultimate goal last year, the Super DIRTcar Series title, the duo proved it had fast cars and solid equipment each and every time it hit the track in 2017.
“We plan on giving the series a good run,” Decker said. “Hopefully we can improve our program a little bit and improve on the places we struggled a bit last year. I screwed up last year when we should have won Cornwall (in Ontario, Canada). That would have given us five series wins last year. If we can clean up where we’re weak, I think we have a shot. We can be competitive and be in the mix at the end of the day.”
There has been a significant change to the series program for 2018: There will no longer be a home track program for the big block modifieds. Traditionally, in order to compete for the Super DIRTcar Series championship, drivers needed the bonus points they were able to collect from the DIRTcar home track program. With the new change to the program, Decker finds the series to be more appealing than ever.
“I think it has the potential to be a fun year,” he said. “Just to get out and see if we’re going to run and be competitive is exciting but I think this year, rather than being tied down to one track, we’ll be able to move around a little bit if we want to. Since we won’t have home track points anymore, we can do a little testing at other tracks if we need to.”
The first race of the season, the Highbank Holdup 100, will get underway LIVE on FloRacing at Fulton Speedway in Fulton, NY, on April 28.
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