Bubba Pollard overcomes Ty Majeski to win Rattler 250 at South Alabama Speedway

“She woke up this morning and said, ‘Daddy going to win again?’” said Pollard’s wife, Erin.

Indeed he did.

Pollard dethroned Ty Majeski as the champion of the Rattler 250 on Sunday afternoon, passing the record-holding, five-time champion on lap 238 and hung on the rest of the way to cross the finish line in front of him.

By winning the 47th running of the annual Super Late Models race for the first time since 2012, Pollard pocketed a race record payout off $25,000.

Besides overcoming Majeski, who had won three straight Rattler 250 races and holds the record with five wins, Pollard had to battle through a crack in his windshield from a rock that flew up from the 4/10 mile asphalt track.

“We had to regroup and refocus, but it all worked out,” Pollard said. “When you outrun Ty Majeski, you’ve done something. The last four, five years he’s been dominant.”

In an interesting twist, Majeski was offered an additional $10,000 by one of the sponsors of the race – Central Florida Roofing – if he was to win the race after accepting their challenge to start in the back of the field.

Majeski had won qualifying on Saturday afternoon with a time of 94.130 mph, doing so after catching a private plane to Opp following his race in the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series at the Atlanta Speedway, making it in time for the Rattler qualifying.

On Sunday, Majeski decided to take up the challenge by Central Florida Roofing, thus started last in the 31-car field. Justin Mondeik was moved into the pole position.

Majeski, a 28-year-old native of Seymour, Wis., worked behind Pollard during the early portions of the race before going low and passing him on lap 72 as he made his first real move to catch the leaders.

After a caution on lap 84, Majaski had moved up to sixth on the re-start, with Mondeik, Jeremy Doss and Jesse Love holding the top three spots. By lap 89, Majeski had moved into fourth. He took third place on lap 95, trailing Doss and Hunter Robbins, which is where things stood at the halfway mark of the race.

Majeski took his first lead of the day on lap 136 as he went low coming through turn 4 to overtake Robbins for first.

It looked as though Majeski would race on to his sixth victory at the track before Pollard, who eventually caught up and was right on his bumper, passed him with 12 laps left by going under him on turn 4.

From that point, it was Pollard who stretched the lead and wasn’t about to be caught in what became a two-car race.

“I got gun shy,” Majeski said. “Bubba was pushing hard when he got into second and it was pretty much just going to be a race on whose car was going to last longer and his just lasted a little bit longer.

“It’s a bummer but overall it was a cool weekend. Just came up a little bit short.”

For Pollard, who resides in Senoia, Ga., winning meant posing with a rattlesnake as is tradition for the race.

“Don’t bring them damn snakes down here,” Pollard joked.

But the traditional photo of the winner and a rattlesnake was taken, and Pollard was proud to be part of it.

So too were his family and friends excited and proud of the accomplishment. Pollard’s wife attended Abbeville Christian Academy during her high school days.

“We always love coming down here,” his wife said. “We get to race in front of some of my family and friends from back home and this is just a really special place. I believe this is his 22nd year here … he started when he was 14. Just hard to believe.”

It was a relatively clean race without any bad wrecks.

The longest caution came on lap 126 just after the restart at the halfway point of the race when Dustin Smith went off the track in turn 2. There was also a delay on lap 150 when Robbins’ car stalled coming out of turn 2. It ended the day for Robbins. Three cars got tangled on lap 182 to bring out another caution flag.