October 16, 2023 | By FLORACING

DIrt Late Model legend Freddy Smith dies AT 76

Kings Mountain, N.C. — A titan of the sport whose championship-winning career spanned from Dirt Late Model racing’s earliest days to the second-to-last of 785 career victories on its latest-generation tour, the venerable Freddy Smith — forever known as the Southern Gentleman — died late Saturday night after a brief battle with leukemia. The Kings Mountain, N.C., native and record-setting five-time Dirt Track World Championship winner was 76.

His son Jeff Smith, calling his father “my real life hero” just like many longtime racing fans of the silver-haired driver of the No. 00, revealed his father’s passing early this morning.

The inaugural National Dirt Late Model Hall of Famer began his career in 1966 and dominated the Carolinas for years became a cornerstone on the National Dirt Racing Association (nine career victories) in the late 1970s while making a handful of NASCAR starts. He began his DTWC run in the 1980s, dazzled in driving for one of the sport’s first super teams in the Bazooka-sponsored rides of Louisiana-based GVS Racing, captured the 1996 Hav-A-Tampa Dirt Racing Series title in a Clayton Christenberry-owned car and finally continued to win crown jewel races into his 50s before retiring in 2012.


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