Brenden Queen wins a heavyweight fight with rival Connor Hall, takes checkered in a dramatic Hampton Heat at Langley

HAMPTON, Va. — The 16th annual Hampton Heat at Langley Speedway featured an incredible display of fireworks, the majority of which exploded long after pre-race pyrotechnics graced the Eastern Virginia sky in front of a sellout crowd.

The main event on a Saturday night that represented the second leg of the prestigious Virginia Late Model Triple Crown — and the story that overshadowed a top-five run by NASCAR Hall of Famer Dale Earnhardt Jr. — was the late battle between two Langley aces, Brenden “Butterbean” Queen and Connor Hall.

They’re rivals. They’re both Langley track champions. And on Saturday, they didn’t pull any punches in the Late Model Stock Car equivalent of a heavyweight bout.

In the end, Queen was the driver who earned a trip to Victory Lane. The 26-year-old from nearby Chesapeake scored his second consecutive Hampton Heat win and third overall. This one was anything but smooth.

Entering the final quarter of the 200-lap race, Queen and Hall found themselves running first and second, respectively, after both had carved their way through the top five. A series of late-race cautions and restarts resulted in multiple side-by-side battles for the lead. On every occasion, when one driver pulled ahead, the other immediately took the fight back to his rival.

Queen delivered the final blow with six laps to go. He drove deep into Turns 3-4, slid Hall up the race track and sped on. Hall this time did not have an opportunity to retaliate.

“We’re going to race hard; we always do.” Queen said. “I just gave it back to him. We were trading blows for a little bit. And then we he ran me up the hill down here, I wasn’t going to let him do that. I’m sure he isn’t happy about it, but I’ll race him like he races me.

“I thought it was a great race. He used me up, I used him up. We can continue it or not.”

Added Hall, the defending NASCAR Advance Auto Parts Weekly Series national champion: “It’s hard to get any room when [he] wasn’t letting me make the corner. So I couldn’t put together a whole corner and try to stretch out at all. I just kept getting moved up the hill, what I would consider darn near wrecked every corner.

“It is what it is. Just part of racing with some of the people we do.”

Queen and Hall have a history of aggressive racing at Langley. They’re cordial off the track, but the racing rivalry clearly was rekindled Saturday night. That’s part of the reasons tempers flared the way they did; Queen and Hall’s spotters even went through a verbal altercation atop the stands during the closing stages of the race.

Third-place finisher Peyton Sellers had the best view of the Queen-Hall saga. He naturally was holding his position just in case the leaders took each other out.

“They were just duking it out,” Sellers said. “Connor was better on the long run; he needed to get clear, and Butterbean new that, so he kept him [on the outside]. Connor moved him up and kind of got a little rough with him, and Bean responded moving him out of the way a little bit.

“All of the top three finished with the fenders on. Everybody’s mad, but that’s racing. At the end of the day, the fans came to see that.”

Those fans turned themselves into another storyline for the 16th Hampton Heat. Spectator gates opened at 11 a.m. ET for a race that was originally scheduled to start at roughly 9:30, and many took the opportunity to watch late morning Late Model Stock practice.

Despite a long delay for a passing storm, the Langley grandstands were packed as track officials worked to dry the track as the sun set. The Hampton Heat didn’t take the green flag until shortly after 11 p.m. ET, and the crowd still was in full force.

Among the reasons for the capacity crowd, of course, was Earnhardt. The 49-year-old logged his fourth Late Model Stock start of the season, and late in the race, he followed Sellers to the front of the field. Earnhardt finished fifth in his debut race at Langley.

Unofficially, Landon Pembelton finished fourth behind Sellers and ahead of Earnhardt. Woody Howard, Kaden Honeycutt, Chase Burrow, Mark Wertz and Matt Waltz finished sixth through 10th, respectively.

The 2024 Virginia Triple Crown will conclude with the third leg on Sept. 28 when Martinsville Speedway hosts the ValleyStar Credit Union 300.