At 14 years old, Brock Pinkerous is much younger than most of the competitors he races against, but he’s already making his presence known.

In his first super late model race last Friday at Lernerville Speedway, the teen from Ellenville, N.Y., led the first 17 laps of the feature.

The race ended in heartbreak as Pinkerous spun after contact with Mike Norris while battling for the lead, but he certainly showed he can handle a big-motored race car.

Now in his second start, he’ll test himself against the division’s best at the 18th annual Firecracker 100 weekend Thursday through Saturday at Lernerville.

“I definitely wasn’t expecting that,” Pinkerous said of his run at Lernerville last week.

“We were really good up to Lap 17. I thought we might be a 10th-place car, because I didn’t think I would acclimate to the car as good as I did. I felt like we had a car to win, and I was on my ‘A’ game. It was crazy how fast I was.”

Pinkerous will pull double duty this weekend. He’s also entered in the Rush crate late models for the Bill Emig Memorial.

Pinkerous has experience in the crates, but Thursday will be his first attempt racing against the professional touring drivers of the Lucas Oil Dirt Late Model Series.

He got started racing at age 6 and through the years has built a strong social media following. He has more than 55,000 followers on his Facebook page.

Pinkerous said he’s gotten some scrutiny from people in his brief racing career but has had plenty of positive responses as well.

“My fan base is great, and it’s crazy how much support I’m getting,” Pinkerous said. “My goal is help other younger kids coming up through and tell them to keep their head on straight, because I have got some hate from people in my career. You just have to do what you do and let the haters hate. That’s what I’ve done and look where I am now.”

Pinkerous has an experienced crew chief in his corner in Russ King.

King is a former super late model driver who won rookie of the year on the World of Outlaws tour in 2009. He’s also a veteran of racing at Lernerville. King has made five starts in the Firecracker 100.

“Everybody on my crew is really important, but when it comes to the race car, it’s Russ and me that have to talk to each other to get it better,” Pinkerous said. “We are still getting to know each other. We’ve only known each other for about a year now, but he definitely knows what to do. When I tell him something, he knows to adjust it right away and make it a fast hot rod. It’s great to have him on my team.”

Racing in a national touring series event as a second career start might seem ambitious to some, but for Pinkerous this weekend is about learning and testing himself against the best.

“I want to make the show obviously, but I really just want to see where I end up with these guys,” Pinkerous said. “They are the best guys in the country, so they know what they are doing. If I get the chance to get behind one of them or in front of one of them, I’m definitely going to look and see what they are doing, try to follow that and see what I can learn off them.”

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