MARTINSVILLE, Va. – Lee Pulliam may have struggled to crack a smile after Saturday’s ValleyStar Credit Union 300, but he still had plenty to celebrate as he left the Martinsville Speedway grounds.

Pulliam’s fifth-career runner-up finish in the Martinsville late model stock car special was just enough to secure his second Virginia Triple Crown Series championship, edging out Peyton Sellers by a single finishing position for the $7,000 top prize.

The Virginia Triple Crown is an annual three-race series encompassing the premier races at South Boston Speedway (South Boston 200), Langley Speedway (Hampton Heat 200) and Martinsville.

The series champion is determined by the lowest average finish across the three races, and eligible drivers must start all three features. Pulliam’s total score of 10 left him with an average finish of 3.33, while Sellers’ combined score of 11 gave him an average finish of 3.67, just short of the prize.

Those totals were the focus in the final laps, as Pulliam put on a furious scrap with Timothy Peters in the closing laps before securing second place for good with four laps left.

Considering that Sellers had a win in his back pocket – and by virtue of that, the tiebreaker over Pulliam – going into Martinsville, the four-time NASCAR Whelen All-American Series national champion knew that every position in the final laps could make the difference in winning or losing the Triple Crown.

“That was a hell of a battle there. It got pretty intense there, beating back and forth, but really Timothy ran me fairly clean,” said Pulliam. “He gave me a little bit of a rub; I rubbed him just a little bit to get under him, but that battle was pretty clean. The 22 (Bobby McCarty) was kind of rough, but it was exciting. That’s just hard racing. Everybody finished in one piece, and that’s what it’s all about.

“I never thought once that I had it, because I’ve been in that position before, and honestly I was just trying to win the race,” Pulliam added. “I wasn’t even thinking about the Triple Crown. At the end of the day, we won the battle for second, and that was the best we could do with where Josh (Berry) was.”

As he reflected on the night as a whole, Pulliam did give major credit where it was deserved: to the No. 88 JR Motorsports squad of Berry, who led all 200 laps of Saturday night’s feature in convincing fashion.

“The (No.) 88 car, I don’t know what the heck they had, but that thing was unbelievable. I mean, I can’t ever remember seeing a car be that dominant here. Good job to those guys; I know they worked hard. Josh is a really good driver and when you’re driving good stuff, often enough good things will happen.

“We were all racing for second in this one. The best car went to victory lane this weekend.”

Saturday night marked the unprecedented fifth time in Pulliam’s career that he’s finished second in the quest for the grandfather clock, a statistic that had the Semora, N.C., veteran shaking his head.

“It’s my fifth time finishing second here, and man … I’ve won it twice, but I think I’m like the king of seconds here,” Pulliam noted. “So anyhow, one spot short again.”

Asked if securing the Triple Crown took some of the sting out of yet another runner-up finish at Martinsville, Pulliam chuckled quietly before offering a small nod in response.

“It does help,” Pulliam told SPEED SPORT. “I tried to take the high road with that deal with Peyton. I got spun a couple times, and I had the opportunity to wreck him tonight, but I just told the guys that I wasn’t gonna race him like that. I wanted to race hard and race for positions, and I think that you get rewarded when you do good stuff like that. We won the thing by one position and I can go to sleep at night when I get home. He ran me clean tonight, too. It was just really cool to win it.

“I’ve won it before, and it’s a neat deal to be a repeat champion of that series, but this weekend was all about that grandfather clock and it was tough to lose it being one spot away tonight.”