Draft:Buck Simmons

Charles Leroy "Buck" Simmons (July 31, 1946 – August 12, 2012) was an American professional dirt track racing and stock car racing driver. He won over one thousand feature events across Dirt Super Late Models and Asphalt Super Late Models reaching 1,012 feature wins by the end of his career in 2005.

Since Buck's death in 2012 a race has been held annually in his honor known as the Buck Simmons Memorial, the first race was held at Toccoa Raceway in 2012 and won by Casey Roberts then went to Lavonia Speedway in 2014 once Lavonia had reopened, it was won once again by Casey Roberts. The race was not run from 2015 to 2018 but returned in 2019 and it was won by Zack Mitchell.

1950s-1970s
Simmons started his racing career at the age of 12, in 1958, driving a No. 41 jalopy-style car and later progressed into Dirt Late Models around the 1960s. At some point in the late-1960s and early 1970s he strung together Dirt Late Model wins in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, against Cale Yarborough and Donnie Allison, and after that, in Hartsville, South Carolina, scoring a win over Dale Earnhardt. Later in the 1970s he progressed to Super Late Models on both dirt and asphalt, scoring several crown jewel wins, such as the Alabama 200 in 1975 and the Rattler 250 (then Rattler 100) in 1976. He also ran well in other Crown Jewel events; in 1977 he scored a second-place finish in the Snowball Derby.

1980s
Simmons kicked off the 1980s by winning the Super Bowl of Dirt and the Georgia 100 at Lavonia Speedway, one of his home tracks. 1981 was one of the best seasons of his career, winning the NDRA championship and accumulating the most wins of any driver in NDRA history, with 13 in that season alone. In 1985, 1986, and 1987, he won the Florida Governor's Cup in the Pro Late Model division, as well as in 1985 winning the Stroh's Invitational at Smoky Mountain Speedway.

1990s-2000s
In the 1990s Simmons scored one more crown jewel win, in the Hillbilly 100 at Pennsboro Speedway in 1990, and then quietly stopped racing full-time. He raced until 2005, when he scored his last win, putting him at 1,012 wins in his career.

Late Model Sportsman Series
Simmons made two starts in the NASCAR Late Model Sportsman Series in 1977.

1979
Simmons made his NASCAR Winston Cup Series debut in the 1979 Dixie 500 at Atlanta Raceway, in the No. 12 for Kennie Childers, where he finished 14th, ahead of Richard Childress and James Hylton. He made one more start that season, in the combination race with the West Series at Ontario, and finished 29th after a transmission failure on lap 123 with 77 laps to go.

1980
Simmons returned in 1980 to the Cup Series, in the No. 12 for Kennie Childers. He started his season by attempting that year's Daytona 500, although he would ultimately DNQ after wrecking out in the first qualifying race on lap 25. He attempted six more races, making all of them, but was plagued by mechanical problems all year and finished only his last two races. His best finish of the year was a 16th at Martinsville Speedway. He never attempted another NASCAR race after 1980.

1979
In 1979 Simmons ran two NASCAR Winston West Series races in the combination races with the NASCAR Winston Cup Series, at one of which he scored a pole for the last race of the season, at Phoenix International Raceway.

Personal life
Simmons had 4 children, he also has a grandson Paris Simmons, who currently competes in Dirt Late Models and won the 602 Crate Dirt Late Model portion of the Buck Simmons Memorial in 2020 as well as the track championship for 602's at Lavonia in 2022.

NASCAR
(key) ( Bold – Pole position awarded by qualifying time. Italics – Pole position earned by points standings or practice time. * – Most laps led. )