A historic moment: North Brunswick High School student Whitney Meggs captures the first female Charger Division win on August 2, 2020.
CONTRIBUTED PHOTO
I
magine driving in just your sixth Charger Division car race. Now imagine you are a 16-year-old girl racing against men of all ages. And on a track in Myrtle Beach where some of the all-time greats have competed, including Dale Earnhardt Sr. and Jr., Jeff Gordon, Mark Martin, Kevin Harvick, Ned Jarrett, Elliot Sadler and many others. Imagine you have the fastest qualifying time and start the race on the pole. And then in an exciting finish, you cross the finish line first to get the checkered flag!
Sounds hard to believe, doesn’t it? But Whitney Meggs of Riegelwood actually did it. The junior at North Brunswick High School became the first female to ever win a Charger Division race at the Myrtle Beach Speedway on August 2, 2020. After starting on the pole, Meggs dropped back to second place for most of the race. She then made a daring pass with only two laps to go to claim her first place trophy and a place in victory lane. When I ask Meggs to describe
72
North Brunswick Magazine
how that moment felt, she says, “It felt like everything we had worked for all year had finally paid off!” It turns out that for Meggs the race was a once-in-a-lifetime experience, at least in this location — shortly thereafter the Myrtle Beach Speedway closed permanently. “I am proud to say that I am part of the history of a track with so much history behind it,” she says. Growing up in Riegelwood with her parents, Chris and Gina Meggs, Meggs was always around racing as her father and
grandfather, Bobby Meggs, raced go karts. Meggs had other hobbies before she even thought of racing. She was destined to become an outdoorswoman. The family always had horses, and she began riding horseback when she was 4. Then she got hooked on fishing as her father took her with him on their fishing boat. At 6 years old, she discovered something she really loved — hunting. “I remember the thrill of going out with my dad and grandpa, hunting either for deer or for