HICKORY, N.C. — Prior to Saturday night, Coleman Pressley had not raced in seven years.

If rust was a factor, Pressley didn’t show it at Hickory Motor Speedway.

With his best friend and reigning NASCAR Cup Series champion Joey Logano calling the race from the spotter stand, Pressley won the 25th anniversary edition of Hickory’s Fall Brawl in his return to late model stock car racing.

“I don’t even know how to do restarts anymore or any of that stuff,” an elated Pressley said after climbing from his race car in Victory Lane. “It’s pretty freaking cool.”

Pressley, who works as Logano’s spotter at Team Penske in the NASCAR Cup Series, is just the second driver in Fall Brawl history to win the race more than once. The other is NASCAR Xfinity Series driver Josh Berry, who has won the Fall Brawl four times.

“It’s so cool to see how good Coleman is,” Logano said as he watched the Victory Lane celebration. “I know he is a great spotter, but how much he’s watched what we do and the studying what we do together and how it’s transformed him into a better driver even though he hasn’t driven in seven years.

“It’s pretty cool.”

While he hadn’t driven a race car in seven years, Pressley did not forgot how to race at Hickory. He spent several years racing at the NASCAR-sanctioned, 0.363-mile oval during his youth, and knew that if he was going to drive a race car again, it was going to happen at Hickory.

That opportunity arrived when Hickory officials opted to postpone the Fall Brawl from its traditional October date to Saturday night. Pressley said he was standing on the spotter stand at Talladega Superspeedway when he saw the news on Twitter.

He instantly knew he wanted to compete.

“If there is a place I feel like I can get comfortable quick, it’s Hickory,” said Pressley, who won the Fall Brawl in 2009. “It made sense. Can’t say I had the bug to be a professional race car driver again. More than anything, I just wanted my kids to see me drive a race car one time, and I figured Hickory was the right place to do it.”

Pressley had his work cut out for him during Saturday’s 200-lap late model stock car main event. He qualified deep in the 23-car field in a car prepared by Byrd Brothers Racing, but he spent the first portion of the race cruising and saving his tires.

It was during the second half when Pressley found his groove, and it wasn’t long before he was racing inside the top five.

However, as the laps clicked away, it appeared the battle for the win was going to be between polesitter Doug Barnes Jr. and Connor Hall.

Things took a drastic turn when Barnes and Hall made contact while battling for the lead. Both cars were severely damaged and fell out of contention, a development that elevated Pressley to second behind new leader Charlie Watson

Pressley spent nearly 20 laps chasing Watson, but with five laps to go, he made the pass for lead. A caution just as the field took the white flag forced a green-white-checkered restart, but Pressley held on to win.

The victory put a bow on an incredible week for Pressley and Logano. One week prior, Pressley helped guide Logano to the NASCAR Cup Series championship with a victory at Phoenix Raceway. Saturday at Hickory, Logano returned the favor.

“Coleman and I have been best friends for a long, long time,” Logano said. “To see him jump back in and start 16th and just kind of chill out and save his tires and methodically pass a couple here and there and then run down the six (Watson) and pass him clean and dealt with the pressure afterwards during the green-white-checkered … it was pretty awesome.”

Amidst the jubilation in Victory Lane, Pressley scooped his children up and gave each of them a bear hug. For him, Saturday wasn’t about winning a race; it was about giving his children a memory that will last a lifetime. He said as much before the event.

“The best thing would be if I could win a race and get a picture with them,” Pressley said a few hours before the green flag waved Saturday. “That would be a story told, and I could just retire on the spot and not have to do it anymore. It’s going to be special no matter what.”

Mission accomplished.

Rodney Childers will always love late model stock car racing.

The discipline helped prepare Childers for life in the NASCAR Cup Series, where he captured the 2014 NASCAR Cup Series championship as crew chief for Kevin Harvick in addition to 40 victories at NASCAR’s top level.

That’s why he’ll always remember his victory in the inaugural running of the Fall Brawl at North Carolina’s Hickory Motor Speedway, an event that celebrates its 25th anniversary Saturday.

RELATED: Watch the Fall Brawl from Hickory live on FloRacing

In 1998, Childers was one of many young late model stock car competitors who were pursing their dreams of racing in the Cup Series. He spent his Friday nights racing at Tri-County Speedway in Hudson, North Carolina, where he quickly became a dominant force.

“That particular season was my first year running late model stocks full-time. My home track was actually Tri-County up the road running on Friday nights,” Childers said. “The thing I remember most about the Fall Brawl is Shane Huffman had won a ton of races at Hickory that year. I don’t remember how many it was, but it was in the teens. I think I had won 10 or 11 at Tri-County.

“One of his guys came to Tri-County one Friday night, it was like the last race of the year, and was running his mouth saying that I was scared to come to Hickory because I knew I would get beat.”

Like any good racer, Childers didn’t back down from the challenge. He spent the few weeks prior to the inaugural Fall Brawl in 1998 rebuilding his race car to make sure everything was perfect before he went to Hickory to challenge Huffman’s dominance.

“I did everything I could do to it to make it better,” Childers said.

When race weekend came along, Childers was ready. He was fast in practice and qualified third for the main event while Huffman qualified on the pole.

The early portion of the race saw Huffman in control, with Childers following in his tire tracks. It wasn’t long before Childers began to realize Huffman’s car wasn’t handling nearly as well as his own.

“We followed Shane for a long time, and about every lap his right-rear tire would smoke just a little bit off Turn 4,” Childers said. “My spotter kept saying, ‘I know you see it. His right-rear is smoking.’ I knew at that point that I had him, because I was just riding and could still keep up with him.”

Childers passed Huffman on a restart and led the remainder of the race, becoming the first winner of the Fall Brawl in the process. It’s a moment he still cherishes.

“I learned a ton that day,” Childers said. “It was a cool race, it was a lot of laps, it was something that a lot of us hadn’t done before in a late model. Obviously winning $10,000 was a huge deal back then. It was a big day, for sure.”

In the years since Childers won the first Fall Brawl, many other recognizable names have added themselves to the winner list. They include 48-time NASCAR Cup Series race winner Denny Hamlin, 2021 NASCAR Camping World Truck Series champion Ben Rhodes and 2020 NASCAR Advance Auto Parts Weekly Series national champion and current NASCAR Xfinity Series competitor Josh Berry, among others.

“It’s a hard race track. It’s hard to win at, and it’s a race that if people are really good, they want to go race it,” Childers said. “I think that’s why that list kind of stands out. You’ve had a lot of good people that want to go race and end up winning it.”

RELATED: Everything to know about the Fall Brawl at Hickory

The Fall Brawl is one of several late-season major events for late model stock car competitors in the Southeast. It serves almost as a proving ground for many rising stars hoping to follow the footsteps of Childers, Hamlin and Dale Earnhardt Jr., all of whom got their starts racing late model stock cars at tracks across the Southeast.

Childers, who is currently building a late model stock car for Harvick that the two hope to debut sometime next year, believes it’s important to support grassroots racing as a whole.

Without that level of the sport, Childers said, many current NASCAR stars would never have made it to where they are today.

“There are so many good racers out there that never get an opportunity,” Childers said. “They don’t get a chance. With me coming from late model stocks and Dale coming from late model stocks and Denny coming from late model stocks, it’s a huge deal for us. If it wasn’t for that, none of us ever would have made it.

“I want to see it succeed, and I want to see short tracks succeed.”