LOUDON, N.H. -- The American-Canadian Tour went big in 2009 with its inaugural ACT Invitational at New Hampshire Motor Speedway. In 2010, it'll go even bigger.
ACT announced on Friday that the second annual ACT Invitational will see an increase in its starting field, race distance, and purse on September 18.
The field will be increased from 36 starters in 2009 to 43 this year. Ten laps will be added, bringing the distance to 60 laps around the 1.058-mile speedway, and the prize purse has been increased throughout the field, from just over $65,000 to more than $73,000. The 2010 ACT Invitational winner will receive a minimum of $4,000; inaugural winner Eddie MacDonald won $3,500.
The race distance was increased to offer race teams the choice to make a pit stop. A mandatory caution period will take place between laps 28 and 38, and teams will be allowed -- but not required -- to change tires and make adjustments.
"This format really sounds like a lot of fun," said Milton driver Brent Dragon in an ACT press release. "I think it will certainly add some strategy to the race and make for some tough decisions about whether to pit or not."
ACT also anounced that over 60 teams will be invited to test and "audition" for a starting spot in the Invitational in August; 2009 "At Large" invitees Nick Sweet and Brandon Watson both finished on the podium.
Like 2009, all 14 ACT Late Model Tour events and all 11 Serie ACT-Castrol Edge events will be Invitational qualifying races that award the winner an automatic starting berth in the race. Also like 2009, four special events will award starting berths: the Mekkelsen RV Memorial Day Classic (May 30) and CARQUEST Vermont Governor's Cup 100 (June 24) at Barre's Thunder Road Int'l Speedbowl, the TD Bank 250 at Maine's Oxford Plains Speedway on July 18, and the third annual Coors Light 200 Showdown at Autodrome Chaudiere in Quebec on August 28.
In addition, the 2010 track champions and/or point leaders at Thunder Road, Oxford Plains, Lee USA (N.H.) Speedway, Twin State (N.H.) Speedway, White Mountain (N.H.) Motorsports Park, Seekonk (Mass.) Speedway, Waterford (Conn.) Speedbowl, Capital City (Ont.) Speedway, and Kawartha (Ont.) Speedway. Each point leader or champion will receive a $400 bonus for competing at NHMS, and a $400 bonus will be paid for each qualifying race win.
"The great success we had with the inaugural ACT Invitational at New Hampshire Motor Speedway last year has given us the confidence to invite several more teams to make up the starting field for this year's race," said ACT president Tom Curley. "We will soon be announcing another great promotion for all the fans that attend weekly affiliate ACT tracks and all touring events during the upcoming season."
Showing posts with label Twin State Speedway. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Twin State Speedway. Show all posts
Friday, April 9, 2010
Centre For Speed Brings ACT Late Model Division to Maritimes in 2011
SHEDIAC, N.B. -- Nearly a year's worth of rumors and talks were confrimed Friday: the American-Canadian Tour Late Model division is headed to the Canadian Maritimes. The Centre For Speed -- a 3/8-mile oval in Shediac, New Brunswick near the city of Moncton -- will introduce the division into weekly competition in 2011.
"The time is right for our race facility and race teams to join forces with what has become the most successful form of weekly and touring racing in the northeastern United States and the provinces of Quebec and Ontario," said Centre For Speed general manager Tim Wile. "We are happy and excited to be the first organization in the Maritimes to introduce this very successful type of Late Model racing to our region."
The Centre For Speed will become the 11th weekly track to utilize some or all of the ACT Late Model rulebook, joining Barre's Thunder Road Int'l Speedbowl, New Hampshire's White Mountain Motorsports Park, Twin State Speedway, Lee USA Speedway, and -- new in 2010 -- Canaan Fair Speedway, Oxford Plains Speedway in Maine, Waterford Speedbowl in Connecticut, Seekonk Speedway in Massachusetts, and Ontario's Kawartha Speedway and Capital City Speedway. The ACT Late Model Tour and Serie ACT-Castrol also use the rulebook in the U.S. and Canada.
"We designed the ACT Late Model division with a high priority on weekly racing as a base to our business model," said ACT president Tom Curley. "The philosophy was, and continues to be, to provide a cost-efficient for race teams, tracks, promoters, and fans. We now have over 400 teams who use the ACT rules and we continue to enjoy expansion. We are eager to work with the Centre For Speed on this expansion project."
"The time is right for our race facility and race teams to join forces with what has become the most successful form of weekly and touring racing in the northeastern United States and the provinces of Quebec and Ontario," said Centre For Speed general manager Tim Wile. "We are happy and excited to be the first organization in the Maritimes to introduce this very successful type of Late Model racing to our region."
The Centre For Speed will become the 11th weekly track to utilize some or all of the ACT Late Model rulebook, joining Barre's Thunder Road Int'l Speedbowl, New Hampshire's White Mountain Motorsports Park, Twin State Speedway, Lee USA Speedway, and -- new in 2010 -- Canaan Fair Speedway, Oxford Plains Speedway in Maine, Waterford Speedbowl in Connecticut, Seekonk Speedway in Massachusetts, and Ontario's Kawartha Speedway and Capital City Speedway. The ACT Late Model Tour and Serie ACT-Castrol also use the rulebook in the U.S. and Canada.
"We designed the ACT Late Model division with a high priority on weekly racing as a base to our business model," said ACT president Tom Curley. "The philosophy was, and continues to be, to provide a cost-efficient for race teams, tracks, promoters, and fans. We now have over 400 teams who use the ACT rules and we continue to enjoy expansion. We are eager to work with the Centre For Speed on this expansion project."
Sunday, March 28, 2010
Modified Racing Series Welcomes a New Jarvis
Budweiser Blastoff 100 coverage presented by "Fifty Years of Excitement"
WATERFORD, Conn. -- The Modified Racing Series has seen plenty of stars in its six-year tenure, among them the Jarvis brothers of Ascutney. Dwight was the 2006 champion of the series, and is among the most successful Vermonters to ever wheel a stock car with another 18 track championships in his hip pocket. His brother, Peter, was the 2007 MRS Rookie of the Year, and has won races from New England to Florida.
But as the Jarvis brothers enter the twilight of their careers, the next generation is ready to step in. At just 18 years old, Joey Jarvis, Peter's son, enters his first full season in the Modified Racing Series.
"We just want to make it in to all the races," Joey says. But don't let him fool you into thinking he's not comfortable behind the wheel. In his first season of Modified racing at Twin State Speedway in Claremont, N.H., last year, he lost the championship by just a single point. The year before that, he took podium finishes in all 18 of his starts to stroll to the track's Strictly Stock championship. Before that, he dominated youth divisions at Twin State and Canaan.
And the car he's driving this year? It's the Wally Albro-owned #9NH formerly driven by -- who else? -- Peter Jarvis.
"It's a good car, and it's getting better and better," said Joey, a very accomplished saxophonist and guitarist. "I think we should be good this season, but I just want to learn." In his three starts with the Modified Racing Series last season, Jarvis showed that the learning curve may be a sort one; he registered a seventh-place finish at Lee USA Speedway to end the year, and was impressive to begin 2010 at Waterford Speedbowl on Sunday.
While running in sixth place on lap 76 and catching the leaders, Jarvis ran out of fuel under caution. He lost one lap while in the pits, but rallied to finish 11th.
"I think we proved the underdogs are here," he said after the race. "We didn't get much to show for how we ran, but if we hadn't run out of gas I think we would have been right up there with the leaders."
With the impressions he's made already, and the pedigree his racing family gave him, Joey Jarvis likely won't have long before he is the leader.
WATERFORD, Conn. -- The Modified Racing Series has seen plenty of stars in its six-year tenure, among them the Jarvis brothers of Ascutney. Dwight was the 2006 champion of the series, and is among the most successful Vermonters to ever wheel a stock car with another 18 track championships in his hip pocket. His brother, Peter, was the 2007 MRS Rookie of the Year, and has won races from New England to Florida.
But as the Jarvis brothers enter the twilight of their careers, the next generation is ready to step in. At just 18 years old, Joey Jarvis, Peter's son, enters his first full season in the Modified Racing Series.
"We just want to make it in to all the races," Joey says. But don't let him fool you into thinking he's not comfortable behind the wheel. In his first season of Modified racing at Twin State Speedway in Claremont, N.H., last year, he lost the championship by just a single point. The year before that, he took podium finishes in all 18 of his starts to stroll to the track's Strictly Stock championship. Before that, he dominated youth divisions at Twin State and Canaan.
And the car he's driving this year? It's the Wally Albro-owned #9NH formerly driven by -- who else? -- Peter Jarvis.
"It's a good car, and it's getting better and better," said Joey, a very accomplished saxophonist and guitarist. "I think we should be good this season, but I just want to learn." In his three starts with the Modified Racing Series last season, Jarvis showed that the learning curve may be a sort one; he registered a seventh-place finish at Lee USA Speedway to end the year, and was impressive to begin 2010 at Waterford Speedbowl on Sunday.
While running in sixth place on lap 76 and catching the leaders, Jarvis ran out of fuel under caution. He lost one lap while in the pits, but rallied to finish 11th.
"I think we proved the underdogs are here," he said after the race. "We didn't get much to show for how we ran, but if we hadn't run out of gas I think we would have been right up there with the leaders."
With the impressions he's made already, and the pedigree his racing family gave him, Joey Jarvis likely won't have long before he is the leader.
Tuesday, January 12, 2010
The Juice: Madhouse, Schmadhouse
-by Justin St. Louis
Seriously. Seriously? Do you expect me to just accept "Madhouse"? No sir.
Fantastic on-track and in-car footage, great behind-the-scenes profiles, and intense shots of passionate fans in the grandstands cheering on their drivers.
The racing, however, is garbage.
I've been told for years by a bunch of folks that Bowman-Gray Stadium down in Winston-Salem, N.C. is as crazy as it looked in the series premiere of The History Channel's newest television show. But that's ONE track. There are a thousand others in the country that are nothing like that, and hopefully never will be. For whatever its reasons, the team of officials at Bowman-Gray seem to think that that style of racing -- which is shown on TV to be nothing more than seeing how hard one guy can drive into another and wreck him, and then punch his lights out after the race -- works.
But let's see Burt Myers and Junior Miller, bitter rivals and arguably the two most intriguing characters on "Madhouse", come to any track up here in the northeast, or even any other track
in the south, and try to get away with wailing on each other over and over and over and over and over. And over. The clip of Myers ramming Miller intentionally in 2008 -- then backing up and doing it again twice more, with an official standing just a couple of feet from the cars -- is great for entertaining a bunch of idiots. But it is absolutely deplorable antics for a semi-professional sporting event. What's even more embarrassing is that the country's most powerful auto racing organization -- NASCAR, Bowman-Gray Stadium's governing body -- not only turns a blind eye to it, but allows it to be the main draw for a freaking television show!
Does anyone remember in 2006, when Robin Blake put on a similar act at Twin State Speedway in Claremont, N.H. (which was a NASCAR-sanctioned track at the time) in 2006? Blake has been through two trials for assault with a deadly weapon as a result of the incident, and pending further litigation (which is supposedly continuing this month), Blake is facing up to seven years in prison. So, Bowman-Gray, am I missing something here? Or is it just you?
The show's five main characters -- multi-time champions Miller and Tim Brown, low-buck underdog Chris Fleming, and Myers and younger brother Jason Myers -- are all totally arrogant, and seem to have nothing but disdain for each other. Trash-talk is the rule, and fistfights seem to be the law. Bowman-Gray's officials -- whether intentional or not -- are seen as totally out of control of their drivers, and none worse than track manager Gray Garrison. The pre-season meeting shown between Garrison, Miller, and Burt Myers is laughable. And not in a "Seinfeld" kind of way.
The reality of the thing is this: I've got my DVR set to record every episode of "Madhouse" and I completely intend to watch the entire series. It's winter, and I want to see race cars on TV. But I'm not watching the show because of the racing itself. I'm a moron that gets duped into catchy, compelling, drama-laden shows, and "Madhouse" fits the bill. If you're a bloodlust, or a non-race fan that loves junk TV, then The History Channel has what you're looking for at 10:00pm every Sunday.
But know this: the short track fan in me cries a little every time I watch.
***
Looking through Alan Ward's photos of the Pre-Hangover 150 at Riverside Speedway, I counted at least three Cadillacs (almost 10% of the starting field), two Junkyard Warriors from Thunder Road including the championship car, more than a few "borrowed" road cones on cars, and a Christmas tree sticking through the roof of a race car.
Awesome.
***
According to the Champlain Valley Racing Association's website, the Tiger Sportsman division will now be its own seperate entity, and the former Limited division is now the Renegades, a la Airborne Speedway. It was previously announced that the Limiteds would be grandfathered in to the new Tiger Sportsman class. Also, the division will run only at Devil's Bowl Speedway in West Haven, and not at sister track Albany-Saratoga Speedway in Malta, N.Y.
This move may actually be a little troublesome. While the idea of keeping the Limited/Renegade division close to its roots is appealing and certainly not a bad move, there may have also been a good case for having the grandfather clause in place, simply in terms of car counts. My fear is that the DBS Tigers won't have the strength in numbers initially, and that the division will end up like the one at Canaan Fair Speedway in 2005 -- with around five or six cars a night, and cancelled after one season.
I hope for the sake of the track and of the sport that teams from Thunder Road and Airborne will support the Devil's Bowl Tigers enough until a solid home base is built up for the division that has been so successful for Tom Curley and Mike Perrotte. I believe White Mountain Motorsports Park will have less trouble building its Tiger spinoff "Super Sportsman" division than Devil's Bowl, due to the fact that the Super Street class it replaces is no longer running (and therefore has a dozen or so teams looking for something to do with their race cars), and the fact that Thunder Road teams have raced at White Mountain before and seem to enjoy the place. Devil's Bowl -- as of this writing -- has no official Thunder Road-, Airborne-, or ACT-sanctioned Tiger Sportsman events. Hopefully teams will be enticed to try something new and will travel to Rutland County without being required to do so.
Asking Devil's Bowl drivers to convert from dirt to asphalt is a big enough challenge. A slow conversion from the old Limiteds to the Tigers might have worked. Keeping the Limiteds as they are will most likely work. But keeping the existing division and creating a totally new division? There exists the potential for some Limited/Renegade teams to convert their cars to Tigers, which in turn lowers the car count for the Renegades and negatively affects that division. There exists the potential for absolutely nobody to support the new Tigers. And, of course, there exists the potential for nobody to support Devil's Bowl at all.
Only time will tell. Keep your fingers crossed and your chins up. We need this to work.
***
The USA/Canada games in the recent IIHF World Junior Championship tournament were without question two of the very best hockey games I've ever seen. The NHL is going to see some talented kids in the next couple of years. Wow.
And for what it's worth, the Habs are above .500 for the moment. We'll see how things look after the All-Star break.
***
Here are some odds and ends we've picked up recently:
-- NASCAR Sprint Cup Series Rookie of the Year Joey Logano will return to the NASCAR Toyota All-Star Showdown at Toyota Speedway at Irwindale (Calif.) on Jan. 29-30, driving for Fadden Racing and car owner Mike Olsen, based out of tiny North Haverhill, N.H. Logano will carry the sponsorship of The Home Depot, his Sprint Cup sponsor. The Toyota All-Star Showdown is regarded as the "Daytona 500" of NASCAR's Camping World Series East and West divisions.
Olsen, a former Thunder Road standout and grandson of the late multi-time track champion Stub Fadden, won the CWSE championship in 2001 and 2006 as a driver. Logano won the Showdown in 2007, and was the apparent winner last year until he was penalized for rough riding with Peyton Sellers on the final lap.
-- Williamstown youngster Jimmy Hebert has his Tiger Sportsman cars for sale, and hopes to make a jump to the ACT Late Model division for 2010. Hebert, 18, became Thunder Road's youngest Tiger Sportsman champion last year.
-- Ben Rowe teaming up with Scott Mulkern can only mean trouble for the PASS North Series. Rowe, a four-time champion of the series, is obviously quite talented, and Mulkern has deep pockets and likes to spend money on racing. The team has four cars at their disposal, with a pair of Chevy engines and another pair of Dodges. And for the record, Mulkern knows what it takes to win, having won a PASS North race and a pair of features on the former PASS Outlaw tour himself. Watch out, Johnny Clark.
-- Eric and Tucker Williams each have new race cars for 2010, but aren't sure if they'll be able to race them. Eric, a two-time ACT Late Model Tour winner last season, was offered "a deal he couldn't refuse" according to Tucker, and is having a new Howe Racing Enterprises house car being built at Howe headquarters in Beaverton, Mich. Tucker, the Thunder Road Street Stock Rookie of the Year, has acquired a Tiger Sportsman car formerly driven to a bunch of wins on either side of Lake Champlain by Robin Wood and Joey Becker. How often the cars race depends on sponsorship funding, Tucker says.
-- We're headed to the ACT/Thunder Road Banquet of Champions on Saturday to hob-knob and bench-race. Keep your eyes peeled for news and things coming soon after.
(PHOTOS: 1. Burt Myers (#1) and Junior Miller (#69) sure do put on a show at Bowman-Gray. A bad one. 2. Ho! Ho! Ho! It's an Enduro! Photo 1 by Eric Hylton; Photo 2 by Alan Ward)
Seriously. Seriously? Do you expect me to just accept "Madhouse"? No sir.
Fantastic on-track and in-car footage, great behind-the-scenes profiles, and intense shots of passionate fans in the grandstands cheering on their drivers.
The racing, however, is garbage.
I've been told for years by a bunch of folks that Bowman-Gray Stadium down in Winston-Salem, N.C. is as crazy as it looked in the series premiere of The History Channel's newest television show. But that's ONE track. There are a thousand others in the country that are nothing like that, and hopefully never will be. For whatever its reasons, the team of officials at Bowman-Gray seem to think that that style of racing -- which is shown on TV to be nothing more than seeing how hard one guy can drive into another and wreck him, and then punch his lights out after the race -- works.
But let's see Burt Myers and Junior Miller, bitter rivals and arguably the two most intriguing characters on "Madhouse", come to any track up here in the northeast, or even any other track
in the south, and try to get away with wailing on each other over and over and over and over and over. And over. The clip of Myers ramming Miller intentionally in 2008 -- then backing up and doing it again twice more, with an official standing just a couple of feet from the cars -- is great for entertaining a bunch of idiots. But it is absolutely deplorable antics for a semi-professional sporting event. What's even more embarrassing is that the country's most powerful auto racing organization -- NASCAR, Bowman-Gray Stadium's governing body -- not only turns a blind eye to it, but allows it to be the main draw for a freaking television show!Does anyone remember in 2006, when Robin Blake put on a similar act at Twin State Speedway in Claremont, N.H. (which was a NASCAR-sanctioned track at the time) in 2006? Blake has been through two trials for assault with a deadly weapon as a result of the incident, and pending further litigation (which is supposedly continuing this month), Blake is facing up to seven years in prison. So, Bowman-Gray, am I missing something here? Or is it just you?
The show's five main characters -- multi-time champions Miller and Tim Brown, low-buck underdog Chris Fleming, and Myers and younger brother Jason Myers -- are all totally arrogant, and seem to have nothing but disdain for each other. Trash-talk is the rule, and fistfights seem to be the law. Bowman-Gray's officials -- whether intentional or not -- are seen as totally out of control of their drivers, and none worse than track manager Gray Garrison. The pre-season meeting shown between Garrison, Miller, and Burt Myers is laughable. And not in a "Seinfeld" kind of way.
The reality of the thing is this: I've got my DVR set to record every episode of "Madhouse" and I completely intend to watch the entire series. It's winter, and I want to see race cars on TV. But I'm not watching the show because of the racing itself. I'm a moron that gets duped into catchy, compelling, drama-laden shows, and "Madhouse" fits the bill. If you're a bloodlust, or a non-race fan that loves junk TV, then The History Channel has what you're looking for at 10:00pm every Sunday.
But know this: the short track fan in me cries a little every time I watch.
***
Looking through Alan Ward's photos of the Pre-Hangover 150 at Riverside Speedway, I counted at least three Cadillacs (almost 10% of the starting field), two Junkyard Warriors from Thunder Road including the championship car, more than a few "borrowed" road cones on cars, and a Christmas tree sticking through the roof of a race car.Awesome.
***
According to the Champlain Valley Racing Association's website, the Tiger Sportsman division will now be its own seperate entity, and the former Limited division is now the Renegades, a la Airborne Speedway. It was previously announced that the Limiteds would be grandfathered in to the new Tiger Sportsman class. Also, the division will run only at Devil's Bowl Speedway in West Haven, and not at sister track Albany-Saratoga Speedway in Malta, N.Y.
This move may actually be a little troublesome. While the idea of keeping the Limited/Renegade division close to its roots is appealing and certainly not a bad move, there may have also been a good case for having the grandfather clause in place, simply in terms of car counts. My fear is that the DBS Tigers won't have the strength in numbers initially, and that the division will end up like the one at Canaan Fair Speedway in 2005 -- with around five or six cars a night, and cancelled after one season.
I hope for the sake of the track and of the sport that teams from Thunder Road and Airborne will support the Devil's Bowl Tigers enough until a solid home base is built up for the division that has been so successful for Tom Curley and Mike Perrotte. I believe White Mountain Motorsports Park will have less trouble building its Tiger spinoff "Super Sportsman" division than Devil's Bowl, due to the fact that the Super Street class it replaces is no longer running (and therefore has a dozen or so teams looking for something to do with their race cars), and the fact that Thunder Road teams have raced at White Mountain before and seem to enjoy the place. Devil's Bowl -- as of this writing -- has no official Thunder Road-, Airborne-, or ACT-sanctioned Tiger Sportsman events. Hopefully teams will be enticed to try something new and will travel to Rutland County without being required to do so.
Asking Devil's Bowl drivers to convert from dirt to asphalt is a big enough challenge. A slow conversion from the old Limiteds to the Tigers might have worked. Keeping the Limiteds as they are will most likely work. But keeping the existing division and creating a totally new division? There exists the potential for some Limited/Renegade teams to convert their cars to Tigers, which in turn lowers the car count for the Renegades and negatively affects that division. There exists the potential for absolutely nobody to support the new Tigers. And, of course, there exists the potential for nobody to support Devil's Bowl at all.
Only time will tell. Keep your fingers crossed and your chins up. We need this to work.
***
The USA/Canada games in the recent IIHF World Junior Championship tournament were without question two of the very best hockey games I've ever seen. The NHL is going to see some talented kids in the next couple of years. Wow.
And for what it's worth, the Habs are above .500 for the moment. We'll see how things look after the All-Star break.
***
Here are some odds and ends we've picked up recently:
-- NASCAR Sprint Cup Series Rookie of the Year Joey Logano will return to the NASCAR Toyota All-Star Showdown at Toyota Speedway at Irwindale (Calif.) on Jan. 29-30, driving for Fadden Racing and car owner Mike Olsen, based out of tiny North Haverhill, N.H. Logano will carry the sponsorship of The Home Depot, his Sprint Cup sponsor. The Toyota All-Star Showdown is regarded as the "Daytona 500" of NASCAR's Camping World Series East and West divisions.
Olsen, a former Thunder Road standout and grandson of the late multi-time track champion Stub Fadden, won the CWSE championship in 2001 and 2006 as a driver. Logano won the Showdown in 2007, and was the apparent winner last year until he was penalized for rough riding with Peyton Sellers on the final lap.
-- Williamstown youngster Jimmy Hebert has his Tiger Sportsman cars for sale, and hopes to make a jump to the ACT Late Model division for 2010. Hebert, 18, became Thunder Road's youngest Tiger Sportsman champion last year.
-- Ben Rowe teaming up with Scott Mulkern can only mean trouble for the PASS North Series. Rowe, a four-time champion of the series, is obviously quite talented, and Mulkern has deep pockets and likes to spend money on racing. The team has four cars at their disposal, with a pair of Chevy engines and another pair of Dodges. And for the record, Mulkern knows what it takes to win, having won a PASS North race and a pair of features on the former PASS Outlaw tour himself. Watch out, Johnny Clark.
-- Eric and Tucker Williams each have new race cars for 2010, but aren't sure if they'll be able to race them. Eric, a two-time ACT Late Model Tour winner last season, was offered "a deal he couldn't refuse" according to Tucker, and is having a new Howe Racing Enterprises house car being built at Howe headquarters in Beaverton, Mich. Tucker, the Thunder Road Street Stock Rookie of the Year, has acquired a Tiger Sportsman car formerly driven to a bunch of wins on either side of Lake Champlain by Robin Wood and Joey Becker. How often the cars race depends on sponsorship funding, Tucker says.
-- We're headed to the ACT/Thunder Road Banquet of Champions on Saturday to hob-knob and bench-race. Keep your eyes peeled for news and things coming soon after.
(PHOTOS: 1. Burt Myers (#1) and Junior Miller (#69) sure do put on a show at Bowman-Gray. A bad one. 2. Ho! Ho! Ho! It's an Enduro! Photo 1 by Eric Hylton; Photo 2 by Alan Ward)
Friday, November 13, 2009
ACT Late Model Tour Releases Partial 2010 Schedule
Tour returns to Québec; Director Curley asks for earlier start times
WATERBURY -- The American-Canadian Tour released most of its 2010 Late Model Tour schedule earlier this week, with 13 confirmed dates at nine venues in New England, New York, and Québec. Two more dates are expected to be added this month, according to the series' official press release.
Tentatively, the ACT Late Model Tour will open its season for the third-straight year at Lee USA (N.H.) Speedway, on April 18. The series then travels to Malta, N.Y. on April 25 for its first-ever visit to Albany-Saratoga Speedway, which is currently undergoing a major transformation from a clay surface to asphalt.
Barre's Thunder Road Int'l Speedbowl will host three events, while Airborne Speedway in Plattsburgh, N.Y. and Oxford Plains (Me.) Speedway will each have a pair of races. Single events will also be held at White Mountain Motorsports Park in North Woodstock, N.H., Beech Ridge Motor Speedway in Scarborough, Me., Twin State Speedway in Claremont, N.H., and Riverside Speedway in Ste-Croix, Qué. Two dates have been reserved for non-championship events: the TD Bank 250 at Oxford Plains on July 18 and the third-annual "Showdown at Chaudière", an all-star race for the ACT Late Model Tour and Série ACT-Castrol, at Autodrome Chaudière in Vallée-Jonction, Qué. on August 28.
POINTS OF INTEREST
--No mention of a return date to New Hampshire Motor Speedway in Loudon, N.H. was made in the ACT press release, although it is widely believed that an announcement will be made in the near future. NHMS hosted the first-ever ACT Invitational, a 50-lap, non-points event, on Saturday, Sept. 19 during the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series' Sylvania 300 weekend. The spectator crowd, estimated by some near 40,000, was reported to be one of the track's most successful Saturday draws in its 20-year history.
--The 200-lap event at Riverside Speedway (formerly Circuit Ste-Croix) on August 14 marks the first championship-counting ACT Late Model Tour event in Québec since a race at Autodrome St-Eustache in July 2007. The "Can-Am Confrontation by the Seaway" at Riverside will also be a combination event for ACT's two touring series, and is the first race since the 2007 St-Eustache event that will award championship points for both the U.S.-based ACT Late Model Tour and the Canadian-based Série ACT-Castrol. Riverside's 5/8-mile layout is the largest that either series will compete on in 2010.
--ACT president Tom Curley has asked track promoters to be conscientious of traveling race teams and fans in the upcoming season. "For 2010 ACT feature events, we have requested that the features be started no later than 8:30pm," said Curley. "We continue to try and accommodate the fans and teams of ACT racing in our efforts to make the tours friendlier to compete in and to attend." Some events were negatively effected by late start times in 2009, including a 100-lap feature at Twin State Speedway in September that began just before 11:30pm.
--Big Bigelow of the Caledonian-Record (Vt.) is reporting that there will be no "Pick 10" championship format in 2010, and that all point-counting events on the schedule will count toward the ACT Late Model Tour championship.
--Two tracks that have hosted multiple ACT Late Model Tour events, Connecticut's Waterford Speedbowl and Kawartha Speedway in Ontario, have not yet been included in the 2010 ACT schedule. Kawartha has held one ACT event each year since 2007, while Waterford rejoined the schedule in 2008 and '09 after a four-year absence; Waterford recently staved off foreclosure for the second time. Both tracks operate with a weekly Late Model division under ACT-legal rulebooks.
--The 100-lap event at Albany-Saratoga will be the 200th championship-counting race for the ACT Late Model Tour, which began in 1992.
--Two major events at Thunder Road -- the Merchants Bank 150 and the Bond Auto Labor Day Classic 200 -- remain on the ACT Late Model Tour schedule. The third event, however, will not be the Mekkelsen RV Memorial Day Classic, as it was in 2009, but rather the Chittenden Bank Milk Bowl, which closes the ACT championship on October 2/3.
ACT LATE MODEL TOUR 2010 SCHEDULE (as of Nov. 9, 2009)
#-Day-Date-Track-Location-Laps
1. Sun., April 18 -- Lee USA Speedway, Lee, N.H. -- 150
2. Sun., April 25 -- Albany-Saratoga Speedway, Malta, N.Y. -- 100
3. Sun., May 2 -- Thunder Road Int'l Speedbowl, Barre -- 150
4. Sat., May 8 -- Airborne Speedway, Plattsburgh, N.Y. -- 100
5. Sun., May 16 -- Oxford Plains Speedway, Oxford, Me. -- 150
6. Sat., June 19 -- Oxford Plains Speedway, Oxford, Me. -- 150
7. Sat., June 26 -- White Mountain Motorsports Park, North Woodstock, N.H. -- 150
-- Sun., July 18 -- Oxford Plains Speedway, Oxford, Me. -- 250 (non-points)
8. Sat., July 24 -- Beech Ridge Motor Speedway, Scarborough (Portland), Me. -- 150
9. Fri., July 30 -- Twin State Speedway, Claremont, N.H. -- 100
10. Sat., Aug. 14 -- Riverside Speedway, Ste-Croix (Québec City), Qué. -- 200 (Tour/Castrol combo)
-- Sat., Aug. 28 -- Autodrome Chaudière, Vallée-Jonction, Qué. -- 200 (non-points)
11. Sun., Sept. 5 -- Thunder Road Int'l Speedbowl, Barre -- 200
12. Sun., Sept. 12 -- Airborne Speedway, Plattsburgh, N.Y. -- 300
13. Sat./Sun., Oct. 2/3 -- Thunder Road Int'l Speedbowl, Barre -- 150
WATERBURY -- The American-Canadian Tour released most of its 2010 Late Model Tour schedule earlier this week, with 13 confirmed dates at nine venues in New England, New York, and Québec. Two more dates are expected to be added this month, according to the series' official press release. Tentatively, the ACT Late Model Tour will open its season for the third-straight year at Lee USA (N.H.) Speedway, on April 18. The series then travels to Malta, N.Y. on April 25 for its first-ever visit to Albany-Saratoga Speedway, which is currently undergoing a major transformation from a clay surface to asphalt.
Barre's Thunder Road Int'l Speedbowl will host three events, while Airborne Speedway in Plattsburgh, N.Y. and Oxford Plains (Me.) Speedway will each have a pair of races. Single events will also be held at White Mountain Motorsports Park in North Woodstock, N.H., Beech Ridge Motor Speedway in Scarborough, Me., Twin State Speedway in Claremont, N.H., and Riverside Speedway in Ste-Croix, Qué. Two dates have been reserved for non-championship events: the TD Bank 250 at Oxford Plains on July 18 and the third-annual "Showdown at Chaudière", an all-star race for the ACT Late Model Tour and Série ACT-Castrol, at Autodrome Chaudière in Vallée-Jonction, Qué. on August 28.
POINTS OF INTEREST
--No mention of a return date to New Hampshire Motor Speedway in Loudon, N.H. was made in the ACT press release, although it is widely believed that an announcement will be made in the near future. NHMS hosted the first-ever ACT Invitational, a 50-lap, non-points event, on Saturday, Sept. 19 during the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series' Sylvania 300 weekend. The spectator crowd, estimated by some near 40,000, was reported to be one of the track's most successful Saturday draws in its 20-year history.
--The 200-lap event at Riverside Speedway (formerly Circuit Ste-Croix) on August 14 marks the first championship-counting ACT Late Model Tour event in Québec since a race at Autodrome St-Eustache in July 2007. The "Can-Am Confrontation by the Seaway" at Riverside will also be a combination event for ACT's two touring series, and is the first race since the 2007 St-Eustache event that will award championship points for both the U.S.-based ACT Late Model Tour and the Canadian-based Série ACT-Castrol. Riverside's 5/8-mile layout is the largest that either series will compete on in 2010.
--ACT president Tom Curley has asked track promoters to be conscientious of traveling race teams and fans in the upcoming season. "For 2010 ACT feature events, we have requested that the features be started no later than 8:30pm," said Curley. "We continue to try and accommodate the fans and teams of ACT racing in our efforts to make the tours friendlier to compete in and to attend." Some events were negatively effected by late start times in 2009, including a 100-lap feature at Twin State Speedway in September that began just before 11:30pm.
--Big Bigelow of the Caledonian-Record (Vt.) is reporting that there will be no "Pick 10" championship format in 2010, and that all point-counting events on the schedule will count toward the ACT Late Model Tour championship.
--Two tracks that have hosted multiple ACT Late Model Tour events, Connecticut's Waterford Speedbowl and Kawartha Speedway in Ontario, have not yet been included in the 2010 ACT schedule. Kawartha has held one ACT event each year since 2007, while Waterford rejoined the schedule in 2008 and '09 after a four-year absence; Waterford recently staved off foreclosure for the second time. Both tracks operate with a weekly Late Model division under ACT-legal rulebooks.
--The 100-lap event at Albany-Saratoga will be the 200th championship-counting race for the ACT Late Model Tour, which began in 1992.
--Two major events at Thunder Road -- the Merchants Bank 150 and the Bond Auto Labor Day Classic 200 -- remain on the ACT Late Model Tour schedule. The third event, however, will not be the Mekkelsen RV Memorial Day Classic, as it was in 2009, but rather the Chittenden Bank Milk Bowl, which closes the ACT championship on October 2/3.
ACT LATE MODEL TOUR 2010 SCHEDULE (as of Nov. 9, 2009)
#-Day-Date-Track-Location-Laps
1. Sun., April 18 -- Lee USA Speedway, Lee, N.H. -- 150
2. Sun., April 25 -- Albany-Saratoga Speedway, Malta, N.Y. -- 100
3. Sun., May 2 -- Thunder Road Int'l Speedbowl, Barre -- 150
4. Sat., May 8 -- Airborne Speedway, Plattsburgh, N.Y. -- 100
5. Sun., May 16 -- Oxford Plains Speedway, Oxford, Me. -- 150
6. Sat., June 19 -- Oxford Plains Speedway, Oxford, Me. -- 150
7. Sat., June 26 -- White Mountain Motorsports Park, North Woodstock, N.H. -- 150
-- Sun., July 18 -- Oxford Plains Speedway, Oxford, Me. -- 250 (non-points)
8. Sat., July 24 -- Beech Ridge Motor Speedway, Scarborough (Portland), Me. -- 150
9. Fri., July 30 -- Twin State Speedway, Claremont, N.H. -- 100
10. Sat., Aug. 14 -- Riverside Speedway, Ste-Croix (Québec City), Qué. -- 200 (Tour/Castrol combo)
-- Sat., Aug. 28 -- Autodrome Chaudière, Vallée-Jonction, Qué. -- 200 (non-points)
11. Sun., Sept. 5 -- Thunder Road Int'l Speedbowl, Barre -- 200
12. Sun., Sept. 12 -- Airborne Speedway, Plattsburgh, N.Y. -- 300
13. Sat./Sun., Oct. 2/3 -- Thunder Road Int'l Speedbowl, Barre -- 150
Wednesday, October 7, 2009
The Juice -- At What Point Did John Donahue Become a Star?
-by Justin St. Louis
Don't look now, but there's a new kid in town. Actually, there's nothing new about him at all, really, or kid-like. He's a hard worker with strong, dirty hands, hints of an old-time "ayuh" accent, and has been around this game for the better part of 20 years.
But all of a sudden, for the first time, John Donahue is a headline driver.
There's no telling the exact moment when he became one. Sunday, after winning the Milk Bowl? It might have been the crown jewel of his career, but it certainly wasn't his first win, or even his first important win. But in writing the post-race wrap-up of the Milk Bowl on Sunday and Monday, I found myself surprised, thinking something to the effect of, "Holy cow, Donahue's racked up quite the résumé. When did that happen?" In reality, it began a lot longer ago than I realized, maybe longer than anyone did.
A farmer by trade, the woodchuck-through-and-through Donahue rolled out of the rural Graniteville hills with a block-long Chevrolet for the "Killer B" class at Barre's Thunder Road in 1994. He recalled thinking that his car -- a larger, heavier, less powerful version of the era's Flying Tigers -- was "too slow" to have any fun in, so he moved up to the Tigers to race against his older brother, Bill, who had followed in their father Paul's footsteps as a multi-time winner and championship contender in the division.
And it turned out that "Irish John" was a chip off the ol' block, finishing third in points as a rookie. During the five seasons that followed, he would earn a pair of Thunder Road championships, a Triple Crown title at New Hampshire's Riverside Speedway, a "Tiger 50 Series" title, well over two dozen feature races at Thunder Road, Riverside, and Airborne Speedway in New York, and three Strictly Stock features at Oxford Plains Speedway in Maine.
In 2002, Donahue was hired to drive an American-Canadian Tour Late Model for Lee Delphia, winning top rookie honors at Thunder Road and finishing second on the Tour to the well-financed Ryan Moore, while also taking a Limited Sportsman win at Oxford. But a split from Delphia as the season ended left Donahue without a full-time ride for 2003, and the funding for his Maine-based team dried up as well. Donahue was on the outside looking in before another car owner, Mike Thompson, put Donahue in his Late Model for 2004.
Although comparatively underfunded, the team notched a win in the 2005 regular season finale at Thunder Road, a second win in mid-2006, and was constantly a top-five threat. A few on-track tussles brought some fanfare, including a couple involving Eric Williams, one of Thunder Road's all-time great villains. Add to that the fact that T-Road impresario Ken Squier loved to say the words "Irish John Donahue" (as he still does), and the name was becoming a water cooler topic in the offices of Central Vermont each Friday morning after the races, but still rarely appeared in print, radio, or television.
A windfall ride from new car owner Kendall Roberts -- complete with flashy, high-profile sponsorship from the National Guard, a pair of brand new cars with technical support from chassis builder Dale Shaw, and the occasional performance boost in crew chief Jeff Laquerre, at least in the first season -- appeared at Donahue's door in 2007, and, as far as my best guess goes, anyway, that's probably when things really began to click. Donahue knocked off a 100-lap open win at Oxford in June and took his first ACT victory in Thunder Road's 200-lap Labor Day Classic in September. The next season, he won back-to-back races at Thunder Road, on Mother's Day and in the ACT race on Memorial Day, then finished in the top-five in points with both the weekly Thunder Road chase and the ACT Late Model Tour. But still, he was never much for the headlines.
Now, this year, Donahue scored a dominating ACT win at White Mountain Motorsports Park, has three ACT runner-up finishes, pulled down a third-place effort in the Oxford 250 after leading some laps, took fifth in the ACT Invitational at New Hampshire Motor Speedway, won last week's Milk Bowl, and is about to again finish among the top five in ACT points. And we're finally talking about him. You'll notice that Donahue has won some races, big ones at that, but like was said earlier, he's been winning from the very start. So what's made him a star now? I think the answer might be John Donahue himself.
It's easy to tell that when speaking with the media, Donahue's still not always comfortable being in the spotlight. But he's certainly come a long way from the days of his Tiger championships; Donahue won the Milk Bowl season finale in 2001 to clinch both the track and Tiger 50 titles, and he got out of the car with big smile and a two-fisted "Rocky" salute to the crowd. All well and good for photos, but his victory lane speech -- and I still remember hearing it -- was pretty much void of the content or emotion a race fan might expect to hear from a driver going through so much excitement.
Last Sunday at the Milk Bowl, though, Donahue played it up for the crowd, for the media, for Squier, for the Governor, for everybody. He performed a series of smoky, spinning burnouts while carrying the checkered flag. He dumped Booth Bros. milk down his frontside as he drank from the bowl trophy. He lifted the farm-style milk can above his head as though it was the Stanley Cup. He kissed the cow in victory lane -- on the lips -- twice. He celebrated with his family and team. As a couple of television cameras and a crowd of a half-dozen reporters stuck their microphones in Donahue's face, he flashed a confident smile, answered on-the-spot questions, and even cracked a joke or two. He never backed down from a question, gave honest answers, and even spit a little bit of fire when confronted with another driver's ruffled feathers. At White Mountain in June, his victory lane and post-race radio interviews were well-spoken and entertaining. His confidence with being a publicly prominent sports figure in the region seems to grow after every top-five finish (and he's on a streak of six straight right now).
Travis Barrett of Green-White-Checker asked Donahue on Sunday if he has felt overlooked as a top driver. I asked him a similar question after the Fall Foliage 300 at Airborne last month, speaking in terms of the ACT championship battle. And it seemed as though Donahue didn't really care if he was forgotten or not. "I'm sort of out of the picture," Donahue said at Airborne. "That's okay, make 'em think." And then he rambled on -- yes, rambled -- about how good his car and his team are, and gave this writer more than enough to fill a blog post's worth of space.
If anyone on the track, in the media, or anywhere else -- myself included -- forgot to think about John Donahue in the past, well, we won't now.
He's not the new kid in town. But he's definitely in town.
***
Three words: Bucktona International Speedway. If you don't know, ask someone who does.
***
Interesting stuff from the Milk Bowl pit meeting:
--ACT president Tom Curley said that there is "no question" that his series will be invited back to New Hampshire Motor Speedway next year. Ken Squier said the same thing.
--Curley said that the 2010 ACT Late Model Tour schedule is expected to be completed and published by the end of October. The Tour will not return to Kawartha Speedway in Ontario, but will visit "one or two new tracks".
--ACT's announcement that it will continue to sanction the Castrol Series in Canada comes this early, in part, to dispell rumors that the recent Patrick Laperle scandal drove Curley's group away. In fact, Curley said he's going back to Canada in 2010 because he's "pissed off" about the Autodrome St-Eustache incident and wants to continue holding fair races for the teams that have supported him.
--Okay, this wasn't at the pit meeting, but we overheard Curley telling third-place finisher Eric Williams that he is exploring the idea of expanding the Milk Bowl's three segments from 50 laps each to 75 laps, as early as next year. Curley thinks that another 25 laps would help bring back the possibility of the single-digit Milk Bowl win and bring back more excitement to the race. The fact that John Donahue's winning score was 17 points, and other recent winning scores have been as high as 23 points -- a far cry from Brian Hoar's 4-point win in 1998 -- means to Curley that the segments are just too short to produce the kind of racing the Milk Bowl became famous for. With the current ACT rules package, the cars are too equal to allow for three back-to-front drives through traffic. Robbie Crouch was the last driver to win every segment and score a perfect three points... in 1986. And it was a distant nine years ago that Phil Scott and Tracie Bellerose each scored eight points in the race, the most recent single-digit scores.
***
Speaking of Bellerose, she will be back in competition at Riverside Speedway on Saturday behind the wheel of a Late Model owned by Jane LeBlanc. Bellerose has been out of competition since a 10th-place ACT Late Model Tour finish at Oxford Plains Speedway in October 2007.
***
And speaking of Oxford, we'll be there on Sunday for the New England Dodge Dealers Fall Spectacular 150 and the ACT Late Model Tour season finale, welcoming a new supporter to Vermont Motorsports Magazine in Burnett Scrap Metals of Williston, Vt. Burnett has been involved in local racing for many years, and fielded a pair of race cars -- Neal Foster's Tiger Sportsman and Keith Fortier's Junkyard Warrior -- at Thunder Road in 2009.
Brian Hoar will try to fend off Scott Payea at Oxford for his sixth ACT championship, and first since 2000. Payea, of course, is looking for his first title, but will have to break his streak of not-so-good luck at Oxford. In ten career ACT starts at Oxford, Payea's got an average finish of just 12th, with a pair of sixth-place runs as his best finishes. He also has two 17ths, a 19th in May of this year, and a 22nd. Payea readily admits that Oxford is his achilles heel, and has been rumored to be building a second chassis for the 2010 season strictly to help improve his Oxford program. It'll be fun to watch, either way.
***
Rookie Jacob Dore of Sanford, Me. celebrated his first True Value Modified Racing Series win... a day after the race. Dore finished second across the finish line at Twin State Speedway on Sunday, but was named the winner of the Ricky Miller Memorial 112 on Monday after Matt Hirschman was disqualified. Dore, 20, was informed of the ruling as he was doing homework in his dorm room at the University of New Hampshire. Dwight Jarvis of Ascutney was fourth, and his nephew, Joey, finished 19th in a car normally driven by his father, Peter. The TVMRS cars now head to Seekonk Speedway in Massachusetts on Saturday and Sunday for the annual D. Anthony Venditti Memorial Fall Classic event.
Don't look now, but there's a new kid in town. Actually, there's nothing new about him at all, really, or kid-like. He's a hard worker with strong, dirty hands, hints of an old-time "ayuh" accent, and has been around this game for the better part of 20 years.
But all of a sudden, for the first time, John Donahue is a headline driver.
There's no telling the exact moment when he became one. Sunday, after winning the Milk Bowl? It might have been the crown jewel of his career, but it certainly wasn't his first win, or even his first important win. But in writing the post-race wrap-up of the Milk Bowl on Sunday and Monday, I found myself surprised, thinking something to the effect of, "Holy cow, Donahue's racked up quite the résumé. When did that happen?" In reality, it began a lot longer ago than I realized, maybe longer than anyone did.
A farmer by trade, the woodchuck-through-and-through Donahue rolled out of the rural Graniteville hills with a block-long Chevrolet for the "Killer B" class at Barre's Thunder Road in 1994. He recalled thinking that his car -- a larger, heavier, less powerful version of the era's Flying Tigers -- was "too slow" to have any fun in, so he moved up to the Tigers to race against his older brother, Bill, who had followed in their father Paul's footsteps as a multi-time winner and championship contender in the division.
And it turned out that "Irish John" was a chip off the ol' block, finishing third in points as a rookie. During the five seasons that followed, he would earn a pair of Thunder Road championships, a Triple Crown title at New Hampshire's Riverside Speedway, a "Tiger 50 Series" title, well over two dozen feature races at Thunder Road, Riverside, and Airborne Speedway in New York, and three Strictly Stock features at Oxford Plains Speedway in Maine.
In 2002, Donahue was hired to drive an American-Canadian Tour Late Model for Lee Delphia, winning top rookie honors at Thunder Road and finishing second on the Tour to the well-financed Ryan Moore, while also taking a Limited Sportsman win at Oxford. But a split from Delphia as the season ended left Donahue without a full-time ride for 2003, and the funding for his Maine-based team dried up as well. Donahue was on the outside looking in before another car owner, Mike Thompson, put Donahue in his Late Model for 2004.
Although comparatively underfunded, the team notched a win in the 2005 regular season finale at Thunder Road, a second win in mid-2006, and was constantly a top-five threat. A few on-track tussles brought some fanfare, including a couple involving Eric Williams, one of Thunder Road's all-time great villains. Add to that the fact that T-Road impresario Ken Squier loved to say the words "Irish John Donahue" (as he still does), and the name was becoming a water cooler topic in the offices of Central Vermont each Friday morning after the races, but still rarely appeared in print, radio, or television.
A windfall ride from new car owner Kendall Roberts -- complete with flashy, high-profile sponsorship from the National Guard, a pair of brand new cars with technical support from chassis builder Dale Shaw, and the occasional performance boost in crew chief Jeff Laquerre, at least in the first season -- appeared at Donahue's door in 2007, and, as far as my best guess goes, anyway, that's probably when things really began to click. Donahue knocked off a 100-lap open win at Oxford in June and took his first ACT victory in Thunder Road's 200-lap Labor Day Classic in September. The next season, he won back-to-back races at Thunder Road, on Mother's Day and in the ACT race on Memorial Day, then finished in the top-five in points with both the weekly Thunder Road chase and the ACT Late Model Tour. But still, he was never much for the headlines.
Now, this year, Donahue scored a dominating ACT win at White Mountain Motorsports Park, has three ACT runner-up finishes, pulled down a third-place effort in the Oxford 250 after leading some laps, took fifth in the ACT Invitational at New Hampshire Motor Speedway, won last week's Milk Bowl, and is about to again finish among the top five in ACT points. And we're finally talking about him. You'll notice that Donahue has won some races, big ones at that, but like was said earlier, he's been winning from the very start. So what's made him a star now? I think the answer might be John Donahue himself.
It's easy to tell that when speaking with the media, Donahue's still not always comfortable being in the spotlight. But he's certainly come a long way from the days of his Tiger championships; Donahue won the Milk Bowl season finale in 2001 to clinch both the track and Tiger 50 titles, and he got out of the car with big smile and a two-fisted "Rocky" salute to the crowd. All well and good for photos, but his victory lane speech -- and I still remember hearing it -- was pretty much void of the content or emotion a race fan might expect to hear from a driver going through so much excitement.
Last Sunday at the Milk Bowl, though, Donahue played it up for the crowd, for the media, for Squier, for the Governor, for everybody. He performed a series of smoky, spinning burnouts while carrying the checkered flag. He dumped Booth Bros. milk down his frontside as he drank from the bowl trophy. He lifted the farm-style milk can above his head as though it was the Stanley Cup. He kissed the cow in victory lane -- on the lips -- twice. He celebrated with his family and team. As a couple of television cameras and a crowd of a half-dozen reporters stuck their microphones in Donahue's face, he flashed a confident smile, answered on-the-spot questions, and even cracked a joke or two. He never backed down from a question, gave honest answers, and even spit a little bit of fire when confronted with another driver's ruffled feathers. At White Mountain in June, his victory lane and post-race radio interviews were well-spoken and entertaining. His confidence with being a publicly prominent sports figure in the region seems to grow after every top-five finish (and he's on a streak of six straight right now).
Travis Barrett of Green-White-Checker asked Donahue on Sunday if he has felt overlooked as a top driver. I asked him a similar question after the Fall Foliage 300 at Airborne last month, speaking in terms of the ACT championship battle. And it seemed as though Donahue didn't really care if he was forgotten or not. "I'm sort of out of the picture," Donahue said at Airborne. "That's okay, make 'em think." And then he rambled on -- yes, rambled -- about how good his car and his team are, and gave this writer more than enough to fill a blog post's worth of space.
If anyone on the track, in the media, or anywhere else -- myself included -- forgot to think about John Donahue in the past, well, we won't now.
He's not the new kid in town. But he's definitely in town.
***
Three words: Bucktona International Speedway. If you don't know, ask someone who does.
***
Interesting stuff from the Milk Bowl pit meeting:
--ACT president Tom Curley said that there is "no question" that his series will be invited back to New Hampshire Motor Speedway next year. Ken Squier said the same thing.
--Curley said that the 2010 ACT Late Model Tour schedule is expected to be completed and published by the end of October. The Tour will not return to Kawartha Speedway in Ontario, but will visit "one or two new tracks".
--ACT's announcement that it will continue to sanction the Castrol Series in Canada comes this early, in part, to dispell rumors that the recent Patrick Laperle scandal drove Curley's group away. In fact, Curley said he's going back to Canada in 2010 because he's "pissed off" about the Autodrome St-Eustache incident and wants to continue holding fair races for the teams that have supported him.
--Okay, this wasn't at the pit meeting, but we overheard Curley telling third-place finisher Eric Williams that he is exploring the idea of expanding the Milk Bowl's three segments from 50 laps each to 75 laps, as early as next year. Curley thinks that another 25 laps would help bring back the possibility of the single-digit Milk Bowl win and bring back more excitement to the race. The fact that John Donahue's winning score was 17 points, and other recent winning scores have been as high as 23 points -- a far cry from Brian Hoar's 4-point win in 1998 -- means to Curley that the segments are just too short to produce the kind of racing the Milk Bowl became famous for. With the current ACT rules package, the cars are too equal to allow for three back-to-front drives through traffic. Robbie Crouch was the last driver to win every segment and score a perfect three points... in 1986. And it was a distant nine years ago that Phil Scott and Tracie Bellerose each scored eight points in the race, the most recent single-digit scores.
***
Speaking of Bellerose, she will be back in competition at Riverside Speedway on Saturday behind the wheel of a Late Model owned by Jane LeBlanc. Bellerose has been out of competition since a 10th-place ACT Late Model Tour finish at Oxford Plains Speedway in October 2007.
***
And speaking of Oxford, we'll be there on Sunday for the New England Dodge Dealers Fall Spectacular 150 and the ACT Late Model Tour season finale, welcoming a new supporter to Vermont Motorsports Magazine in Burnett Scrap Metals of Williston, Vt. Burnett has been involved in local racing for many years, and fielded a pair of race cars -- Neal Foster's Tiger Sportsman and Keith Fortier's Junkyard Warrior -- at Thunder Road in 2009.Brian Hoar will try to fend off Scott Payea at Oxford for his sixth ACT championship, and first since 2000. Payea, of course, is looking for his first title, but will have to break his streak of not-so-good luck at Oxford. In ten career ACT starts at Oxford, Payea's got an average finish of just 12th, with a pair of sixth-place runs as his best finishes. He also has two 17ths, a 19th in May of this year, and a 22nd. Payea readily admits that Oxford is his achilles heel, and has been rumored to be building a second chassis for the 2010 season strictly to help improve his Oxford program. It'll be fun to watch, either way.
***
Rookie Jacob Dore of Sanford, Me. celebrated his first True Value Modified Racing Series win... a day after the race. Dore finished second across the finish line at Twin State Speedway on Sunday, but was named the winner of the Ricky Miller Memorial 112 on Monday after Matt Hirschman was disqualified. Dore, 20, was informed of the ruling as he was doing homework in his dorm room at the University of New Hampshire. Dwight Jarvis of Ascutney was fourth, and his nephew, Joey, finished 19th in a car normally driven by his father, Peter. The TVMRS cars now head to Seekonk Speedway in Massachusetts on Saturday and Sunday for the annual D. Anthony Venditti Memorial Fall Classic event.
Tuesday, September 29, 2009
PHOTOS: A September to Remember
September was an action-packed month around the region, and we did our best to capture some of it in photos. Click here for a 196-photo gallery of events from Bear Ridge Speedway, Thunder Road Int'l Speedbowl, Airborne Speedway, Twin State Speedway, and New Hampshire Motor Speedway. All photos by Justin St. Louis/VMM.
Thursday, September 10, 2009
ACT Invitational List Nearly Complete
One spot remains for White Mountain champion, up to two more may be added
LOUDON, N.H. -- The American-Canadian Tour came one step closer on Thursday to finalizing its list of 36 drivers for next Saturday's inaugural ACT Invitational at New Hampshire Motor Speedway. The names of seven invitees for the event -- the first superspeedway race for Late Model cars in the northeast -- were added to an existing roster of 28 drivers from the ACT Late Model Tour, Série ACT-Castrol, a host of regional weekly short tracks, and winners of select qualifying events.
Guy Caron of Lempster, N.H. was extended an invite to compete in the race by ACT President Tom Curley at Twin State Speedway last Friday after wrapping up that track's 2009 championship; Caron's name officially appeared on the NHMS roster with Thursday's announcement.
LOUDON, N.H. -- The American-Canadian Tour came one step closer on Thursday to finalizing its list of 36 drivers for next Saturday's inaugural ACT Invitational at New Hampshire Motor Speedway. The names of seven invitees for the event -- the first superspeedway race for Late Model cars in the northeast -- were added to an existing roster of 28 drivers from the ACT Late Model Tour, Série ACT-Castrol, a host of regional weekly short tracks, and winners of select qualifying events.Guy Caron of Lempster, N.H. was extended an invite to compete in the race by ACT President Tom Curley at Twin State Speedway last Friday after wrapping up that track's 2009 championship; Caron's name officially appeared on the NHMS roster with Thursday's announcement.
Similiarly, Travis Adams of Canton, Me. was given official notice of his invitation to compete on Thursday after clinching his fourth consecutive championship at Oxford Plains Speedway last Saturday night.
Wayne Helliwell, Jr. of Dracut, Mass. will represent Lee USA (N.H.) Speedway in the event, as he currenlty holds a probable -- although mathematically beatable -- lock on that track's Late Model title with two events remaining. Bryan Kruczek of Newmarket, N.H. is the only driver with a chance to overtake Helliwell for the title.
Three drivers from Thunder Road Int'l Speedbowl in Barre and one driver from the ACT Late Model Tour were extended "at-large" invites to NHMS. From Thunder Road come three-time champion Cris Michaud of Northfield, sophomore Barre racer Nick Sweet, and East Montpelier veteran Joey Laquerre, who, at 66 years old, is the track's all-time victory leader. Glen Luce of Turner, Me. was extended an invitation from the ACT Late Model Tour.
One spot in the advertised 36-car field remains to be filled, and is being held open for the soon-to-be-named track champion at White Mountain Motorsports Park in North Woodstock, N.H. The championship battle will be decided on Friday, Sept. 18 -- less than 24 hours before the ACT Invitational at NHMS -- between Quinny Welch of Lancaster, N.H. and Stacy Cahoon of St. Johnsbury, Vt. Only six points seperate them entering the finale.
"This has been a whole lot more difficult than I had anticipated," Curley said in an ACT press release of the driver selection process for the Invitational. "I have had a 'short list' sitting on my desk and traveling with me for over a week. The toughest part of this process was trying to find reasons not to invite any of the teams I had put on the list. I started looking for reasons why to invite the final teams. The final 36 teams will make some history for Late Model racing. It is my hope that others will get an opportunity to race at NHMS in the future because of their efforts."
If Kruczek does take the championship from Helliwell, or should a driver not yet invited to NHMS win Sunday's Fall Foliage 300 at Airborne Speedway in Plattsburgh, N.Y., the final NHMS qualifying event, Curley said spots may be added to the starting field at NHMS on Sept. 19. "I guess we would have to consider a change in the format and add [Kruczek's] name," Curley said. "Bryan did a great job at the test and I would not have a second thought about adding him if we found ourselves in that situation. I just think it is only fair to let the Helliwell team know they are in, so they can prepare for the NHMS experience while still chasing the title.
"Actually, we are taking a bit of a gamble by making these announcements before this weekend’s Fall Foliage 300 at Airborne," Curley continued. "If we had a surprise winner who could be approved, I guess we would have to look at that in the same way. Like I said earlier, this has been a whole lot more difficult than I had originally envisioned."
Wednesday, September 9, 2009
The Juice: A Weird Weekend, and Awesome Food
-by Justin St. Louis
VMM went to three races in three states in three days last weekend. And not a one of those programs went off as expected. Was it a bad thing? You decide.
Friday, it was Claremont, N.H. and Twin State Speedway, a place I hadn't seen in five years. Immediately, my first thought walking through the pit gate was, "Fantastic, there are a ton of race cars here." But then I began to identify which cars went with which divisions. NEMA Midgets, one. NEMA Lites, two. Monte Carlo-type things, three. Modifieds, four. ACT Late Models, five. A VW Scirocco, six. The Batmobile, seven. A four-cylinder car that a 13 year-old kid just climbed into, eight.
Folks, that's just too many divisions. It's about four too many. And on a night when there are three touring divisions in town, it's about five too many. Obvi, any promoter will want to showcase his local talent at an event when a lot of outsiders come to town to watch the ACT and NEMA cars. So get your two best divisions -- not your five best divisions -- and give them each a feature for no points, or give them all 50 points for showing up, or something. When three extra touring divisions are on the card and each one has to run qualifying heats (and in the case of ACT, two consis and a "B" feature as well), there is ZERO time to mess around with a 20-lap mini stock race, or whatever it is.
As it turned out, the only division that had its act together that night seemed to be the local Modifieds, who ripped off a fantastic show, including a thrilling finish in which Mike Willis, Jr. absolutely robbed Nate Kehoe for the win by inches at the line. The NEMA Midgets were pretty decent, too, running their heats and a 75-lap feature very quickly, push-starts aside. The ACT Late Model Tour and local Twin State guys finally figured out how to race each other by the time the feature came around, but the consis and "B" feature were pretty bad, and full of mistakes and stupid choices by drivers. The Strictly Stocks and Super Streets had lots of cautions, lots of guys teeing off on each other.
All told, the show ran about six hours, and the temperatures dipped into the 40s. The crowd was -- I'm told -- huge for Twin State, and a lot of the people that showed up stayed for the duration.
After getting home at 3:30am, I settled in for a short summer's nap, then got up to head across Lake Champlain to Airborne for the 100-lap Modified race, bringing some friends along for the 6:00pm show. When we left a bit after 11:00, we were thinking that maybe this three-day marathon thing wasn't all it was cracked up to be. The racing at Airborne is always good, but the nonsense that goes on when the drivers are having a bad night is just insane. The Modifieds never really got going, with their longest green flag run only a 13-lap stretch. Too bad, too, because the race between Patrick Dupree and Martin Roy would have almost certainly been one of the best of the year if they had 20 laps to do their thing.
The Sportsman feature was well over a half-hour long, for 25 stinkin' laps. Completely unnecessary. But what do you do as a race director, when there's only one race left to run in the program, and your main attraction (the Mod 100) is already done? You let 'em go, I guess. The Bombers, who have sort of been the problem child at Airborne this season, were the total professionals, running a fascinating 20-lap race in less than six minutes, with lots of three-wide action.
And then Sunday, it was a short trip down I-89 to Thunder Road for the Bond Auto Labor Day Classic. I had no real complaints about any of the racing (okay, so the final seven laps of the Tiger Sportsman race took almost as long as the first 43, but that's it), but I was just totally confused by the ACT race.
How in the name of Forsythe was anyone to expect a 181-lap caution-free run at Thunder Freaking Road? I mean, big congratulations to the drivers and everything, but really? You guys couldn't have spun yourselves out on purpose, just to make things interesting?
The guys I was impressed the most with in that race were not Dave Pembroke or John Donahue or Patrick Laperle, who were clearly the class of the field, but rather drivers like Craig Bushey, Dave Paya, Jerry Lesage, and Tony Andrews, drivers who don't have an overwhelming amount of experience running 200 smart, clean, conservative laps at Thunder Road, and Travis Stearns, who had never raced at Thunder Road at all before the Classic. The race was a bit of a snoozer as far as wrecks and lead changes go, but was likely the most impressive collective display of any 30 drivers in the history of the track, and each one of them should be very proud of their effort.
But still, I'm not sure what to think of the weekend. What do you think? Good? Bad? Would you do it again?
***
Yes, "obvi" was a DeGrassi reference.
***
The list of invitees for the ACT Invitational at New Hampshire Motor Speedway -- which, by the way, is only 10 days away -- is now at 30 drivers. Track champion Guy Caron was extended an invitation by Tom Curley during the pit meeting at Twin State Speedway on Friday night, and Travis Adams was confirmed as an invitee after winning the Oxford Plains Speedway title on Saturday.
And for the record, that pit meeting was an instant classic. The animated Curley began to lose his voice halfway through it, only adding to the drama -- and at points, the intentional comedy -- of the meeting.
***
How awesome is it that Josh Sunn won the Mini Stock championship at the Canaan Dirt Speedway AND the Outlaw Mini title at the Canaan asphalt track? Congratulations to Sunn and his team.
***
VMM first heard of the rumor about a weekly Late Model division running at Airborne Speedway in 2010 a few weeks ago. Promoter Mike Perrotte, when asked about the rumor, said there was "no chance" for a Late Model class at the track.
Perrotte said that not only does Airborne have enough divisions already with its five weekly groups, he has no interest in rocking the boat with ACT, which runs primarily on Saturdays, as Airborne does, and already has two ACT dates, including the blockbuster Fall Foliage 300.
So there's that.
***
I hate, hate, hate any sort of championship point system where races are dropped to determine the final standings. It might be the number-one thing that bothers me more than anything else in racing.
***
The steak sandwich I ate at Twin State on Friday night was simply outstanding. Sauteed peppers and onions, a ton of cheese, and juicy shaved steak, on a foot-long sub roll. I added about a gallon of Tabasco sauce to it, and it made my whole night.
It also got me thinking about the food I've had over the years at race tracks all over the place, so I made a list. Before this year, my all-time favorite race track food was the meatball sub in the pit concessions at Airborne, back when Tom Curley used to make them himself, but it was knocked off the top this year, and pushed back to third on Friday night. It's been a good year for track snacks. Here's a list of The Best Short Track Food I've Ever Had:
1. Michigan Dogs at Airborne Speedway, Plattsburgh, N.Y., 2009
2. Steak Sandwich at Twin State Speedway, Claremont, N.H., 2009
3. Tom's Meatball Subs at Airborne Speedway, Plattsburgh, N.Y., 2001
4. Corn Chowder at White Mountain Motorsports Park, North Woodstock, N.H., 2005
5. Poutine Fries at Autodrome St-Eustache, St-Eustache, Qué., 2007
6. Chappy's Sausage Bombs at Canaan Fair Speedway, Canaan, N.H., any year
7. Onion Rings at White Mountain Motorsports Park, North Woodstock, N.H., any year
8. Al's French Frys at Thunder Road Int'l Speedbowl, Barre, Vt., any year
9. Cheeseburgers at Riverside Speedway, Groveton, N.H., any year
10. Pepperoni Pizza at Bear Ridge Speedway, Bradford, Vt., 2009
11. Al's Fried Dough at Thunder Road Int'l Speedbowl, Barre, Vt., any year
12. Poutine Fries at Autodrome St-Félicien, St-Félicien, Qué., 2008
13. Chicken Fingers at White Mountain Motorsports Park, any year
14. Poutine Fries at Autodrome Chaudière, Vallée-Jct., Qué., 2008
15. Cheeseburgers at Waterford Speedbowl, Waterford, Conn., 2008
16. Sausage Bombs at Oxford Plains Speedway, Oxford, Me., 2009
17. Steak Sandwich at Lee USA Speedway, Lee, N.H., 2004
18. Clam Strips at Twin State Speedway, Claremont, N.H., 2004
19. Macaroni & Cheese at White Mountain Motorsports Park, any year
20. Al's Chicken Breast Sandwich (with BBQ sauce) at Thunder Road Int'l Speedbowl, 2002
***
AROUND THE REGION:
Time to take a look at the top Vermonters from the past weekend...
ACT Late Model Tour: On Friday night at Twin State Speedway in Claremont, N.H., Milton's Brent Dragon posted his first Tour win of the year in the Twin State 100, beating John Donahue of Graniteville, Scott Payea of Milton, Joey Doiron of Berwick, Me., and Williston's Brian Hoar. On Sunday at Barre's Thunder Road Int'l Speedbowl, Dave Pembroke of Middlesex dominated the Bond Auto Labor Day Classic 200 over Donahue, Patrick Laperle of St-Denis, Qué., Hoar, and Eric Williams of Hyde Park.
Airborne Speedway (Plattsburgh, N.Y.): Mike Bruno of Castleton finished third in Saturday's Charlie Trombley Memorial 100 in the Modified division on Saturday night. Martin Roy of Napierville, Qué. was named the Modified track champion. Milton's Bill Sawyer was seventh in the Sportsman feature with Joey Roberts of Georgia eighth. Rob Gordon of Milton won his second-straight Renegade feature, with Swanton's Kevin Boutin third and Lance Rabtoy of Fairfax fourth.
Albany-Saratoga Speedway (Malta, N.Y.): Dave Camara of Fair Haven finished fifth in the 358 Modified feature on Friday night with Middlebury's Todd Stone seventh. Fred Little of Salisbury was sixth in the Pro Street Stock feature with Benson's Jeff Washburn eighth.
Bear Ridge Speedway (Bradford): Ryan Avery of Thornton, N.H. won his second Sportsman Modified feature of the year on Saturday night in a three-segment event, beating Gary Siemons of Orford, N.H., Bryan King of Corinth, Chris Donnelly of Piermont, N.H., and Jack Cook of Moultonboro, N.H. King continued his strong run by winning his first Sportsman Coupe feature of the season, beating Bradford rookie Billy Simmons, point leader Josh Harrington of Topsham, Ritchie Simmons of Bradford, and Mike McGinley of East Barre. Shane Race of South Strafford took his third Limited Late Model feature win of the year over Will Hull of East Montpelier, T.C. Forward of Lyme, N.H., Jason Giguere of Enfield, N.H., and Jeremy Hodge of Bradford. Wilder's Andy Johnson beat Steve Bell of St. Johnsbury and Bradford's Ryan Dutton for the Fast Four win, and Bradford's Tom Placey beat St. Johnsbury drivers Karl Sheldon and Bobby Bell for his ninth Hornet win of the year. Melissa King of Corinth won the Hornet Queen race.
Canaan Dirt Speedway (Canaan, N.H.): Thetford Center's Dave Lacasse was sixth in Friday's Modified race. Dan Eastman of Thetford Center was third in the Street Stock feature with East Montpelier's Will Hull fourth and Cricket Williams of Ascutney eighth. Hull beat Eastman by a single point for the championship. Andy Johnson of Wilder was the Mini Stock runner-up with champion Josh Sunn of White River Junction fourth and Ryan Dutton of Bradford fifth.
Canaan Fair Speedway (Canaan, N.H.): Dave Davis of White River Junction was fourth in the Pro Stock race on Saturday night with Mendon's Chris Wilk fifth and Kevin Menard of South Royalton ninth; Jimmy Renfrew of Hooksett, N.H. won the race and the championship. Bradford's Arnie Stygles wrapped up the Super Street championship with a feature win. Jamie Hodgdon of Ascutney finished sixth in the Pure Stock feature with North Springfield's Rory Merritt eighth, Kyle Davis of Pittsford ninth, and Andy Merritt of Perkinsville tenth; Ed Laquire of Newport, N.H. was the champion. Bobby Prior of White River Junction won the Outlaw Mini feature over Chris McKinstry of Thetford, champion Josh Sunn of White River Junction, Mike McKinstry of Thetford, and Chris Lyman of Hartland. Mike Parker of Bradford beat champion Trever Perreault of Enfield, N.H. for the Bandit win.
Devil's Bowl Speedway (West Haven): Todd Stone of Middlebury posted his third 358 Modified win of the season on Sunday night, but surrendered his crown to Kenny Tremont, Jr. of West Sand Lake, N.Y. by a single point, 715-714. Ray Hoard of Granville, N.Y., Marc Johnson of Guilderland, N.Y., Kris Vernold of Glens Falls, N.Y., and Tremont completed the top-five in the feature behind Stone. Frank Hoard, III of Manchester won the Budget Sportsman feature over Derrick McGrew of Ballston Spa, N.Y., D.J. Brundige of Mechanicville, N.Y., Chuck Dickinson of Schaghticoke, N.Y., and Jack Swinton of Hudson Falls, N.Y. Cale Kneer of Troy, N.Y. won the Pro Street Stock feature and the track championship. Fred Little of Salisbury finished second in the race, with Fair Haven's Carl Vladyka third. Bill Duprey of Hydeville won his sixth Limited feature of the year over Brandon's Mike Clark, who clinched the division championship. Don Williams of Ripton was third in the race. Erika Lilly of Castleton was the Mini Stock/Duke Stock feature winner. Kayla Bryant of Rutland was the six-cylinder Mini Stock champion, Nathan Woodworth of Essex Junction was the four-cylinder Mini Stock champion, and Andy Smith of South Glens Falls, N.Y. was the Duke Stock champion. Chad King of Caroga Lake, N.Y. won the CRSA Sprint Car feature.
Monadnock Speedway (Winchester, N.H.): Josh King of Vernon was eighth in the Outlaw Pro Stock feature on Saturday night, while Dana Shepard of Putney finished 14th in the Super Stock race, Joe Rogers of Ludlow was 17th in the Mini Stocks, and Vernon's Heath Renaud beat Dick Houle of West Brattleboro to win the four-cylinder Enduro race.
Riverside Speedway (Groveton, N.H.): Derek Ming of Island Pond won the Outlaw Sportsman feature on Saturday night with Dan Sidney of St. Johnsbury fifth and Davey Ofsuryk of Newport Center seventh. Dilyn Switser of West Burke was the Super Stock runner-up. Cabot sisters Johanna and Lyndsay Christman finished 1-2 in the Angel feature.
Thunder Road Int'l Speedbowl (Barre): Scott Coburn of Barre took his second Tiger Sportsman win of the season on Sunday over Washington's Ricky Roberts, Pete Ainsworth of Middlesex, Joey Laquerre of East Montpelier, and Tommy Therrien of Hinesburg. Rookie Tucker Williams of Hyde Park took his fourth Street Stock win of the year over Tommy "Thunder" Smith of Williamstown, David Whitcomb of Elmore, Jason Corliss of Danville, and Lloyd Blakely of Barre. Donny Yates of North Montpelier was the Junkyard Warrior winner over Waitsfield's Kevin Streeter, Ken Christman of Cabot, Keith Fortier of Hinesburg, and Kevin Dodge of Barre.
Twin State Speedway (Claremont, N.H.): Nate Kehoe of Windham was the Modified runner-up on Friday night, with Ascutney's Joey Jarvis beating his father, Peter Jarvis for fifth, Robert Hagar of Windsor in seventh, and Joe Olmstead of Hartland tenth. Dave Davis of White River Junction was the Super Street runner-up, with Russ Davis of Cavendish fourth and Ascutney's Colby Hodgdon seventh. Tara Tarbell of Springfield was the Strictly Stock runner-up with West Hartford's Jeremy Blood sixth, David Greenslit of Waitsfield seventh, and Kyle Davis of Pittsford tenth.
White Mountain Motorsports Park (North Woodstock, N.H.): Bernie Lantagne of McIndoe Falls finished fourth in Saturday's Late Model feature with St. Johnsbury's Stacy Cahoon sixth. Stevie Parker of Lyndonville won the Strictly Stock feature with Milton's Gordie Stone third, and Concord's Rubin Call was the Strictly Stock Mini winner.
***
WEEKEND SCHEDULE:
Friday, Sept. 11
Albany-Saratoga Speedway, Malta, N.Y. -- 6:45pm (Empire Lightning Sprints)
Twin State Speedway, Claremont, N.H. -- 7:30pm (Regular Event)
Saturday, Sept. 12
Bear Ridge Speedway, Bradford -- 6:00pm (Championship Night)
Airborne Speedway, Plattsburgh, N.Y. -- 3:00pm (Local division qualifying)
Monadnock Speedway, Winchester, N.H. -- 6:00pm (NEMA Midgets)
Riverside Speedway, Groveton, N.H. -- 5:00pm (Late Model Triple Crown 100)
White Mountain Motorsports Park, North Woodstock, N.H. -- 6:00pm (Regular Event)
Sunday, Sept. 13
Airborne Speedway, Plattsburgh, N.Y. -- 1:00pm (ACT Late Model Tour)
TOURING SERIES:
ACT Late Model Tour: Sun., Sept. 13 -- Airborne Speedway, Plattsburgh, N.Y. (1:00pm)
PASS North Super Late Models: Sun., Sept. 13 -- Beech Ridge Motor Speedway, Scarborough, Me. (12:00 noon)
VMM went to three races in three states in three days last weekend. And not a one of those programs went off as expected. Was it a bad thing? You decide.
Friday, it was Claremont, N.H. and Twin State Speedway, a place I hadn't seen in five years. Immediately, my first thought walking through the pit gate was, "Fantastic, there are a ton of race cars here." But then I began to identify which cars went with which divisions. NEMA Midgets, one. NEMA Lites, two. Monte Carlo-type things, three. Modifieds, four. ACT Late Models, five. A VW Scirocco, six. The Batmobile, seven. A four-cylinder car that a 13 year-old kid just climbed into, eight.
Folks, that's just too many divisions. It's about four too many. And on a night when there are three touring divisions in town, it's about five too many. Obvi, any promoter will want to showcase his local talent at an event when a lot of outsiders come to town to watch the ACT and NEMA cars. So get your two best divisions -- not your five best divisions -- and give them each a feature for no points, or give them all 50 points for showing up, or something. When three extra touring divisions are on the card and each one has to run qualifying heats (and in the case of ACT, two consis and a "B" feature as well), there is ZERO time to mess around with a 20-lap mini stock race, or whatever it is.
As it turned out, the only division that had its act together that night seemed to be the local Modifieds, who ripped off a fantastic show, including a thrilling finish in which Mike Willis, Jr. absolutely robbed Nate Kehoe for the win by inches at the line. The NEMA Midgets were pretty decent, too, running their heats and a 75-lap feature very quickly, push-starts aside. The ACT Late Model Tour and local Twin State guys finally figured out how to race each other by the time the feature came around, but the consis and "B" feature were pretty bad, and full of mistakes and stupid choices by drivers. The Strictly Stocks and Super Streets had lots of cautions, lots of guys teeing off on each other.
All told, the show ran about six hours, and the temperatures dipped into the 40s. The crowd was -- I'm told -- huge for Twin State, and a lot of the people that showed up stayed for the duration.
After getting home at 3:30am, I settled in for a short summer's nap, then got up to head across Lake Champlain to Airborne for the 100-lap Modified race, bringing some friends along for the 6:00pm show. When we left a bit after 11:00, we were thinking that maybe this three-day marathon thing wasn't all it was cracked up to be. The racing at Airborne is always good, but the nonsense that goes on when the drivers are having a bad night is just insane. The Modifieds never really got going, with their longest green flag run only a 13-lap stretch. Too bad, too, because the race between Patrick Dupree and Martin Roy would have almost certainly been one of the best of the year if they had 20 laps to do their thing.
The Sportsman feature was well over a half-hour long, for 25 stinkin' laps. Completely unnecessary. But what do you do as a race director, when there's only one race left to run in the program, and your main attraction (the Mod 100) is already done? You let 'em go, I guess. The Bombers, who have sort of been the problem child at Airborne this season, were the total professionals, running a fascinating 20-lap race in less than six minutes, with lots of three-wide action.
And then Sunday, it was a short trip down I-89 to Thunder Road for the Bond Auto Labor Day Classic. I had no real complaints about any of the racing (okay, so the final seven laps of the Tiger Sportsman race took almost as long as the first 43, but that's it), but I was just totally confused by the ACT race.
How in the name of Forsythe was anyone to expect a 181-lap caution-free run at Thunder Freaking Road? I mean, big congratulations to the drivers and everything, but really? You guys couldn't have spun yourselves out on purpose, just to make things interesting?
The guys I was impressed the most with in that race were not Dave Pembroke or John Donahue or Patrick Laperle, who were clearly the class of the field, but rather drivers like Craig Bushey, Dave Paya, Jerry Lesage, and Tony Andrews, drivers who don't have an overwhelming amount of experience running 200 smart, clean, conservative laps at Thunder Road, and Travis Stearns, who had never raced at Thunder Road at all before the Classic. The race was a bit of a snoozer as far as wrecks and lead changes go, but was likely the most impressive collective display of any 30 drivers in the history of the track, and each one of them should be very proud of their effort.
But still, I'm not sure what to think of the weekend. What do you think? Good? Bad? Would you do it again?
***
Yes, "obvi" was a DeGrassi reference.
***
The list of invitees for the ACT Invitational at New Hampshire Motor Speedway -- which, by the way, is only 10 days away -- is now at 30 drivers. Track champion Guy Caron was extended an invitation by Tom Curley during the pit meeting at Twin State Speedway on Friday night, and Travis Adams was confirmed as an invitee after winning the Oxford Plains Speedway title on Saturday.
And for the record, that pit meeting was an instant classic. The animated Curley began to lose his voice halfway through it, only adding to the drama -- and at points, the intentional comedy -- of the meeting.
***
How awesome is it that Josh Sunn won the Mini Stock championship at the Canaan Dirt Speedway AND the Outlaw Mini title at the Canaan asphalt track? Congratulations to Sunn and his team.
***
VMM first heard of the rumor about a weekly Late Model division running at Airborne Speedway in 2010 a few weeks ago. Promoter Mike Perrotte, when asked about the rumor, said there was "no chance" for a Late Model class at the track.
Perrotte said that not only does Airborne have enough divisions already with its five weekly groups, he has no interest in rocking the boat with ACT, which runs primarily on Saturdays, as Airborne does, and already has two ACT dates, including the blockbuster Fall Foliage 300.
So there's that.
***
I hate, hate, hate any sort of championship point system where races are dropped to determine the final standings. It might be the number-one thing that bothers me more than anything else in racing.
***
The steak sandwich I ate at Twin State on Friday night was simply outstanding. Sauteed peppers and onions, a ton of cheese, and juicy shaved steak, on a foot-long sub roll. I added about a gallon of Tabasco sauce to it, and it made my whole night.
It also got me thinking about the food I've had over the years at race tracks all over the place, so I made a list. Before this year, my all-time favorite race track food was the meatball sub in the pit concessions at Airborne, back when Tom Curley used to make them himself, but it was knocked off the top this year, and pushed back to third on Friday night. It's been a good year for track snacks. Here's a list of The Best Short Track Food I've Ever Had:
1. Michigan Dogs at Airborne Speedway, Plattsburgh, N.Y., 2009
2. Steak Sandwich at Twin State Speedway, Claremont, N.H., 2009
3. Tom's Meatball Subs at Airborne Speedway, Plattsburgh, N.Y., 2001
4. Corn Chowder at White Mountain Motorsports Park, North Woodstock, N.H., 2005
5. Poutine Fries at Autodrome St-Eustache, St-Eustache, Qué., 2007
6. Chappy's Sausage Bombs at Canaan Fair Speedway, Canaan, N.H., any year
7. Onion Rings at White Mountain Motorsports Park, North Woodstock, N.H., any year
8. Al's French Frys at Thunder Road Int'l Speedbowl, Barre, Vt., any year
9. Cheeseburgers at Riverside Speedway, Groveton, N.H., any year
10. Pepperoni Pizza at Bear Ridge Speedway, Bradford, Vt., 2009
11. Al's Fried Dough at Thunder Road Int'l Speedbowl, Barre, Vt., any year
12. Poutine Fries at Autodrome St-Félicien, St-Félicien, Qué., 2008
13. Chicken Fingers at White Mountain Motorsports Park, any year
14. Poutine Fries at Autodrome Chaudière, Vallée-Jct., Qué., 2008
15. Cheeseburgers at Waterford Speedbowl, Waterford, Conn., 2008
16. Sausage Bombs at Oxford Plains Speedway, Oxford, Me., 2009
17. Steak Sandwich at Lee USA Speedway, Lee, N.H., 2004
18. Clam Strips at Twin State Speedway, Claremont, N.H., 2004
19. Macaroni & Cheese at White Mountain Motorsports Park, any year
20. Al's Chicken Breast Sandwich (with BBQ sauce) at Thunder Road Int'l Speedbowl, 2002
***
AROUND THE REGION:
Time to take a look at the top Vermonters from the past weekend...
ACT Late Model Tour: On Friday night at Twin State Speedway in Claremont, N.H., Milton's Brent Dragon posted his first Tour win of the year in the Twin State 100, beating John Donahue of Graniteville, Scott Payea of Milton, Joey Doiron of Berwick, Me., and Williston's Brian Hoar. On Sunday at Barre's Thunder Road Int'l Speedbowl, Dave Pembroke of Middlesex dominated the Bond Auto Labor Day Classic 200 over Donahue, Patrick Laperle of St-Denis, Qué., Hoar, and Eric Williams of Hyde Park.
Airborne Speedway (Plattsburgh, N.Y.): Mike Bruno of Castleton finished third in Saturday's Charlie Trombley Memorial 100 in the Modified division on Saturday night. Martin Roy of Napierville, Qué. was named the Modified track champion. Milton's Bill Sawyer was seventh in the Sportsman feature with Joey Roberts of Georgia eighth. Rob Gordon of Milton won his second-straight Renegade feature, with Swanton's Kevin Boutin third and Lance Rabtoy of Fairfax fourth.
Albany-Saratoga Speedway (Malta, N.Y.): Dave Camara of Fair Haven finished fifth in the 358 Modified feature on Friday night with Middlebury's Todd Stone seventh. Fred Little of Salisbury was sixth in the Pro Street Stock feature with Benson's Jeff Washburn eighth.
Bear Ridge Speedway (Bradford): Ryan Avery of Thornton, N.H. won his second Sportsman Modified feature of the year on Saturday night in a three-segment event, beating Gary Siemons of Orford, N.H., Bryan King of Corinth, Chris Donnelly of Piermont, N.H., and Jack Cook of Moultonboro, N.H. King continued his strong run by winning his first Sportsman Coupe feature of the season, beating Bradford rookie Billy Simmons, point leader Josh Harrington of Topsham, Ritchie Simmons of Bradford, and Mike McGinley of East Barre. Shane Race of South Strafford took his third Limited Late Model feature win of the year over Will Hull of East Montpelier, T.C. Forward of Lyme, N.H., Jason Giguere of Enfield, N.H., and Jeremy Hodge of Bradford. Wilder's Andy Johnson beat Steve Bell of St. Johnsbury and Bradford's Ryan Dutton for the Fast Four win, and Bradford's Tom Placey beat St. Johnsbury drivers Karl Sheldon and Bobby Bell for his ninth Hornet win of the year. Melissa King of Corinth won the Hornet Queen race.
Canaan Dirt Speedway (Canaan, N.H.): Thetford Center's Dave Lacasse was sixth in Friday's Modified race. Dan Eastman of Thetford Center was third in the Street Stock feature with East Montpelier's Will Hull fourth and Cricket Williams of Ascutney eighth. Hull beat Eastman by a single point for the championship. Andy Johnson of Wilder was the Mini Stock runner-up with champion Josh Sunn of White River Junction fourth and Ryan Dutton of Bradford fifth.
Canaan Fair Speedway (Canaan, N.H.): Dave Davis of White River Junction was fourth in the Pro Stock race on Saturday night with Mendon's Chris Wilk fifth and Kevin Menard of South Royalton ninth; Jimmy Renfrew of Hooksett, N.H. won the race and the championship. Bradford's Arnie Stygles wrapped up the Super Street championship with a feature win. Jamie Hodgdon of Ascutney finished sixth in the Pure Stock feature with North Springfield's Rory Merritt eighth, Kyle Davis of Pittsford ninth, and Andy Merritt of Perkinsville tenth; Ed Laquire of Newport, N.H. was the champion. Bobby Prior of White River Junction won the Outlaw Mini feature over Chris McKinstry of Thetford, champion Josh Sunn of White River Junction, Mike McKinstry of Thetford, and Chris Lyman of Hartland. Mike Parker of Bradford beat champion Trever Perreault of Enfield, N.H. for the Bandit win.
Devil's Bowl Speedway (West Haven): Todd Stone of Middlebury posted his third 358 Modified win of the season on Sunday night, but surrendered his crown to Kenny Tremont, Jr. of West Sand Lake, N.Y. by a single point, 715-714. Ray Hoard of Granville, N.Y., Marc Johnson of Guilderland, N.Y., Kris Vernold of Glens Falls, N.Y., and Tremont completed the top-five in the feature behind Stone. Frank Hoard, III of Manchester won the Budget Sportsman feature over Derrick McGrew of Ballston Spa, N.Y., D.J. Brundige of Mechanicville, N.Y., Chuck Dickinson of Schaghticoke, N.Y., and Jack Swinton of Hudson Falls, N.Y. Cale Kneer of Troy, N.Y. won the Pro Street Stock feature and the track championship. Fred Little of Salisbury finished second in the race, with Fair Haven's Carl Vladyka third. Bill Duprey of Hydeville won his sixth Limited feature of the year over Brandon's Mike Clark, who clinched the division championship. Don Williams of Ripton was third in the race. Erika Lilly of Castleton was the Mini Stock/Duke Stock feature winner. Kayla Bryant of Rutland was the six-cylinder Mini Stock champion, Nathan Woodworth of Essex Junction was the four-cylinder Mini Stock champion, and Andy Smith of South Glens Falls, N.Y. was the Duke Stock champion. Chad King of Caroga Lake, N.Y. won the CRSA Sprint Car feature.
Monadnock Speedway (Winchester, N.H.): Josh King of Vernon was eighth in the Outlaw Pro Stock feature on Saturday night, while Dana Shepard of Putney finished 14th in the Super Stock race, Joe Rogers of Ludlow was 17th in the Mini Stocks, and Vernon's Heath Renaud beat Dick Houle of West Brattleboro to win the four-cylinder Enduro race.
Riverside Speedway (Groveton, N.H.): Derek Ming of Island Pond won the Outlaw Sportsman feature on Saturday night with Dan Sidney of St. Johnsbury fifth and Davey Ofsuryk of Newport Center seventh. Dilyn Switser of West Burke was the Super Stock runner-up. Cabot sisters Johanna and Lyndsay Christman finished 1-2 in the Angel feature.
Thunder Road Int'l Speedbowl (Barre): Scott Coburn of Barre took his second Tiger Sportsman win of the season on Sunday over Washington's Ricky Roberts, Pete Ainsworth of Middlesex, Joey Laquerre of East Montpelier, and Tommy Therrien of Hinesburg. Rookie Tucker Williams of Hyde Park took his fourth Street Stock win of the year over Tommy "Thunder" Smith of Williamstown, David Whitcomb of Elmore, Jason Corliss of Danville, and Lloyd Blakely of Barre. Donny Yates of North Montpelier was the Junkyard Warrior winner over Waitsfield's Kevin Streeter, Ken Christman of Cabot, Keith Fortier of Hinesburg, and Kevin Dodge of Barre.
Twin State Speedway (Claremont, N.H.): Nate Kehoe of Windham was the Modified runner-up on Friday night, with Ascutney's Joey Jarvis beating his father, Peter Jarvis for fifth, Robert Hagar of Windsor in seventh, and Joe Olmstead of Hartland tenth. Dave Davis of White River Junction was the Super Street runner-up, with Russ Davis of Cavendish fourth and Ascutney's Colby Hodgdon seventh. Tara Tarbell of Springfield was the Strictly Stock runner-up with West Hartford's Jeremy Blood sixth, David Greenslit of Waitsfield seventh, and Kyle Davis of Pittsford tenth.
White Mountain Motorsports Park (North Woodstock, N.H.): Bernie Lantagne of McIndoe Falls finished fourth in Saturday's Late Model feature with St. Johnsbury's Stacy Cahoon sixth. Stevie Parker of Lyndonville won the Strictly Stock feature with Milton's Gordie Stone third, and Concord's Rubin Call was the Strictly Stock Mini winner.
***
WEEKEND SCHEDULE:
Friday, Sept. 11
Albany-Saratoga Speedway, Malta, N.Y. -- 6:45pm (Empire Lightning Sprints)
Twin State Speedway, Claremont, N.H. -- 7:30pm (Regular Event)
Saturday, Sept. 12
Bear Ridge Speedway, Bradford -- 6:00pm (Championship Night)
Airborne Speedway, Plattsburgh, N.Y. -- 3:00pm (Local division qualifying)
Monadnock Speedway, Winchester, N.H. -- 6:00pm (NEMA Midgets)
Riverside Speedway, Groveton, N.H. -- 5:00pm (Late Model Triple Crown 100)
White Mountain Motorsports Park, North Woodstock, N.H. -- 6:00pm (Regular Event)
Sunday, Sept. 13
Airborne Speedway, Plattsburgh, N.Y. -- 1:00pm (ACT Late Model Tour)
TOURING SERIES:
ACT Late Model Tour: Sun., Sept. 13 -- Airborne Speedway, Plattsburgh, N.Y. (1:00pm)
PASS North Super Late Models: Sun., Sept. 13 -- Beech Ridge Motor Speedway, Scarborough, Me. (12:00 noon)
VIDEO GALLERY: Weekend of Sept. 4-6, 2009
The MotorMag took in a lot of racing over the past weekend, and we figured we might as well share some of the long-lost videos with you.
The first is of a NEMA Midget qualifying heat at Twin State Speedway in Claremont, N.H. on Friday. Nokie Fornoro (#4) makes quick work of it, taking the early lead, while Adam Cantor (#7NY) and Russ Stoehr (#45) slice through the field.
The second video is of the opening laps of the Renegade feature at Airborne Speedway in Plattsburgh, N.Y. on Saturday night, with a twilight sunscape in Turn 3 and a full moon over Turn 1. Rob Gordon (#H20) went on to take the win after a lengthy side-by-side battle with Lance Rabtoy (#11), eventually holding off point leader Nick Heywood (#29), Kevin Boutin (#25), and Rabtoy for his second-straight victory.
The third video is of the 50-lap Tiger Sportsman feature at Thunder Road in Barre on Sunday afternoon. Scott Coburn (#1) takes the lead from Chris Lacey (#35) and eventually scored the win, while rookie Steve "Mudflap" Quenneville (#88) and Josh Demers (#10) go for a spin on the backstretch.
(Videos by Justin St. Louis/VMM)
Saturday, September 5, 2009
Scott Wrecks, Dragon Wins at Twin State
CLAREMONT, N.H. -- It's been eight years, 11 months, and four days since Phil Scott won an ACT Late Model Tour race. And unfortunately for Scott, that time will extend for at least one more day. The Vermont State Senator and former ACT champion was practically a shoo-in to end the dry spell at Twin State Speedway in Claremont, N.H. on Friday night before a pair of late-race incidents, both involving number-four point driver Randy Potter, effectively ended Scott's night.Scott led every step of the Twin State 100 from the pole position, navigating lapped traffic with ease, before a lap 70 caution brought second-place runner Brent Dragon to Scott's tail for a restart. The yellow caution flag flew for Guy Caron, who after some tight, sometimes physical racing with Potter, was dumped off the backstretch by Potter by into the infield.
With Dragon pressuring Scott for the lead a dozen laps later, Potter spun just before Turn 1, coming to rest with the front half of his car on the racing surface. Potter got his stalled car refired in time to move out of the way as the leaders approched, but in a brief instant, the yellow flag flew just as Potter inexplicably drove out onto the track directly into their path. Scott jammed on his brakes and drove to the high side in an attempt to avoid, but collided hard with Potter and spun into the wall; Dragon got by unscathed on the inside.
Despite heavy cosmetic damage, Scott refired his car on his own, but was placed at the rear of the field for the restart with Potter. It was then smooth sailing for Dragon, who held off John Donahue through that restart and another final one on lap 93 for the win.
Scott was obviously disappointed with the wreck. "I guess I could have paid attention [to what Potter was doing] more. I saw him coming out, I just thought he was going to stay there," Scott said. "I did what I thought was right, and usually a car that's spun on the inside usually comes down and stays low, it doesn't cross the track. I don't know if he didn't see how quickly we were coming."Potter left the pit area almost immediately after the race concluded and was unavailable for comment.
Scott was also frustrated with the call made by race director Tom Curley to place him at the rear of the field for the lap 82 restart, thinking that the caution flag flew for Potter before the accident. Scott fell off the pace at the restart until debris cleared itself away from the right-front tire of his car under the green flag. "As it turned out, I don't know as we could have held on to the lead anyhow, but I wasn't happy with [the call]," Scott said. "But you know, you make the calls as you see them, and obviously [Curley] was throwing the yellow for [Potter]. And [Curley] was letting some cars spin and stay there [until they refired during other incidents in the race], so it's not like it was anything directed at me, but sometimes, you know, it's tough to take."
Prior to the lap 82 wreck, Dragon had several chances to force his way into the lead past Scott, both on the inside and outside lanes. In fact, Dragon was just under Scott's car at the time of the accident.
"I think I could have beat Phil. We were pressuring him pretty good, and it's too bad he got wrecked," Dragon said. "He was so tight in the middle of the corner, and I could have drove up underneath him. Even on the straightaway there was a couple times I had my nose in there. And I had him outside, too, but I really wanted to go underneath him and just beat him on the straightaway nice and clean, because I knew once I got all the way beside he'd just let me go. It would have been interesting, it would have been fun."
Scott saw it differently, thinking he had the car to beat. "I was just being very, very careful trying to protect the bottom when we had that restart [on lap 70] with the lapped car on the outside," he said. "I didn't want to slip up into him and I didn't want to have Brent dive underneath me, so I was just biding my time a little bit, protecting the bottom. Once I got out and started hitting my marks again, I don't know as Brent could have caught us. We had a very stout car. We'll try [Sunday at Thunder Road] to go out and win that race."
For Dragon, the win was his third of 2009, but his first victory of the year on the ACT Late Model Tour. He won a pair of events in Canada prior to the Twin State 100 -- the Coors Light 200 Showdown all-star event at Autodrome Chaudière last Sunday, and a Série ACT-Castrol event at Riverside Speedway in Ste-Croix, Qué. in June. Dragon joked that he was relieved to finally be able to put an end to the season-long ribbing he's taken from friends and competitors that he couldn't win a race in the United States.
"This is our first win in the States this year, so I guess I can be a U.S. citizen again," Dragon laughed. "Everybody's been beating on me about being a Canadian all year."
ACT Late Model Tour point leader Scott Payea had a quiet, but impressive drive from 19th starting position to finish in third place. The finish was his sixth third-place effort of the year, coupled with a win at Airborne Speedway in May. Rookie Joey Doiron, 17, finished an ACT career-best fourth, with Brian Hoar, Payea's chief rival for the championship, in fifth place. Daniel Descoste finished a career-best sixth, in front of Joey Polewarczyk, Jr., Ben Rowe, and Twin State Speedway regulars Aaron Fellows and Dallas Trombley.
Unofficially, Payea maintained a narrow five-point lead over Hoar entering Sunday's Bond Auto Labor Day Classic 200 at Thunder Road in Barre.
UNOFFICIAL RESULTS -- Twin State 100
ACT Late Model Tour -- Twin State Speedway, Claremont, N.H.
Friday, Sept. 4, 2009
Pos.-Driver-Hometown (# - indicates rookie)
1. Brent Dragon, Milton
2. John Donahue, Graniteville
3. Scott Payea, Milton
4. #Joey Doiron, Berwick, Me.
5. Brian Hoar, Williston
6. Daniel Descoste, St-Joseph-du-Lac, Qué.
7. Joey Polewarczyk, Jr., Hudson, N.H.
8. Ben Rowe, Turner, Me.
9. Aaron Fellows, Croydon, N.H.
10. Dallas Trombley, Rutland
11. Stéphane Descoste, Oka, Qué.
12. Randy Potter, Groveton, N.H.
13. Darrell Keane, Springfield, Mass.
14. Phil Scott, Montpelier
15. Chris Riendeau, Ascutney
16. Tyler Cahoon, St. Johnsbury
17. Jamie Fisher, Shelburne
18. Todd Davis, Claremont, N.H.
19. Pete Potvin, III, Graniteville
20. Marc Palmisano, Hadley, Mass.
21. Chip Grenier, Graniteville
22. Bryan Town, Charlestown, N.H.
23. Chris Bergeron, Claremont, N.H.
24. Mark Hayward, Unity, N.H.
25. Punky Caron, Goshen, N.H.
26. Guy Caron, Lempster, N.H.
27. Eric Williams, Hyde Park
28. Dennis Stange, Athol, Mass.
29. Ricky Rolfe, Albany Twp., Me.
30. Glen Luce, Turner, Me.
(PHOTOS: 1. Bretn Dragon waves to the crowd after his victory in the Twin State 100; 2. Phil Scott's car became a mangled mess after a lap 82 crash while Scott was leading. Photos by Justin St. Louis/VMM)
VIDEO: Punky Wins, Fellows Fast
The following video shows qualifying heat #4 at Twin State Speedway in Claremont, N.H. on Friday night, for the ACT Late Model Tour Twin State 100. The legendary Howard "Punky" Caron (#81) made his first ACT appearance since the 1980s a good one, winning the heat race over Bryan Town (#11), Stéphane Descoste (#10QC) and Aaron Fellows (#29). After a first-lap run-in with Guy Caron (#8), Fellows put on an impressive display of driving, from ninth at the start; his "+5" handicap put him on the outside pole for the Twin State 100, in which he eventually finished ninth.
(Video by Justin St. Louis/VMM)
Tuesday, September 1, 2009
BREAKING NEWS: Lamberton to Return to ACT
New York racer to run Twin State, Airborne events; eyeing full season in 2010
CLAREMONT, N.H. -- Three years ago, Mark Lamberton was one of the hottest drivers on the ACT Late Model Tour, and certainly the face of New York-based Late Model racing in northern New England. Friday, he'll try to rekindle those flames as he returns to the race track at Twin State Speedway in Claremont, N.H.
The Mooers Forks, N.Y. driver has been absent from ACT competition since finishing fifth in championship points in 2006, but will make his return behind the wheel of the #16 Richard Green Trucking Ford normally driven by Joey Becker. Lamberton has been a part-time crew member with the team for two seasons, and has also been serving as crew chief for Sportsman driver Bill Sawyer at Airborne Speedway in Plattsburgh, N.Y. this year. With Lamberton turning wrenches, Becker turned in a season-best third-place finish at Thunder Road in Barre on August 20.
Lamberton's most recent on-track experience was in the Modified division at Airborne in 2007.
"I've been hanging around the last few years looking for the right opportunity to come along," said Lamberton. "I've raced a Modified, I've worked on cars, I tried a bunch of things, but [racing with ACT] is what I want to be doing. In all my years of racing, it was the most fun I ever had. I've missed it."
Initial plans call for Lamberton to be in the Rick Green-owned car at Twin State on Friday and at the Fall Foliage 300 at Airborne Speedway on Sept. 13. Becker will drive the car at Thunder Road on Sunday in the Bond Auto Labor Day Classic 200 and at the Chittenden Bank Milk Bowl later in the month. Ironically, it was Becker and Lamberton that turned in one of the most memorable finishes in Thunder Road history in 2004, as they traded the lead more than a dozen times during the final 35 laps of the Memorial Day Classic -- Lamberton spun, Becker won.
Green said that he was considering putting Lamberton in a full-time ACT Late Model Tour ride for 2010 when he got a call from ACT President Tom Curley. "Tom approached me about getting Mark into one of my cars at the 300," Green explained, noting that Curley thought Lamberton, who won both the Foliage event and the Airborne Speedway Late Model track championship in 2001, might be an added attraction to the race. "I had already thought about having him race for us on the Tour next year, but when Tom called, I figured we might as well speed up the process and get things rolling sooner rather than later."
Curley clearly thinks highly of Green's new driver. "[Lamberton's family] along with his whole team always represented to me exactly why I have stayed in this business for so long," Curley said Tuesday. "If I could have 30 Mark Lambertons on the road each week, I would keep doing this until I either dropped dead or became so senile that they threw me out. He is in the same racer mold as Brent Dragon, Randy Potter, Phil Scott, Cris Michaud, Donald Theetge, Jamie Fisher, Karl Allard, as well as a bunch of others, and you know how much respect I have for those kinds of racers and teams.
"Mark is one of the best natural racers I have ever known," Curley continued. "He captured my respect when I watched him struggle for years at Thunder Road, and he kept coming back until he finally became pretty good there. I loved that tenacity that he brought to his racing. He is a hell of a good racer that understands the business as much as he understands how to race cars. "
Curley also said that should Lamberton win one of the events at Twin State or Airborne -- both of which are qualifiying races for the ACT Invitational at New Hampshire Motor Speedway on Sept. 19 -- he would consider inviting him to compete in the race, despite not having any track time at the 1.058-mile superspeedway. "I said to someone the other day that [Lamberton] would be about the only driver I would consider inviting to the Invitational without having been
to the test-and-tune (last week). I have that much respect for him as a long track racer," Curley said. Lamberton's three ACT Late Model Tour wins all came at Airborne, a fast, 4/10-mile oval, and a significant number of his career ACT top-five finishes have come at Airborne, the 5/8-mile Riverside Speedway in Ste-Croix, Qué., and the 9/10-mile Sanair Super Speedway near Montréal.
"Mark has helped us change a lot on the setup of the car already, so these races will be a good test to get any bugs worked out," said Green. "And he's a very good driver, so who knows, maybe we can make something out of it. It should be fun."
Lamberton finished fourth at Twin State in his own car at ACT's last visit in 2004. "It was a few years ago and in a different car, but I liked the track at Claremont and I'm hoping we can do well there again. And the 300, I can't wait for that. I wanted to get a ride for that race as soon as [ACT] announced it last year. I hope I make Rick and Joey proud."
(PHOTOS: 1. Mark Lamberton will return to the driver's seat this weekend at Twin State Speedway in one of Richard Green's #16 cars; 2. Lamberton (#29) and Joey Becker (#16) battle at Thunder Road in 2004; 3. Lamberton (#29) on the way to winning the Fall Foliage 200 at Airborne Speedway in 2001. Photo 1 by Justin St. Louis/VMM; Photos 2 and 3 by Gene Gagne/OutsideGroove.com)
CLAREMONT, N.H. -- Three years ago, Mark Lamberton was one of the hottest drivers on the ACT Late Model Tour, and certainly the face of New York-based Late Model racing in northern New England. Friday, he'll try to rekindle those flames as he returns to the race track at Twin State Speedway in Claremont, N.H.The Mooers Forks, N.Y. driver has been absent from ACT competition since finishing fifth in championship points in 2006, but will make his return behind the wheel of the #16 Richard Green Trucking Ford normally driven by Joey Becker. Lamberton has been a part-time crew member with the team for two seasons, and has also been serving as crew chief for Sportsman driver Bill Sawyer at Airborne Speedway in Plattsburgh, N.Y. this year. With Lamberton turning wrenches, Becker turned in a season-best third-place finish at Thunder Road in Barre on August 20.
Lamberton's most recent on-track experience was in the Modified division at Airborne in 2007.
"I've been hanging around the last few years looking for the right opportunity to come along," said Lamberton. "I've raced a Modified, I've worked on cars, I tried a bunch of things, but [racing with ACT] is what I want to be doing. In all my years of racing, it was the most fun I ever had. I've missed it."
Initial plans call for Lamberton to be in the Rick Green-owned car at Twin State on Friday and at the Fall Foliage 300 at Airborne Speedway on Sept. 13. Becker will drive the car at Thunder Road on Sunday in the Bond Auto Labor Day Classic 200 and at the Chittenden Bank Milk Bowl later in the month. Ironically, it was Becker and Lamberton that turned in one of the most memorable finishes in Thunder Road history in 2004, as they traded the lead more than a dozen times during the final 35 laps of the Memorial Day Classic -- Lamberton spun, Becker won.Green said that he was considering putting Lamberton in a full-time ACT Late Model Tour ride for 2010 when he got a call from ACT President Tom Curley. "Tom approached me about getting Mark into one of my cars at the 300," Green explained, noting that Curley thought Lamberton, who won both the Foliage event and the Airborne Speedway Late Model track championship in 2001, might be an added attraction to the race. "I had already thought about having him race for us on the Tour next year, but when Tom called, I figured we might as well speed up the process and get things rolling sooner rather than later."
Curley clearly thinks highly of Green's new driver. "[Lamberton's family] along with his whole team always represented to me exactly why I have stayed in this business for so long," Curley said Tuesday. "If I could have 30 Mark Lambertons on the road each week, I would keep doing this until I either dropped dead or became so senile that they threw me out. He is in the same racer mold as Brent Dragon, Randy Potter, Phil Scott, Cris Michaud, Donald Theetge, Jamie Fisher, Karl Allard, as well as a bunch of others, and you know how much respect I have for those kinds of racers and teams.
"Mark is one of the best natural racers I have ever known," Curley continued. "He captured my respect when I watched him struggle for years at Thunder Road, and he kept coming back until he finally became pretty good there. I loved that tenacity that he brought to his racing. He is a hell of a good racer that understands the business as much as he understands how to race cars. "
Curley also said that should Lamberton win one of the events at Twin State or Airborne -- both of which are qualifiying races for the ACT Invitational at New Hampshire Motor Speedway on Sept. 19 -- he would consider inviting him to compete in the race, despite not having any track time at the 1.058-mile superspeedway. "I said to someone the other day that [Lamberton] would be about the only driver I would consider inviting to the Invitational without having been
to the test-and-tune (last week). I have that much respect for him as a long track racer," Curley said. Lamberton's three ACT Late Model Tour wins all came at Airborne, a fast, 4/10-mile oval, and a significant number of his career ACT top-five finishes have come at Airborne, the 5/8-mile Riverside Speedway in Ste-Croix, Qué., and the 9/10-mile Sanair Super Speedway near Montréal."Mark has helped us change a lot on the setup of the car already, so these races will be a good test to get any bugs worked out," said Green. "And he's a very good driver, so who knows, maybe we can make something out of it. It should be fun."
Lamberton finished fourth at Twin State in his own car at ACT's last visit in 2004. "It was a few years ago and in a different car, but I liked the track at Claremont and I'm hoping we can do well there again. And the 300, I can't wait for that. I wanted to get a ride for that race as soon as [ACT] announced it last year. I hope I make Rick and Joey proud."
(PHOTOS: 1. Mark Lamberton will return to the driver's seat this weekend at Twin State Speedway in one of Richard Green's #16 cars; 2. Lamberton (#29) and Joey Becker (#16) battle at Thunder Road in 2004; 3. Lamberton (#29) on the way to winning the Fall Foliage 200 at Airborne Speedway in 2001. Photo 1 by Justin St. Louis/VMM; Photos 2 and 3 by Gene Gagne/OutsideGroove.com)
Saturday, August 22, 2009
Ragan to Drive Phil Scott Team Car
MIDDLESEX -- Car owner and crew chief Pete Duto confirmed Saturday that NASCAR Sprint Cup Series driver David Ragan of Unadilla, Ga. will compete at Barre's Thunder Road Int'l Speedbowl on Thursday in a car prepared by Duto as a teammate to multi-time "King of the Road" Phil Scott.However, exactly which car Ragan will be in is still up in the air.
"The plan right now is to have (Ragan) in Phil's green car on Thursday," said Duto, who prepares Scott's cars and is the registered owner of the #55NH car run primarily on the ACT Late Model Tour by Brad Leighton.
Scott will drive the green car in a test at New Hampshire Motor Speedway in Loudon, N.H. on Tuesday, in preparation for the ACT Invitational on Sept. 19.
"Depending on how the test at Loudon goes, Ragan will be in that car," said Duto. "But if we need to make a lot of changes, then we'll put him in Brad's car. But then again, that's not for certain, either; there's a lot of (ACT) racing coming up with Claremont (Twin State Speedway), Labor Day (at Thunder Road), and everything else. We'll know more next week."
Ragan earned his second career NASCAR Nationwide Series win at Bristol Motor Speedway on Friday night.
Thursday's 100-lap Vt. State Employees Credit Union feature at Thunder Road will decide the 2009 "King of the Road." Scott, of Montpelier, enters the event 52 points behind leader Jean-Paul Cyr of Milton. Post time is 6:00pm.
Thursday, August 13, 2009
The Juice: Either Come Back or Get Out
-by Justin St. Louis
When is Kevin Lepage going to find something else to do? The guy should have retired five years ago and opened up, I don't know, a boat sales shop or a car dealership or a movie theater or something. Instead, he's now become just a guy that everyone says, "Who is that?" about when the Nationwide Series finishes are posted. And it's a shame.
Lepage was one of the racers I cheered for while I was growing up, because he won his share of races, mostly while driving and maintaining his own cars, and was one of the only Vermont drivers in the late 1980s and early '90s that could keep pace with the Canadian and Maine-based cars. He had some Vermont work ethic in him. He went out and got his own sponsorship dollars from Citgo and Allen Lumber, built his operation from the ground up, and became one of the better drivers in the northeast. One of the few that could beat Junior Hanley a couple times a year. His magical 1993 season was an exciting thing to watch, capped off by his Milk Bowl double win in both the Pro Stock and Late Model divisions.
When Lepage moved south out of his Shelburne, Vt. roots in 1994, he again did it on his own, with his own cars and equipment, and a hard-earned sponsorship from Vermont Teddy Bear. He finally got hooked up with some top-notch cars owned by David Ridling in 1996 and broke through with his first Busch Series win at Homestead, finishing eighth in points. The next year he had a handful of impressive runs in the #91 Winston Cup car, and began a full-season effort in 1998 with the team, only to be picked up midstream by powerhouse Jack Roush. Along the way, he took another Busch win at Bristol. It really was a very proud time for Vermonters with an interest in racing. When Lepage came back to Thunder Road, he was treated like a bona fide celebrity, which, in this area of hard-working folks that do what they can to scratch out a modest living, he probably deserved.
But then the bottom sort of started to fall out. Lepage's downfall in the Cup Series might be blamed on the fact that he was in the Roush's "R&D" car, the #16 ride. Ted Musgrave had been moderately successful in the car, but as the Roush organization began to expand around the time Lepage arrived, the car became more of an in-race test dummy. With Lepage's on-track performances likely suffering from that scenario, his market value dipped. After a breakup with Roush, Lepage was rideless for the first part of 2001 before taking over the once-stout Kodak #4 car for Larry McClure. Then came the Jim Smith #7 team that became the bastard child of Geoff Bodine's ex-team, which was the ex-team of the late Alan Kulwicki. Then McClure's stuff again in 2003, followed by pick-up rides in third-rate cars owned by people no one had ever heard of.
Lepage re-opened his Busch Series team during the first stint with McClure, then stepped into the potent #37 Timber Wolf car after Jeff Purvis was injured. Lepage put the car on the pole position a couple of times, but for whatever reason, never produced the finishes to back up the qualifying performances. And again, his market value dipped on that series.
Since around 2004, Lepage has been a go-to guy for any car owner looking to do the start-and-park thing, which is a great way to make enough money to pay your monthly bills, but a horrible excuse to own a "race" team. His current gig is on the Nationwide Series, splitting time between a car owned by former driver Jimmy Means, and running a two-car team with Derrike Cope -- whose career practically mirrors Lepage's, by the way, from the hometown beginning to today. Lepage's best finish this year has been 33rd in one of Means' cars at Texas Motor Speedway, when he finished 11 laps down. So far, it's the only race he's finished, and it's also the only race he's made it past halfway in.
That's just plain embarrassing. For all of us.
Let's face it, Kevin Lepage was probably never going to be the next Dale Earnhardt. But he could have been the next Ricky Rudd or Geoff Bodine, guys who owned their own stuff or drove for other prominent teams here and there, ripping off a Cup win or three every year.
For a guy that was proud to come from humble beginnings -- building a respectable career after flopping around at Thunder Road and Catamount Stadium for a few years -- this is not how it should have been. Kevin Lepage was not the next Dale Earnhardt; there were five or six Kevin Lepage types from the northeast that could have gone south and done as well or better. But Lepage himself was living the short track racer's dream, and built a name for himself at the top levels of the sport. Then, somewhere along the way, he forgot about that.
Would he have been better off running a Cup team on his own? Should he have stayed in the Busch/Nationwide Series full-time after losing the Roush ride, and tried to become a star there? There's really no telling now. It's a moot point. Kevin Lepage was on his way, but the road got rocky and it seems like Lepage just threw up his hands and gave up. And once he did that, he should have started himself a business outside of racing -- his Cup and Nationwide career winnings have totalled over $15 million, he could have probably afforded a restaurant or something -- and returned to the short tracks of the Carolinas or even back home in New England. There would have been no shame in that at all. There still would be no shame in it.
But to a kid like me that grew up saving newspaper clippings of the local guy making it big in NASCAR, well, we've given up on Kevin Lepage, at least nationally. He should get himself a short track car and begin a new career, or pick up where he left off in 1993. Rich Bickle did it, Dave Mader did it, Jimmy Horton did it, and they were wildly successful after their cup of coffee in NASCAR. Or just get out entirely. Do it for all of us. Do it for Vermont.
Lepage should think back to victory lane at at Claremont Int'l Speedway in 1987, where he was standing next to a car hastily cobbled together by he and his father after getting dropped from the E.J. Prescott ride, and remember why he ever got in a race car in the first place. Was it so he could split $22,000 with Derrike Cope after a 10-lap tour of Gateway Int'l Raceway, or was it so he could be the best racer on the track? Get out, come home, and build a Late Model. Win a Thursday night show at Thunder Road. Do it for all us.
But most of all, do it for yourself.
***
Not gonna lie, I'm excited to get back to Bear Ridge this Saturday night.
***
I'm hearing ACT point leader Scott Payea will drop in on Thunder Road tonight to test some new setups in his car.
***
Brian Hoar on his race for the win at Waterford Speedbowl last weekend: "This is the funniest thing I've ever said in my life, but Brad Leighton thought I drove him rough. That's bulls**t. And that's a direct quote. Write that down. He got his hand caught in the candy jar. I stuck my car up to his door and he came down and made contact. It was bulls**t. I'm obviously not going to hit the brakes. I like Brad, I've known him for a long time, but I knew it was going to be hard racing. If he's got a problem with me, we'll work it out."
Joey Polewarczyk on racing with Hoar, after the two tangled at Airborne Speedway in May and again last weekend at Waterford: "He blatantly drove over my nose. I'm not taking his crap any more. It's happened to me too many times."
Hoar on his incident with Polewarczyk at Waterford: "He's upset because he spun out. We were racing side-by-side and we touched. It wasn't hard, I didn't chop him. It was nothing intentional. I rather would have raced Joey Polewarczyk for the lead than Brad Leighton, given the choice. One time we had a minor problem on the track, and I thought it was over by the end of the race. I'm sure I've got an 'X' on my back now, but I'd like to think that he and his team will calm down."
Sounds like we missed a good one.
***
I'm 26. I started going to races regularly when I was four years old, and have been at no less than five races a year since then. So, by my calcuations, I've got only 18 years left before I'll know what I'm talking about. At least I'm over the hump, right?
***
I like the term "Money Month". It's catchy, and, quite honestly, there's a ton of dough on the line for the ACT teams.
***
My biggest fear is that the upcoming ACT Invitational qualifier at Wiscasset Raceway in Maine this Sunday will turn out to be a bad joke. Between track reports and what we're hearing from everyone out that way, Wiscasset will be lucky to get 25 Late Models for a show that pays the winner $5,000 and a trip to Loudon. At that point, you have to worry about track owner Doug White, who will pay another $5,000 to the winner of a companion 150-lap Pro Stock race on the same day -- one that is expected to draw no more than 20 or 22 cars -- and has been losing money every time the gates swing open this year. Good luck, Mr. White.
***
Two words: Jason Bay.
***
AROUND THE REGION:
Time to take a look at the top Vermonters from the past weekend...
ACT Late Model Tour: Brian Hoar of Williston made it two-for-two by winning the Nutmeg State 100 at Waterford Speedbowl in Connecticut on Saturday night. Point leader Scott Payea of Milton finished third behind Randy Potter, and Graniteville's John Donahue was fourth. Brent Dragon of Milton finished sixth, and Tyler Cahoon of St. Johnsbury earned his second top-ten finish of the season and of his ACT career in tenth place.
Airborne Speedway (Plattsburgh, N.Y.): Don Scarborough of Brandon was the top Vermonter in Saturday's Modified race, finishing sixth. Rich Watson of Milton was the lone Sportsman driver in the feature, finishing 15th. Milton's Rob Gordon was the runner-up in the Renegade feature; Swanton's Dave Rabtoy was ninth, with Lance Rabtoy of Fairfax tenth. Billy Jenkins of Milton was seventh in the Mini-Modified feature, and Brad Bushey of Georgia was tenth in the Bomber race.
Albany-Saratoga Speedway (Malta, N.Y.): Todd Stone of Middlebury finished fifth in the 358 Modified feature on Friday night, while Rob Langevin of Londonderry was the runner-up in the Sportsman class. Frank Hoard, III of Manchester finished fifth in the Budget Sportsman feature. Lori Langevin of Londerderry was third in the Pro Street Stock feature with Manchester's Chuck Towslee fifth, Fred Little of Salisbury seventh, and Ed Thompson of Fair Haven eighth.
Bear Ridge Speedway (Bradford): Gary Siemons of Orford, N.H. posted his second Sportsman Modified win of the season on Saturday night, over Bob Shepard of West Topsham, Travis Shinn of Groton, N.H., Blake Shepard of Newton, N.H., and Jeremy Huntoon of Bradford. Josh Harrington of Topsham won the three-segment Sportsman Coupe "Madness" event over Melvin Pierson of Topsham, Bryan King of Corinth, and Bradford rookies Billy Simmons and Jason Horniak. Dan Eastman of Thetford Center won his eighth Limited Late Model feature of the season over Troy Comeau of Alexandria, N.H., Will Hull of East Montpelier, Dan Cook of South Tamworth, N.H., and Jeremy Hodge of Bradford. Sharon's Mitch Durkee won the Fast Four feature, followed by Wilder's Andy Johnson, Steve Bell of St. Johnsbury, Mark Brown, and Kevin Harran of St. Johnsbury. Tom Placey of Bradford won his sixth consecutive Hornet feature, with Groton's Charlie Lakin, Karl Sheldon of St. Johnsbury, Amanda Gray of East Thetford, and Bobby Bell of St. Johnsbury completing the top five. Misty Bell of St. Johnsbury won the Hornet Queen race.
Canaan Dirt Speedway (Canaan, N.H.): Thetford Center's Dave Lacasse finished sixth in the Modified feature on Friday night, with Todd Petschke of Windsor seventh. Will Hull of East Montpelier was the Street Stock runner-up, with Ascutney's Cricket Williams eighth and Dan Eastman of Thetford Center tenth. Josh Sunn of White River Junction was the Fast Four runner-up with Wilder's Andy Johnson third and Ryan Dutton of Bradford eighth.
Canaan Fair Speedway (Canaan, N.H.): Kris Lyman of West Hartford was the Pro Stock runner-up on Saturday, while Bradford's Arnie Stylges finished third in the Super Street race. Jamie Hodgdon of Ascutney won the Pure Stock feature with Kyle Davis of Pittsford eighth and Rory Merritt of North Springfield ninth. White River Junction drivers Bobby Prior and Josh Sunn went 1-2 in the Outlaw Mini Stock race, with Robert Gioia of East Thetford third and Chris Lyman of Hartland fifth. Kyle Small of Quechee won the Bandit race over Ascutney's Tyler Lescord.
Devil's Bowl Speedway (West Haven): Defending track champion Todd Stone of Middlebury took his first 358 Modified win of the season on Sunday, over Kris Vernold of Glens Falls, N.Y., Vince Quenneville, Jr. of Brandon, Gardner Stone of Middlebury (Todd's father), and Ray Hoard of Granville, N.Y. Jimmy Ryan of Whiting was sixth, with the top-ten completed by Don Mattison of Wells, Cullen Howe of South Londonderry, point leader Kenny Tremont, Jr. of West Sand Lake, N.Y., and Frank Hoard, Sr. of Manchester. Frank Hoard, III of Manchester won the Budget Sportsman feature over South Londonderry's Seth Howe, Jack Swinton of Hudson Falls, N.Y., Josh Joseph of South Glens Falls, N.Y., and C.V. Elms, III of North Haverhill, N.H. Salisbury's Fred Little won the Pro Street Stock race over Cale Kneer of Troy, N.Y., Carl Vladyka of Fair Haven, Mike Bussino, and Chuck Towslee of Manchester. Randy Alger won the Limited feature over Bill Duprey of Hydeville, and Colin Clow of Troy, N.Y. won the Mini Stock feature.
Monadnock Speedway (Winchester, N.H.): Dana Shepard of Putney finished 11th in the Super Stock race on Saturday. Dick Houle of West Brattleboro won the 4-cylinder Enduro.
Riverside Speedway (Groveton, N.H.): Bob Ailes, Sr. of St. Johnsbury was the runner-up in the Late Model feature on Saturday night, with Howard Switser of West Burke third, Paul Schartner, III of Lyndonville sixth, Stephen Hodgdon of Danville eighth, and Brett Gervais of Island Pond ninth. Derek Ming of Island Pond won again in the Outlaw Sportsman division over Davey Ofsuryk of Newport Center. West Burke's Jesse Switser was the Street Stock runner-up with Lyndonville's Dean Switser fourth. In twin Dwarf Car features, Concord's Toby Merchant posted finishes of second and fourth, while Lyndonville's Ernie LaPlant was third and ninth. Andy Simpson of Lyndon Center beat Anthony Mason of Orleans for the Cyclone win, while sisters Lyndsay and Johanna Christman of Cabot finished second and fourth in the Angels, resepectively.
SCoNE 360 Sprint Cars: Mark Cole of Lebanon, N.H. won at Canaan (N.H.) Dirt Speedway on Friday night over Ossipee, N.H.'s Clay Dow and Lacey Hanson of Orwell. Dow won at Bear Ridge Speedway in Bradford on Saturday night, with Matt Shuart second and Bob Giuliani of Middletown, N.H. third.
Série ACT-Castrol: Patrick Laperle of St-Denis-sur-Richelieu, Qué. won the Luminaire Napert 150 at Autodrome Chaudière on Saturday night for his second-straight win. Trampas Demers of South Burlington finished 20th.
Thunder Road Int'l Speedbowl (Barre): On Thursday, Rich Lowrey of Charlotte was the Late Model winner over Shelburne's Jamie Fisher, Milton's Jean-Paul Cyr and Eric Chase, and Phil Scott of Montpelier. Mark Barnier of Essex Junction won the Tiger Sportsman feature over Milton's Eric Badore, Joel Hodgdon of Craftsbury, Hinesburg's Tommy Therrien, and Ricky Roberts of Washington. Ron Gabaree of Barre won the Street Stock feature over rookies Danny Doyle of Hancock and Scott Weston of Berlin, Greg Adams, Jr. of Hardwick, and Tim Campbell of West Topsham. Kevin Streeter of Waitsfield took his fifth Junkyard Warrior win of the year over Donny Yates of North Montpelier, Alex Whitcomb of Montpelier, John Prentice of Northfield, and Ken Christman of Cabot. On Sunday, Bill Davis of Monson, Mass. won $5,000 with his victory in the 25th Annual M&M Beverage Enduro 250. Mike MacAskill of Williamstown won the 50-lap Street Stock special over Elmore's David Whitcomb, Tommy Smith of Williamstown, rookie Tucker Williams of Hyde Park, and Danville's Jason Corliss. Bunker Hodgdon of Hardwick made his return to the Warriors with a win over Williamstown's Lance Donald, Kevin Dodge of Barre, Keith Fortier of Hinesburg, and Christman.
True Value Modified Racing Series: Jon McKennedy of Chelmsford, Mass. took another win and extended his point lead at Beech Ridge Motor Speedway in Scarborough, Me. on Saturday night. David Pinkham of Buxton, Me. was second, followed by Ascutney's Dwight Jarvis.
Twin State Speedway (Claremont, N.H.): Dallas Trombley of Rutland won the Late Model feature on Friday with Ascutney's Chris Riendeau seventh. Peter Jarvis of Ascutney won the Modified feature, with son Joey Jarvis fourth, Robert Hagar of Windsor fifth, Nate Kehoe of Windham seventh, and Leo Martin of Windsor tenth. Russ Davis of Cavendish won the Super Street feature with Dave Davis of White River Junction fourth, Bruce Jaycox of Hartland seventh, and Chris Wilk of Mendon ninth. Josh Lovely of Barre was the Strictly Stock runner-up with Tara Tarbell of Springfield fifth, Kyle Davis of Pittsford sixth, and and Jeremy Blood of West Hartford seventh. Kyle Small of Quechee won the Wildcat feature over Jeremiah Losee of North Springfield and Cody Small of Hartland.
White Mountain Motorsports Park (North Woodstock, N.H.): Bernie Lantagne of McIndoe Falls was the runner-up in Saturday's 100-lap feature, with Stacy Cahoon of St. Johnsbury third and Eric Williams of Hyde Park eighth. Stevie Parker of Lyndonville was fifth in the Strictly Stock feature, and Concord driver Rubin Call was the Strictly Stock Mini runner-up.
***
Thunder Road Int'l Speedbowl in Barre has a doubleheader week with full race cards on Thursday and Friday -- including the ACT Tiger Sportsman Tri-State Series finale on Thursday -- while regular events are on tap at Albany-Saratoga, Canaan Dirt, and Twin State on Friday night. The PASS North Super Late Models are at Seekonk (Mass.) Speedway on Saturday night, while the True Value Modified Racing Series is at Waterford (Conn.) Speedbowl, and regular events are scheduled for Bear Ridge Speedway in Bradford, Airborne, Canaan Fair, Monadnock, Riverside, and White Mountain. Wiscasset (Me.) Raceway holds an ACT Invitational qualifier on Sunday, Riverside (N.H.) Speedway has the $5,000-to-win "Clash of the Titans 150" Late Model event with PASS Sportsman also on the card, and Devil's Bowl Speedway in West Haven will have a 50-lap Budget Sportsman feature and regular event.
When is Kevin Lepage going to find something else to do? The guy should have retired five years ago and opened up, I don't know, a boat sales shop or a car dealership or a movie theater or something. Instead, he's now become just a guy that everyone says, "Who is that?" about when the Nationwide Series finishes are posted. And it's a shame.
Lepage was one of the racers I cheered for while I was growing up, because he won his share of races, mostly while driving and maintaining his own cars, and was one of the only Vermont drivers in the late 1980s and early '90s that could keep pace with the Canadian and Maine-based cars. He had some Vermont work ethic in him. He went out and got his own sponsorship dollars from Citgo and Allen Lumber, built his operation from the ground up, and became one of the better drivers in the northeast. One of the few that could beat Junior Hanley a couple times a year. His magical 1993 season was an exciting thing to watch, capped off by his Milk Bowl double win in both the Pro Stock and Late Model divisions.
When Lepage moved south out of his Shelburne, Vt. roots in 1994, he again did it on his own, with his own cars and equipment, and a hard-earned sponsorship from Vermont Teddy Bear. He finally got hooked up with some top-notch cars owned by David Ridling in 1996 and broke through with his first Busch Series win at Homestead, finishing eighth in points. The next year he had a handful of impressive runs in the #91 Winston Cup car, and began a full-season effort in 1998 with the team, only to be picked up midstream by powerhouse Jack Roush. Along the way, he took another Busch win at Bristol. It really was a very proud time for Vermonters with an interest in racing. When Lepage came back to Thunder Road, he was treated like a bona fide celebrity, which, in this area of hard-working folks that do what they can to scratch out a modest living, he probably deserved.
But then the bottom sort of started to fall out. Lepage's downfall in the Cup Series might be blamed on the fact that he was in the Roush's "R&D" car, the #16 ride. Ted Musgrave had been moderately successful in the car, but as the Roush organization began to expand around the time Lepage arrived, the car became more of an in-race test dummy. With Lepage's on-track performances likely suffering from that scenario, his market value dipped. After a breakup with Roush, Lepage was rideless for the first part of 2001 before taking over the once-stout Kodak #4 car for Larry McClure. Then came the Jim Smith #7 team that became the bastard child of Geoff Bodine's ex-team, which was the ex-team of the late Alan Kulwicki. Then McClure's stuff again in 2003, followed by pick-up rides in third-rate cars owned by people no one had ever heard of.
Lepage re-opened his Busch Series team during the first stint with McClure, then stepped into the potent #37 Timber Wolf car after Jeff Purvis was injured. Lepage put the car on the pole position a couple of times, but for whatever reason, never produced the finishes to back up the qualifying performances. And again, his market value dipped on that series.
Since around 2004, Lepage has been a go-to guy for any car owner looking to do the start-and-park thing, which is a great way to make enough money to pay your monthly bills, but a horrible excuse to own a "race" team. His current gig is on the Nationwide Series, splitting time between a car owned by former driver Jimmy Means, and running a two-car team with Derrike Cope -- whose career practically mirrors Lepage's, by the way, from the hometown beginning to today. Lepage's best finish this year has been 33rd in one of Means' cars at Texas Motor Speedway, when he finished 11 laps down. So far, it's the only race he's finished, and it's also the only race he's made it past halfway in.
That's just plain embarrassing. For all of us.
Let's face it, Kevin Lepage was probably never going to be the next Dale Earnhardt. But he could have been the next Ricky Rudd or Geoff Bodine, guys who owned their own stuff or drove for other prominent teams here and there, ripping off a Cup win or three every year.
For a guy that was proud to come from humble beginnings -- building a respectable career after flopping around at Thunder Road and Catamount Stadium for a few years -- this is not how it should have been. Kevin Lepage was not the next Dale Earnhardt; there were five or six Kevin Lepage types from the northeast that could have gone south and done as well or better. But Lepage himself was living the short track racer's dream, and built a name for himself at the top levels of the sport. Then, somewhere along the way, he forgot about that.
Would he have been better off running a Cup team on his own? Should he have stayed in the Busch/Nationwide Series full-time after losing the Roush ride, and tried to become a star there? There's really no telling now. It's a moot point. Kevin Lepage was on his way, but the road got rocky and it seems like Lepage just threw up his hands and gave up. And once he did that, he should have started himself a business outside of racing -- his Cup and Nationwide career winnings have totalled over $15 million, he could have probably afforded a restaurant or something -- and returned to the short tracks of the Carolinas or even back home in New England. There would have been no shame in that at all. There still would be no shame in it.
But to a kid like me that grew up saving newspaper clippings of the local guy making it big in NASCAR, well, we've given up on Kevin Lepage, at least nationally. He should get himself a short track car and begin a new career, or pick up where he left off in 1993. Rich Bickle did it, Dave Mader did it, Jimmy Horton did it, and they were wildly successful after their cup of coffee in NASCAR. Or just get out entirely. Do it for all of us. Do it for Vermont.
Lepage should think back to victory lane at at Claremont Int'l Speedway in 1987, where he was standing next to a car hastily cobbled together by he and his father after getting dropped from the E.J. Prescott ride, and remember why he ever got in a race car in the first place. Was it so he could split $22,000 with Derrike Cope after a 10-lap tour of Gateway Int'l Raceway, or was it so he could be the best racer on the track? Get out, come home, and build a Late Model. Win a Thursday night show at Thunder Road. Do it for all us.
But most of all, do it for yourself.
***
Not gonna lie, I'm excited to get back to Bear Ridge this Saturday night.
***
I'm hearing ACT point leader Scott Payea will drop in on Thunder Road tonight to test some new setups in his car.
***
Brian Hoar on his race for the win at Waterford Speedbowl last weekend: "This is the funniest thing I've ever said in my life, but Brad Leighton thought I drove him rough. That's bulls**t. And that's a direct quote. Write that down. He got his hand caught in the candy jar. I stuck my car up to his door and he came down and made contact. It was bulls**t. I'm obviously not going to hit the brakes. I like Brad, I've known him for a long time, but I knew it was going to be hard racing. If he's got a problem with me, we'll work it out."
Joey Polewarczyk on racing with Hoar, after the two tangled at Airborne Speedway in May and again last weekend at Waterford: "He blatantly drove over my nose. I'm not taking his crap any more. It's happened to me too many times."
Hoar on his incident with Polewarczyk at Waterford: "He's upset because he spun out. We were racing side-by-side and we touched. It wasn't hard, I didn't chop him. It was nothing intentional. I rather would have raced Joey Polewarczyk for the lead than Brad Leighton, given the choice. One time we had a minor problem on the track, and I thought it was over by the end of the race. I'm sure I've got an 'X' on my back now, but I'd like to think that he and his team will calm down."
Sounds like we missed a good one.
***
I'm 26. I started going to races regularly when I was four years old, and have been at no less than five races a year since then. So, by my calcuations, I've got only 18 years left before I'll know what I'm talking about. At least I'm over the hump, right?
***
I like the term "Money Month". It's catchy, and, quite honestly, there's a ton of dough on the line for the ACT teams.
***
My biggest fear is that the upcoming ACT Invitational qualifier at Wiscasset Raceway in Maine this Sunday will turn out to be a bad joke. Between track reports and what we're hearing from everyone out that way, Wiscasset will be lucky to get 25 Late Models for a show that pays the winner $5,000 and a trip to Loudon. At that point, you have to worry about track owner Doug White, who will pay another $5,000 to the winner of a companion 150-lap Pro Stock race on the same day -- one that is expected to draw no more than 20 or 22 cars -- and has been losing money every time the gates swing open this year. Good luck, Mr. White.
***
Two words: Jason Bay.
***
AROUND THE REGION:
Time to take a look at the top Vermonters from the past weekend...
ACT Late Model Tour: Brian Hoar of Williston made it two-for-two by winning the Nutmeg State 100 at Waterford Speedbowl in Connecticut on Saturday night. Point leader Scott Payea of Milton finished third behind Randy Potter, and Graniteville's John Donahue was fourth. Brent Dragon of Milton finished sixth, and Tyler Cahoon of St. Johnsbury earned his second top-ten finish of the season and of his ACT career in tenth place.
Airborne Speedway (Plattsburgh, N.Y.): Don Scarborough of Brandon was the top Vermonter in Saturday's Modified race, finishing sixth. Rich Watson of Milton was the lone Sportsman driver in the feature, finishing 15th. Milton's Rob Gordon was the runner-up in the Renegade feature; Swanton's Dave Rabtoy was ninth, with Lance Rabtoy of Fairfax tenth. Billy Jenkins of Milton was seventh in the Mini-Modified feature, and Brad Bushey of Georgia was tenth in the Bomber race.
Albany-Saratoga Speedway (Malta, N.Y.): Todd Stone of Middlebury finished fifth in the 358 Modified feature on Friday night, while Rob Langevin of Londonderry was the runner-up in the Sportsman class. Frank Hoard, III of Manchester finished fifth in the Budget Sportsman feature. Lori Langevin of Londerderry was third in the Pro Street Stock feature with Manchester's Chuck Towslee fifth, Fred Little of Salisbury seventh, and Ed Thompson of Fair Haven eighth.
Bear Ridge Speedway (Bradford): Gary Siemons of Orford, N.H. posted his second Sportsman Modified win of the season on Saturday night, over Bob Shepard of West Topsham, Travis Shinn of Groton, N.H., Blake Shepard of Newton, N.H., and Jeremy Huntoon of Bradford. Josh Harrington of Topsham won the three-segment Sportsman Coupe "Madness" event over Melvin Pierson of Topsham, Bryan King of Corinth, and Bradford rookies Billy Simmons and Jason Horniak. Dan Eastman of Thetford Center won his eighth Limited Late Model feature of the season over Troy Comeau of Alexandria, N.H., Will Hull of East Montpelier, Dan Cook of South Tamworth, N.H., and Jeremy Hodge of Bradford. Sharon's Mitch Durkee won the Fast Four feature, followed by Wilder's Andy Johnson, Steve Bell of St. Johnsbury, Mark Brown, and Kevin Harran of St. Johnsbury. Tom Placey of Bradford won his sixth consecutive Hornet feature, with Groton's Charlie Lakin, Karl Sheldon of St. Johnsbury, Amanda Gray of East Thetford, and Bobby Bell of St. Johnsbury completing the top five. Misty Bell of St. Johnsbury won the Hornet Queen race.
Canaan Dirt Speedway (Canaan, N.H.): Thetford Center's Dave Lacasse finished sixth in the Modified feature on Friday night, with Todd Petschke of Windsor seventh. Will Hull of East Montpelier was the Street Stock runner-up, with Ascutney's Cricket Williams eighth and Dan Eastman of Thetford Center tenth. Josh Sunn of White River Junction was the Fast Four runner-up with Wilder's Andy Johnson third and Ryan Dutton of Bradford eighth.
Canaan Fair Speedway (Canaan, N.H.): Kris Lyman of West Hartford was the Pro Stock runner-up on Saturday, while Bradford's Arnie Stylges finished third in the Super Street race. Jamie Hodgdon of Ascutney won the Pure Stock feature with Kyle Davis of Pittsford eighth and Rory Merritt of North Springfield ninth. White River Junction drivers Bobby Prior and Josh Sunn went 1-2 in the Outlaw Mini Stock race, with Robert Gioia of East Thetford third and Chris Lyman of Hartland fifth. Kyle Small of Quechee won the Bandit race over Ascutney's Tyler Lescord.
Devil's Bowl Speedway (West Haven): Defending track champion Todd Stone of Middlebury took his first 358 Modified win of the season on Sunday, over Kris Vernold of Glens Falls, N.Y., Vince Quenneville, Jr. of Brandon, Gardner Stone of Middlebury (Todd's father), and Ray Hoard of Granville, N.Y. Jimmy Ryan of Whiting was sixth, with the top-ten completed by Don Mattison of Wells, Cullen Howe of South Londonderry, point leader Kenny Tremont, Jr. of West Sand Lake, N.Y., and Frank Hoard, Sr. of Manchester. Frank Hoard, III of Manchester won the Budget Sportsman feature over South Londonderry's Seth Howe, Jack Swinton of Hudson Falls, N.Y., Josh Joseph of South Glens Falls, N.Y., and C.V. Elms, III of North Haverhill, N.H. Salisbury's Fred Little won the Pro Street Stock race over Cale Kneer of Troy, N.Y., Carl Vladyka of Fair Haven, Mike Bussino, and Chuck Towslee of Manchester. Randy Alger won the Limited feature over Bill Duprey of Hydeville, and Colin Clow of Troy, N.Y. won the Mini Stock feature.
Monadnock Speedway (Winchester, N.H.): Dana Shepard of Putney finished 11th in the Super Stock race on Saturday. Dick Houle of West Brattleboro won the 4-cylinder Enduro.
Riverside Speedway (Groveton, N.H.): Bob Ailes, Sr. of St. Johnsbury was the runner-up in the Late Model feature on Saturday night, with Howard Switser of West Burke third, Paul Schartner, III of Lyndonville sixth, Stephen Hodgdon of Danville eighth, and Brett Gervais of Island Pond ninth. Derek Ming of Island Pond won again in the Outlaw Sportsman division over Davey Ofsuryk of Newport Center. West Burke's Jesse Switser was the Street Stock runner-up with Lyndonville's Dean Switser fourth. In twin Dwarf Car features, Concord's Toby Merchant posted finishes of second and fourth, while Lyndonville's Ernie LaPlant was third and ninth. Andy Simpson of Lyndon Center beat Anthony Mason of Orleans for the Cyclone win, while sisters Lyndsay and Johanna Christman of Cabot finished second and fourth in the Angels, resepectively.
SCoNE 360 Sprint Cars: Mark Cole of Lebanon, N.H. won at Canaan (N.H.) Dirt Speedway on Friday night over Ossipee, N.H.'s Clay Dow and Lacey Hanson of Orwell. Dow won at Bear Ridge Speedway in Bradford on Saturday night, with Matt Shuart second and Bob Giuliani of Middletown, N.H. third.
Série ACT-Castrol: Patrick Laperle of St-Denis-sur-Richelieu, Qué. won the Luminaire Napert 150 at Autodrome Chaudière on Saturday night for his second-straight win. Trampas Demers of South Burlington finished 20th.
Thunder Road Int'l Speedbowl (Barre): On Thursday, Rich Lowrey of Charlotte was the Late Model winner over Shelburne's Jamie Fisher, Milton's Jean-Paul Cyr and Eric Chase, and Phil Scott of Montpelier. Mark Barnier of Essex Junction won the Tiger Sportsman feature over Milton's Eric Badore, Joel Hodgdon of Craftsbury, Hinesburg's Tommy Therrien, and Ricky Roberts of Washington. Ron Gabaree of Barre won the Street Stock feature over rookies Danny Doyle of Hancock and Scott Weston of Berlin, Greg Adams, Jr. of Hardwick, and Tim Campbell of West Topsham. Kevin Streeter of Waitsfield took his fifth Junkyard Warrior win of the year over Donny Yates of North Montpelier, Alex Whitcomb of Montpelier, John Prentice of Northfield, and Ken Christman of Cabot. On Sunday, Bill Davis of Monson, Mass. won $5,000 with his victory in the 25th Annual M&M Beverage Enduro 250. Mike MacAskill of Williamstown won the 50-lap Street Stock special over Elmore's David Whitcomb, Tommy Smith of Williamstown, rookie Tucker Williams of Hyde Park, and Danville's Jason Corliss. Bunker Hodgdon of Hardwick made his return to the Warriors with a win over Williamstown's Lance Donald, Kevin Dodge of Barre, Keith Fortier of Hinesburg, and Christman.
True Value Modified Racing Series: Jon McKennedy of Chelmsford, Mass. took another win and extended his point lead at Beech Ridge Motor Speedway in Scarborough, Me. on Saturday night. David Pinkham of Buxton, Me. was second, followed by Ascutney's Dwight Jarvis.
Twin State Speedway (Claremont, N.H.): Dallas Trombley of Rutland won the Late Model feature on Friday with Ascutney's Chris Riendeau seventh. Peter Jarvis of Ascutney won the Modified feature, with son Joey Jarvis fourth, Robert Hagar of Windsor fifth, Nate Kehoe of Windham seventh, and Leo Martin of Windsor tenth. Russ Davis of Cavendish won the Super Street feature with Dave Davis of White River Junction fourth, Bruce Jaycox of Hartland seventh, and Chris Wilk of Mendon ninth. Josh Lovely of Barre was the Strictly Stock runner-up with Tara Tarbell of Springfield fifth, Kyle Davis of Pittsford sixth, and and Jeremy Blood of West Hartford seventh. Kyle Small of Quechee won the Wildcat feature over Jeremiah Losee of North Springfield and Cody Small of Hartland.
White Mountain Motorsports Park (North Woodstock, N.H.): Bernie Lantagne of McIndoe Falls was the runner-up in Saturday's 100-lap feature, with Stacy Cahoon of St. Johnsbury third and Eric Williams of Hyde Park eighth. Stevie Parker of Lyndonville was fifth in the Strictly Stock feature, and Concord driver Rubin Call was the Strictly Stock Mini runner-up.
***
Thunder Road Int'l Speedbowl in Barre has a doubleheader week with full race cards on Thursday and Friday -- including the ACT Tiger Sportsman Tri-State Series finale on Thursday -- while regular events are on tap at Albany-Saratoga, Canaan Dirt, and Twin State on Friday night. The PASS North Super Late Models are at Seekonk (Mass.) Speedway on Saturday night, while the True Value Modified Racing Series is at Waterford (Conn.) Speedbowl, and regular events are scheduled for Bear Ridge Speedway in Bradford, Airborne, Canaan Fair, Monadnock, Riverside, and White Mountain. Wiscasset (Me.) Raceway holds an ACT Invitational qualifier on Sunday, Riverside (N.H.) Speedway has the $5,000-to-win "Clash of the Titans 150" Late Model event with PASS Sportsman also on the card, and Devil's Bowl Speedway in West Haven will have a 50-lap Budget Sportsman feature and regular event.
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