For racers who were cooped up for what was seemingly the longest off-season in the history of off-season’s, it’s an idyllic situation.
Two divisions of Tour Type Modified racing running events on back-to-back days in New Hampshire.
The NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour makes its 2020 New England debut with a Fourth of July event at White Mountain Motorsports Park in Woodstock, N.H. The next day the Tri-Track Open Modified Series kicks off its 2020 schedule with a 100-lap event at Monadnock Speedway in Winchester, N.H.
And just the lineup of drivers planning to run both events would be the envy of any track promoter putting on a Modified event these days.
The drivers expected to be on the entry list for both events include Ron Silk, Matt Swanson, Dave Sapienza, Woody Pitkat, Chase Dowling, Craig Lutz, Matt Hirschman, Sammy Rameau and Anthony Nocella.
The Whelen Modified Tour will be visiting White Mountain for the first time for an event that was recently added to an ever evolving 2020 schedule for the series. Monadnock is just about two hours drive southwest from White Mountain.
“I’m really looking forward to it,” said Swanson, who races regularly with both divisions. “When I was growing up racing Quarter Midgets, that’s how me and my father did it. We’d go from one place on Friday to another place on Saturday to another place on Sunday. That’s the way I grew up racing. That’s just the rhythm I grew up following. It’s cool that I have my team at [Boehler Racing Enterprises] as well as Larry Westgate, my car owner for the Tri-Track [Open Modified Series] car, willing to have a long Fourth of July weekend away from their families. Trying to get some wins and keep doing what we’re doing.”
Lutz, who finished second in the Whelen Modified Tour season opening Wade Cole Memorial 133 presented by Dunleavy’s Truck & Trailer Repair on Sunday at Jennerstown Speedway, said he is looking to race whenever and wherever possible after the long delay in starting the season due to COVID-19 global pandemic shutdowns and restrictions.
“For me and my [Whelen Modified Tour team owner] Russell Goodale, the agreement we had is that we’re going to try to run as many races as possible,” said Lutz, who competes primarily with the Whelen Modified Tour. “Having the Monadnock race in the same weekend as the White Mountain race in the same state we figured, how can you miss that one?”
Sapienza, who owns his own team, will be looking to make his Tri-Track Open Modified Series debut at Monadnock.
“I’ve got all these race cars, I might as well use them,” Sapienza said. “You’re guaranteed $1,000 to start [the Tri-Track Open Modified Series event at Monadnock]. Who wouldn’t do that? We’re going to be up there anyway. Tri-Track is guaranteeing more [purse money] than NASCAR is. We’re going to be an hour or two away? Why not? We’re going to work our way toward home and go have some fun. We’ve got all the equipment, it’s time to start using it.”
Pitkat will run for Eddie Harvey Racing at Monadnock and for car owner Stan Mertz at Monadnock.
“At the end of the day I’m glad this worked out this way,” Pitkat said. “I want to race both of them and definitely want to race as much as I can.”
But dafella said they could run both at the same time with no conflict. I don’t know who to believe anymore.
This doubleheader sort of came to be due to Covid-19 but it reminds me of the old NH Cup weeks where Lee and Star and the others would host weeknight shows leading up to the weekend. I recall Ryan Newman turning laps at Lee in a NEMA midget. Can’t go wrong spending a few days or a week in lovely NH. Maybe next year, TT can incorporate a big weeknight show for the fans and drivers heading into the big Cup weekend. If not them, maybe LIM and Dick Williams. These doubleheaders are great in the summer months.
The number of WMT drivers/teams continues to grow for the TT event @ Monadnock. Going to be a good one.
Looks like weather might be an issue for Saturday, is WMT rain date Sunday? That will mess things up for lots of teams doing TTOMS at Monadnock.
Forecast is sunny and 80 for Saturday. Is that an issue? It’s going to rain all week in NH and turn nice on Friday. The way things have gone this year I fully expected rain but we should be good
Nascar doesn’t care about TT so running on Sunday isn’t an issue for them if it ever got to that point. Its a huge issue for many others but not for them.
Weather notwithstanding this will be a banner weekend for we streamers. Friday Stafford and their terrific stream that exceeded all expectations quality wise. White Mountain on Saturday via NBC Sports Gold. For Sunday the TTOMS race popped up on Speed51. Hopefully they will not have a blackout zone under the circumstances.
So, are these 50% capacity shows? What about buying tickets? Online or at the gate?
When are we going to learn more about the Tour schedule? Do they have plans to replace the Nor’Easter 100 with another track? Any chance there are races run at some of the NH short tracks that weren’t part of the original schedule? Are we at least looking good for the Musket 250?
JG,
I think everything right now is day to day, week to week and very fluid because of restrictions. There are no plans to reschedule the Nor’Easter 100 at another track. That’s just one of quite a few events either cancelled or currently postponed indefinitely. And even things that look in place today could all change if restrictions in places get implemented once again. Travel bans could also force changes. The Musket 200 (not 250 anymore) is still scheduled. As the addition of White Mountain proved, anything is possible as far as adding races to the schedule at various tracks, even if they’re not NASCAR sanctioned facilities.