The goal for Jacob Perry in heading to Lee USA Speedway Saturday for the 2021 finale day for the Modified Racing Series is the same goal he’s taken to every event this year.
Just win.
Perry will have two chances to achieve that goal Saturday with the Modified Racing Series running twin 50-lap features as part of the Octoberfest weekend festivities in Lee, N.H.
After recording two wins this season on the Modified Racing Series, Perry goes into the final day of action second in the series standings, trailing Brian Robie by 36 points.
“As of right now we’re trying not to think about points as much as possible,” Perry said. “That’s what we’ve done all year. Right now we’re trying to focus on getting two wins with the double features. We’re going there to trophy hunt and close out the year the best we absolutely we can. If [the championship] happens, that would be awesome. But right now we’re just chasing trophies.”
Perry held a 16-point lead over Robie in the standings following the Aug. 28 series event at Oxford Plains Speedway.
But a mechanical issue in the Star Classic 100 on Sept. 19 at Star Speedway in Epping, N.H. relegated Perry to a 21st place finish. With his fifth place at Star Robie was able to jump into a 15-point lead over Perry.
The series moved on to Claremont (N.H.) Speedway Saturday and through his heat race efforts Perry was able to cut Robie’s lead in the standings to 10 going into the feature.
A broken trailing arm led to a body rub and left rear flat 27 laps into Saturday’s event at Claremont. Unfortunately, Perry wasn’t able to get back on track before the race went back to green. Getting stuck in the track’s reentry chute watching a long green flag run essentially killed any hopes Perry had of salvaging a good points day at Claremont. He ended up 17th in the 18 car field, with Robie finishing fourth.
“At Star a mechanical failure happened and you know they’re going to happen through the year,” Perry said. “Star was our one mechanical failure. I was like ‘Alright, we push on to the next and we chase down Brian.’ After the heat race at Claremont I thought we were going to have a really good shot to get ourselves back into it. We were 10 points back going into the feature. Unfortunately we got stuck in the pit and that was very disheartening watching your championship chances go down the drain while you’re sitting in the chute waiting to go out.”
Perry had series wins this year at Monadnock Speedway in Winchester, N.H. on June 5 and Riverside Speedway in Groveton, N.H. on Aug. 7. He’s hoping to double that win total Saturday.
“It’s on to the next one and lets go win at Lee,” Perry said. “It’s all we can do.”
I looks like it’s going to be twin 40’s. The MRS site has a schedule up listing 40 lap features, as does the Oktoberfest schedule on the Lee USA site. I’m guessing it was a late change because they were listing twin 50’s previously.
Tenative Lee Octoberfest Entries
1. Derek Robbie 27ma
2. Brian Robie 25nh
3. Ryan Doucette 55a
4. Dan Meservey 45
5. George Sherman 93
6. Anthony Bello 12
7. Bill Dixon 33
8. Joey Jarvis 04vt
9. Andy Shaw 60
10. Carl Medeiros 50a
11. Matt Kimball 50
12. Kluth Motorsports 44 ?
13. Cameron Sontag 13
14. Stewart McCormack 04
15. Andrew Charron 31
16. Jacob Perry 47
17. Donnie Lashua 17
18. Tommy Barrett 07
19. Dylan Izzo 85
20. Max Zachem – 20
21. Jeff Gallup 4
22. Robert Bloxson 55b
23. Joey Doiron 16
24. Roscoe Racing 25 ??
25. Kirk Alexander 76
26. Kurt Vigeant 7
I’m pretty excited about this event. For one reason there are no generally considered top cars and drivers in what looks to be a darned good field of cars. If the 25 wants to stay home and get ready for the 300 so much the better. This allows the MRS to be what it was originally intended to be which is a northern tier modified centric tour.
The twin races also dynamite. Not a fan of hard tires and no pit stops and this will shuffle the deck without having the expense and risk of a pit stop.
Now if Spence can just bring his A game and not sleep walk through the event this should be a good one.