(Press release from Souza Media)
As the NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour season concludes this Thursday evening at Martinsville Speedway, the NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour will be in the spotlight. The championship battle is down to the final event of the 18 on the 2023 schedule and Justin Bonsignore has a shot to win the title.
He enters the race 13 points behind Ron Silk, looking for his fourth title. Although Bonsignore has goals of sealing the title Thursday, his other goal is winning a Grandfather Clock at Martinsville. The clock is a historic trophy in all of racing and Bonsignore would love to leave there Thursday with one to bring home to his living room.
In the last three years of running the ‘Paperclip’ track in Virginia, Bonsignore has finished on the podium twice and led 52 laps. He was running inside the top-five in the final laps last year before a mechanical issue.
The entire Kenneth Massa Motorsports team is excited for the opportunity in front of them.
“We just have to go to Martinsville and try to win the race,” Bonsignore said. “Leaving there with a Grandfather Clock would be special for all of us. As soon as they added Martinsville back to the Whelen Modified Tour schedule, it was one we circled on the calendar. We’re going to give it our best shot to win the race and see how the rest plays out after 200 laps.”
The schedule for the season-finale at Martinsville includes one practice from 3-4 p.m., followed by Mayhew qualifying at 5:30 p.m. and the Virginia Is For Racing Lovers 200 at 8 p.m. For those who can’t make it to the track, the race will be live on FloRacing.TV.
For more information on three-time NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour champion Justin Bonsignore, visit JustinBonsignore.com and follow his Athlete page on Facebook for the latest news and updates, including from the track on race day.
At least for now I’m a bigger fan of the Tour and never thought that would be the case enjoying all tour mod events for their uniqueness. The Haunted Hundred was pretty epic for sure. A shame on a couple fronts. It had to run so late ironically based on the success of the car counts. More specifically Hirschman winning something that over shadowed the intense competition going on behind him. To get in the feature and try to get in shouting distance of the front runner. Take out the 60 and it’s balanced, unpredictable racing at it’s best.
That said it doesn’t get much better then this Silk, Bonsignor battle that’s been raging for weeks. All coming down to this one race. Sure Silk has the upper hand but the 16 team has to seal the deal and the pressure is intense. The 51 gets to let it all hang out with nothing to lose and there’s no better driver to do that then J. Bonsignor a guy that always carries his brass knuckles in case he should need them.
Those Waterford guys can crow about the car counts that frankly the track didn’t have that much to do with it was the sanctioning groups. They can point fingers and mock the Tour for whatever reason it’s old hat at this point. Maybe you could start with having the finale in a place that will get a smattering of fans when it should be at Thompson.
Be that as it may there is no comparison to a NWMT finale where a season comes down to more then one team in a long race where anything can happen. Add in our man Preece signed for another year in the Bigs making his lone appearance in a modified this year, Meyers and a mix of southern boys and of course the PeeDee 60 just itching to show up the Tour guys yet again, come on man whose your daddy? For this moment in time it’s the Nascar Whelen Modified Tour for sure.
Sorry all you true racing patriots won’t get to see it knowing how you feel about watching races vs being there. I’ll let you now what happens.
where were you on this day 38 years ago?
the day that the music died!
i’ll never forget where i was!
space shuttle
9/11
Sox beating the Yankees in 04
Richie getting killed on 10/24/85
cmon race fans!!