It was a day for celebrating old and new Saturday in victory lane following the NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour Granite State Derby at Monadnock Speedway.
It was the iconic Ole Blue No. 3 car celebrating victory with first-time series winner Jake Johnson.
Behind Johnson at the checkered flag was Austin Beers in second and Patrick Emerling in third.
And it made for a unique situation that hadn’t been seen since the fifth event of the 2023 season on the Whelen Modified Tour.
Coming into Saturday’s Granite State Derby at Monadnock there had been 16 consecutive NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour events run where either Ron Silk or Justin Bonsignore had finished in the top-three.
Before Saturday, the last time the Whelen Modified Tour had run an event without Silk or Bonsignore finishing in the top-three was May 27, 2023 at Lee USA Speedway in Lee, N.H.
Matt Hirschman won that event at Lee with Jon McKennedy finishing second and Beers third. Silk was fifth in that event and Bonsignore ninth.
There were only two events during the 2023 season where neither Silk or Bonsignore was on the podium. The Lee event previously mentioned and the event at Richmond (Va.) Raceway on March 31, 2023. In the 2023 Richmond event, Bonsignore was fourth and Silk seventh.
Before Saturday at Monadnock, Silk and Bonsignore had combined to win 13 of the previous 21 Whelen Modified Tour events run since the start of the 2023 season.
Going into Saturday’s event at Monadnock the Whelen Modified Tour had run 21 consecutive events where either Silk or Bonsignore finished in the top-five. The last time a Whelen Modified Tour event was run that didn’t feature Silk or Bonsignore in the top five was on Oct. 27, 2022, which was the season finale at Martinsville (Va.) Speedway. Silk finished 11th in that event and Bonsignore was 29th.
That 2022 event at Martinsville also represents the last time the Whelen Modified Tour has run an event where neither Silk or Bonsignore finished in the top-10.
“AY” Nothing to worry about! Freshly laid asphalt.
With the repave, this was a new track for everybody. Surprised that Moran and Stone were that far off, especially with the practice.
Two more visits to Monadnock and they will be interesting and exciting. The pave is awesome!!!
It’s not like they got beat by back markers. All 3 podium cars are good cars piloted by talented drivers. Can’t win them all no matter how much money you spend. Actually kind of refreshing to see different people up there.
Maybe the Fury teams hired their biggest fan dareal as a consultant for this race. bahahahahaha!
This is how modified racing should be. Equal cars with different set up and drivers racing for a win. May the best combination win. No need for 8 addition guys at a 7k per year expense with license food and travel for pit stops that put all but 3 teams out of contention 80% of the time. Hence the entire article that the 2 teams that dominate didn’t even make the top 5 for the first time since dareal made an accurate statement. Believe it or not that is GREAT for this division. Racing teams with unlimited funds is tough when they have the budget to pay pit crews every race. Some teams pay 200.00 per guy per race! Where do you think the talent will go? To a team that can’t pay them or a team that can. TAKE THIS OUT!! That would cut about 50-60k per year from an already over budget budget. I bet every team would like to have an additional 50k to race off of. Oh……and by the way…. you can spend the 20k in pit equipment (some pit boxes run over 40k alone) on your yearly race expenses like tires and fuel. Yes…. I said it. The race was in my opinion was the best race of the year and I was home before 9pm. This is the future of our sport. Or it WILL DIE!!
To the guy that is going to respond with “but the fans love the pit stops.” Please. What would the fans rather watch? The 16 and 51 dominating a 17 car fields with 5 competitive cars or 30 cars showing up and 12 that could win like it used to be? You decide.