After five and a half years of effort, Sam Rameau recently celebrated his college graduation with a master’s degree in civil engineering from Wentworth Institute of Technology in Boston.
The 22-year old from Westminster, Mass. graduated with a 4.0 grade point average, proving he knows his way around school books as well as he does around race tracks.
“It’s pretty bittersweet saying this, but I am officially done college, which is awesome,” Rameau said. “It’s been a long five and a half years. But I officially graduated last week with my Masters in civil engineering. I just found out this past week that I graduated with distinction and a 4.0 [grade point average] at Wentworth Institute of Technology. It was a lot of hard work for the masters degree, I started it my junior year in undergrad school and finished it just a couple weeks ago while I was working full-time. So it was a lot of hard work.
“It’s truly bittersweet to kind of close the door to Wentworth. I truly treated that place as a home. It will always be another home. That was my life outside of racing.”
While Wentworth was the home when it came to studies, when it comes to race for Rameau, home is Monadnock Speedway in Winchester, N.H.
Rameau will make his first NASCAR Modified Tour start of 2025 in Saturday’s Cheshire County Clash at Monadnock. Rameau grew up at the track and has multiple wins there, including two wins there with the Monaco Modified Tri-Track Series (2020, 2021).
“I’m super excited to get back to the NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour,” Rameau said. “Obviously Monadnock is my home track, my team’s home track. There’s a lot of history there with the [Monaco Modified Tri-Track Series] and stuff like that, with [Modified Racing Series], Open shows, we’ve won some races there. Super excited to get back to Monadnock.
“Definitely looking forward to getting back to Monadnock for sure. It’s been a while. It’s pretty sweet to head back there. My team is excited, I’m excited. We have a bunch of sponsors coming out, so that’s really good.”
But Rameau will make his return to Monadock Speedway to visit an old home that has changed plenty since he was last there. Saturday’s will be Rameau’s first visit to the quarter-mile high banked oval since it was repaved prior to the 2024 season.
“I tested there a couple weeks ago,” Rameau said. “It’s going to take a lot of getting used to with the new racing surface. But it’s a beautiful facility. They’ve done such a great job with the racing surface, I’m so impressed.
The new racing surface means much of the successful notebook of the past for Rameau is out the window.
“Before a couple [weeks] ago I probably would have told you [the changes] are not that bad,” Rameau said. “I think Monadnock Speedway was one of the most technical race tracks in the Northeast. The racing surface – how rough it was – where the bumps were located on the race track made it very difficult to navigate and make passes and save your tires for long runs in races. It was very technical. Not saying that it’s still not technical, but it’s just different now. … We went there with a similar package that we used to [use] and we were good, good enough to be competitive, but I don’t think we were good enough to win. I think we’ve made the correct changes to be good enough to win now. … I like the race track, I like how fast it is, but I definitely miss the old racing surface.”
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