Harvick to run Oxford 250

Oxford Plains Speedway owner Bill Ryan can tell pretty early in the conversation when a driver is serious about his entry into Maine's annual summer stock-car racing classic.

"When they're like, 'What's the practice schedule?', I know they're pretty serious about it," Ryan said on Thursday afternoon, moments after confirming that defending Daytona 500 champion Kevin Harvick has filed an entry for the 35th annual TD Banknorth 250 at Oxford Plains on July 20.

Harvick first approached Ryan about running the race roughly three weeks ago.

"It moved along pretty quickly from there," Ryan said.

The entry parallels that of former NASCAR Cup Series champion Kurt Busch, who competed in the 250 in 2004. Like Busch, Harvick will prepare his own car for the Late Model event. Kevin Harvick Inc. will field and crew the car on race weekend.

Ryan said Harvick and his wife were discussing his 2008 schedule, deciding which prestigious short-track races they wanted to run. The TD Banknorth 250 was near the top of the list for the driver who runs the No. 29 Shell Chevrolets for Richard Childress Racing in the Sprint Cup Series, according to Ryan.

Matt Kenseth and Kyle Busch each participated in the Oxford 250 twice, and other current and former Cup drivers like Kevin Lepage, J.J. Yeley, Denny Hamlin, Ricky Craven and Terry Labonte have also run the race in recent years.

Reverse gear: 2007's Top 10

No. 6

Car of Tomorrow


Obviously, this story would appear much higher on the list if I were focused solely on the national stock car racing scene. But just because we're giving local interests the nod in this space doesn't mean New Englanders weren't affected by NASCAR's Car of Tomorrow.

Two rather uneventful races at New Hampshire International Speedway in 2007 made sure of that. Just ask the 100,000 people who paid somewhere in the neighborhood of 100 bucks a whack to watch a 43-car parade what they thought.

In that small sample of COT competition, some things became painfully evident. The improved competition NASCAR hoped to produce didn't materialize (at least not immediately) and a few teams (read: Hendrick Motorsports and Joe Gibbs Racing) had the early handle on the COT's performance and took advantage of that.

Only a late-race charge by Jeff Gordon in June provided anything in the way of drama during either Denny Hamlin's (June) or Clint Bowyer's (September) marches to victory lane. If NASCAR doesn't get the competition it seeks from the 2008 season -- when the Sprint Cup Series runs the COT exclusively -- then the multi-year project will prove to be a bust.

A big bust.

*****
7. Clark-Chapman rifts

8. Return of the outlaws

9. DEI signs with Andy Santerre Motorsports

10. Ben Rowe's 4th PASS North Series title

Reverse gear: 2007's Top 10

No. 7

The Clark-Chapman rifts

This was supposed to be the year in which Cassius Clark and his team ended the Ben Rowe-Johnny Clark stranglehold on the PASS North Series championship. Fresh off a 2006 in which Clark drove his Ed Chapman-owned car to more victories than anyone else, the team was by and large the pre-season favorite.

But before the engines even fired for the first practice session of 2007, Clark's team hit hard times. Clark and Chapman split after disagreements on the direction the team was taking. They patched things up in time for the rain-delayed season-opening event at Beech Ridge Motor Speedway, but it was just a sign of things to come.

Before the season was at the midpoint, they formidable pairing had split for a second time. Again, they patched things up in time to keep going and finish out the year.

Unfortunately, the rift only served to underline the entire slate of racing for the No. 8 team. Disqualifications following victories at Speedway 95 and Wiscasset Raceway and repeated engine troubles througout the year were merely overshadowed by what was happening off the track.

One of the region's best teams -- and one that long represented what a limited budget and hard work could accomplish in a sport where money means more and more to success -- was damaged by the discord. What's more troubling is that these types of wounds don't generally heal within race teams.

One little thing becomes another, and then becomes yet another, until no one is talking, even while working under the same roof on the same car during the week.

The team is good enough to contend for its first PASS North championship in 2008, but only if what happened in 2007 doesn't continue to follow the driver and owner.

*****

8. Return of the outlaws

9. DEI signs with Andy Santerre Motorsports

10. Ben Rowe's 4th PASS North Series title

Lawler added to Expo lineup

PASS South champion Ryan Lawler, a Texas native now living in North Carolina, will be at the 20th annual Northeast Motorsports Expo at the Augusta Civic Center, show director Tim Attaya confirmed.

Lawler will join 4-time and current PASS North Series champion Ben Rowe to sign autographs at the event, which will be held Jan. 5-7. Sunoco Race Fuels has put together a special hero card featuring both Lawler and Rowe that will be available for signatures.

For more info about the Expo, click here.

Reverse gear: 2007's Top 10

No. 8

Return of the 'outlaws'

It wasn't one race here or there that fed this story, but a series of occurences over the course of a long 2007 season.

Patrick Laperle hopping in a car owned by Mike Lux at the TD Banknorth 250. Brad Leighton, a multi-time Busch East Series champion taking a shot at both the TD Banknorth 250 and the PASS 300 at Beech Ridge. Ben and Mike Rowe in the Labor Day Classic 200 at Thunder Road in Vermont. Venerable Dave Dion has made a habit over the last half-decade of being where the money is.

The decade dominated by racers chasing points and championships -- and the prize money and, hopefully, national prestige that goes along with those titles -- seems to be dissipating slightly. That's opened the door to more and more racers who are going places just to race.

What it's doing for the sport on the local level is not easily quantified, though one thing is clear -- it feels like we've stepped back almost 2 decades. Now, big events are beginning to feel like big events again (despite an over-abundance of extra-distance races with big purses), where you truly never know whose haulers are going to show up in the pit area until race day.

That's obviously great for fans paying to see quality racing, but it's good for track owners and promoters, too. It also doesn't hurt media coverage of the sport, as recognizeable names lend instant credibility to races in the eyes of sports editors across the region.

Again, it's not so much one event or another that's made this a Top-10 story, but it's certainly the beginning of a trend worth watching.

*****

9. DEI signs with Andy Santerre Motorsports

10. Ben Rowe's 4th PASS North Series Title

One more time around

New Hampshire Motor Speedway just added another parade lap to its July event.

The track and sponsor Lenox Industrial Tools announced on Wednesday that the annual Sprint Cup Series event at the facility will be extended from 300 to 301 laps -- a promotion designed to go "the extra mile" for Lenox customers and New Hampshire Motor Speedway fans.

The Lenox 301 is scheduled for Sunday, June 29.

Denny Hamlin and Clint Bowyer were the Cup winners at Loudon last season.

Reverse gear: 2007's Top 10

No. 9

DEI signs with Andy Santerre Motorsports

It was only a matter of weeks before the 2007 Busch East Series began that Andy Santerre Motorsports took the step it had long wanted to take.

During September of 2006, Santerre himself talked openly about his goals as an owner in the Busch East Series -- he wanted to work with Nextel Cup Series teams as an organization where developmental drivers could learn under his tutelage. At the time, the only driver Santerre had was Sean Caisse -- an unaffiliated young driver that Santerre had put in the seat of the No. 44 Chevrolets he had vacated.

But last winter, Santerre got the call he wanted. Dale Earnhardt Inc. put teenager Jeffrey Earnhardt at ASM, and Santerre began preparing the No. 1 Bass Pro Shops/Tracker Boats cars for the youngster with only short-track Late Model experience on his resume.

The work that ASM did with Earnhardt -- Earnhardt finished 5th in the final series point standings, winning 1 pole and posting 4 top-5 finishes in 13 starts.

Going forward, the grandson of Richard Childress, Austin Dillon, will join ASM for 2008. It's a sign that Santerre's work with DEI (which has moved all of its development operations in-house) opened eyes around the Cup Series world that it's a place where young drivers can find success.

It's also proof that Santerre might get exactly what he wants out of an ownership career in NASCAR's minor-league ranks.

*****

10. Ben Rowe's 4th PASS North Series title

Reverse gear: 2007's Top 10

No. 10

Ben Rowe's 4th PASS North Series title

Ben Rowe avoids controversy like it's some kind of flat tire while leading a race at the white flag, and his success goes largely unnoticed. Simply put, his racing career follows a simple formula: find good rides, win races, win championships.

Not surprisingly, it works.

The talent pool may not necessarily be all that deep in the PASS North Series from top to bottom, but the few competitive teams that Rowe routinely beats out for the championship honors are at the top of the Super Late Model game, both here and further south. Testament to Rowe's ability as a driver, too, is the fact that he's now won the PASS title while driving for different teams. The 2007 crown comes while competing for Richard Moody Racing, the second team he's competed for in the series.

Rowe may only have won 1 race this year in PASS North competition -- 4 fewer than his father, Mike, who finished second in the standings -- but it doesn't tell the complete story. He finished 2nd a series-high 5 times in '07.

Rowe is an exceptionally clean driver, he has an ability to take a 6th-place car and get a 2nd-place finish out of it and he simply doesn't quit driving. How many times this year did we see that yellow No. 4 pit a bunch of times in the first half of a race while it was struggling just to turn left, only to see Rowe put it on the podium by the time the day was over?

Johnny Clark is the only other driver with multiple PASS titles, and with his 4th championship this year, Rowe has distanced himself from the field -- something the history books will reflect for many, many years to come. Like his father was to the generation before, Ben Rowe will be the benchmark for this generation of Maine racers in the decades that follow.

It's the Clark and Clark show... on the road

The depth of the talent pool in the PASS North Series can easily be viewed as being a tad on the shallow side, but there's no denying that the top teams in the series are as good at their game as anyone anywhere in the country.

More proof, you say?

On Friday night at Five Flags Speedway in Pensacola, Fla., 2-time PASS North champion Johnny Clark qualified 3rd for Sunday's prestigious Snowball Derby. Two spots behind him, in 5th, was Cassius Clark, a multi-time PASS North race winner over the last 2 seasons.

The top 30 starters for the 300-lap Snowball Derby were locked in by Friday's qualifying, as were 3 provisional starters. Unofficially, 25 cars remain to vie for the six remaining starting spots to come out of today's last-chance races.

Among the notables not yet qualified for the Derby: Maine's Trevor Sanborn, driving a Jay Cushman-owned Ford, the car Jason Hogan attempted to qualify for NASCAR Nextel Cup Series driver Kyle Busch, and Steven Wallace, Busch Series regular and son of former Cup champion Rusty Wallace.

Drag racing death mars holiday weekend

How's this for ironic?

Bowdoin's Christopher Gould gave up a career racing motorcycles because he thought it was too dangerous. On Sunday afternoon at the Moroso Motorsports Park in Jupiter, Fla., Gould was killed when his jet-powered Funny Car crashed after making an exhibition run at the Citrus Nationals.

Gould, 52, was in his 4th year driving Funny Cars on the exhibition tour.

"There wasn't a hidden agenda for him," said Brian Lohnes, who works for both the International Hot Rod Association (IHRA) and New England Dragway in Epping, N.H. "He was doing what he was doing not because he saw it as some kind of stepping stone.

"He was a regular guy who was dreaming about doing something he loved, and he was out doing it."

According to Lohnes and other eyewitness accounts, Gould's car crashed violently after crossing the finish line. It was there that some type of parachute malfunction set in motion a grisly chain of events that led to Gould's death.

"He made a run earlier in the day, and the car had acteed strangely at the top of the track," Lohnes said, adding that funny car tragedies typically stem from throttles that hang open.

Whether the chutes deployed at all or deployed unevenly, which could cause the car to veer uncontrollably, was not known. The car made a "hard turn," according to Lohnes, into the grass alongside the strip and then tumbled.

Gould was pronounced dead at the scene. The remainder of the program was canceled.

A veteran of motorcyle racing, Gould gave that up more than a decade ago and first received clearance from the National Hot Rod Association (NHRA) to compete in the Funny Car jet ranks in 2004. The cars, with the same bodies and chassis as those Funny Cars on the NHRA and IHRA circuits, sport small jet engines.

Gould only competed on a "booking" basis, meaning he was invited by promoters to shows nationwide -- thanks to his graciousness to both fans and race directors alike.

"This one hurts, it was close to home," said Joe Lombardo, track manager of New England Dragway. "Chris was living out his dream. He bought a jet car and start touring the country.

"He was really one of the good guys in this sport. There are a lot of people who treat this as more of a business, but there are some like Chris who do it because they love it. If you went down to his pit area and talked to him, even if he was working on the car, he would stop and talk to kids and their parents about it. He’s been on other side. In that respect, he was racing because it was fun."

Let's take a look back at 2007

Most days begin the same way for me now. Cold sweats. Disorientation. Incoherent mumbling. To myself.

It takes me weeks -- well, months really -- to come down from the adrenaline feed that is the 8-month grind of the local racing season. Races, stories, analysis, finishing orders, 2:30 a.m. blog entries... Truth be told, I'm not sure I ever really get over the post-racing season hangover. Like any functional junkie, I think after a while I just hide the symptoms from the rest of the world, until March rolls around and the season starts anew.

But these few weeks do give us the opportunity to look back at what we saw, kind of take stock of the year in motorsports, if you will. And if there are 2 things we fans like, it's highlight reels and top-10 lists.

Beginning next Monday, Dec. 3, and running every Monday for the next 10 weeks, I'm planning on running a top-10 countdown from the 2007 season. We'll start with No. 10 and each week work our way toward No. 1, examining one final time the biggest stories of the local season and some of the far-reaching national headlines, too. It'll take us right up to the week leading into the Shootout at Daytona...

If there's anything you'd like to see on the list, something you don't want me to forget, let me know. I'm sure it will all spark plenty of debates...

What the ELF is this?

So, who's your favorite Christmas elf?

Johnny, Cassius or Mike? You decide...

You can thank me later.

Oxford finale in NHMS crosshairs

If Oxford Plains Speedway's decision to close its 2007 season with a 150-lap American-Canadian Tour race was curious, then the track's recent announcement that it will finish up next season with an ACT event on Sept. 13 could prove disastrous.

For the first time in recent memory, ACT closed its '07 slate with a race other than the prestigious Milk Bowl, returning to Oxford on Oct. 6 for a 150-lap finale that ACT insider deemed "a favor." Though the Sept. 13 New England Dodge Dealers 150 at Oxford next season won't serve as ACT's finale (the Milk Bowl 2 weeks later will), it's a move by Oxford Plains that begs the question.

Why?

This time around there won't be the threat of cold weather, or the Fryeburg Fair just down the road apiece. Instead, that mid-September date comes smack dab in the middle of the Sylvania 300 weekend at New Hampshire Motor Speedway, the first race in the 10-race Chase for the NASCAR Sprint Cup.

You're not asking New England fans to choose which event to attend by holding them head-to-head, because for most there is no choice — and annual attendance of more than 100,000 speaks volumes to that end. Tickets to 1 of only 2 area appearances for NASCAR's top series are purchased long in advance, and the travel plans are made well ahead of time, too. With uncertainty surrounding Speedway Motorsports Inc.'s purchase of the New Hampshire track in the future, the September race could be the final one of its kind.

Tracks much further away from Loudon, N.H., than Oxford close their gates for entire weekends for fear of poor attendance.

The weekend of Sept. 20 is an open weekend on the 2008 ACT schedule as its currently comprised. The 2 Little Guy 100's are to be held on that same day as that ACT race, too -- the same day as the final points program at Wiscasset Raceway.

Nobody in the world of short-track racing should be held prisoner by the NASCAR behemoth, but the much smarter money should have been placed on holding the New England Dodge Dealers 150 the next weekend. It would help racers who want to compete in the Oxford finale, and it would save fans, once again, from being forced to make difficult choices with their racing dollars.

Rowe puts cap on '07 season

It's a day late and a dollar short -- and most of you have probably found it by now -- but here's an unofficial top-10 from the Mason-Dixon Meltdown last Saturday night in Concord, N.C.

The PASS combination event was won by a northern driver for the 2nd year in a row, with 4-time PASS North Series champ Ben Rowe passing Corey Williams for the win as the white and yellow flags came out in the closing stages of the event. Johnny Clark was 3rd.

Defenind Meltdown champion Cassius Clark finished 6th.

Mason-Dixon Meltdown

Unofficial results

1. Ben Rowe

2. Corey Williams

3. Johnny Clark

4. Preston Peltier

5. Trevor Sanborn

6. Cassius Clark

7. Richie Dearborn

8. Adam Bates

9. Mike Rowe

10. Perry Brown

A few final laps...

Spend hours on end in a blind somewhere in the woods, waiting for Bambi's uncle (the brother of the one who died in the fire) to come walking by, and you'll get to thinking. Thinking reminded me of a couple of things I needed to do...

* NASCAR has no one to blame but itself for the fact that most of the world thinks this year's Chase has been a bore. Typically, 2 race teams separated by only a few points would qualify as real drama. Problem is, Jimmie Johnson and Jeff Gordon are really one in the same — and NASCAR's ridiculously soft stance on the creation of superteams hasn't helped.

If Chad Knaus and Steve Letarte are working out of the same shop and same notebooks (which they are), is either really winning the Nextel Cup championship over the other? Of course not. It's a Hendrick Motorsports title, no matter who gets to stuff the trophy in the suitcase.

* The 2008 schedules are out for both Wiscasset Raceway and Oxford Plains Speedway are out, and, as promised, Wiscasset is making its stand as Maine's Pro Stock capital. The slate will included the DNK 250, the Coastal 200, a couple of Twin 125's and the final race of the PASS North Series slate.

The '250,' of course, is a direct response to the Oxford version of the 250 (you may have heard, there have been 34 of them to date) being handed over to the Late Model crowd. The Original 250 comes on July 20; the knock-off comes about a month later, on Aug. 17.

* In case you missed some of this stuff over the last few weeks:
- Jerry Gappens has been named by Speedway Motorsports Inc. as general manager of New Hampshire Motor Speedway
- Austin Dillon will drive for Andy Santerre Motorsports next year in the We Don't Have A Title Sponsor Yet East Series. Still no word on what the No. 44 and Sean Caisse's plans are
- It's Mason-Dixon Meltdown weekend in Concord, N.C. Cassius Clark is the defending champion of the event, which was held last year in South Boston, Va.

The kids are alright...

Oh, if I had a nickel for everytime something like this came across my desk...

"My 11 year son won his first race a year ago in September and we asked (Travis) to do a write up on it. At the time we were pretty sure he was the youngest to win a feature race in the state. (Travis') response was that he couldn't because of too many other sports going on and there wasn't enough room, but it was funny that not long after this more racing news made the paper. (Travis) also said that he would be sure to do one on him in the spring. We're still waiting for spring to come."

Buckle up, folks, because most of you aren't going to like what follows here.

An 11-year-old winning a race is not in and of itself newsworthy. The fact that the boy in question here (and I'm not going to name names, even though I know exactly who made the above post on MaineRacing.com) won that race at Unity Raceway wasn't newsworthy, either. Yes, he may in fact have been the youngest feature winner ever at Unity, but there's far more to that story.

And it's that story that, at one point, was weighed on the news desk at the Kennebec Journal and Morning Sentinel. The boy in question won a race in the "Teen" division, which, at Unity, is open to anybody ages 10-17. In essence, the boy won a race that equated to a Little League baseball game.

Our papers don't cover Little League baseball, and our policy is fairly firm on that. As the boy's mother was told, if he won the championship, the family was more than welcome to send a picture of him with his car/trophy to the paper -- and that photo would run on our community sports page. It was the decision that the sports editor came to -- with input from me -- and that's where it ended. It was strictly a policy decision, not a slight to a certain family having "the wrong last name."

Unfortunately, most people are under the assumption that newspaper hacks are free to write about whatever they want, whenever they want. I'm given a lot of free reign -- and I understand that. But I also need to discuss every story that I'm planning on in full detail with my editor.

Yes, the hacks have bosses, too.

I'm particularly fond of the above criticism that after I declined to write a feature story on our 11-year-old "future Jeff Gordon" there was still other racing news reported in our papers. Yes, there was. It was called "news."

It becomes incredibly hard to sell racing stories to sports editors once football season rolls around and baseball playoffs get underway. It is the same way at every newspaper across New England -- feel free to ask around. The feature stories, the human interest pieces, are gone -- and we are forced to stick to straight news. We cover individual races and pay attention to championships, and that's about all there's room for.

It's just how it is. Yes, as a racing writer and fan, I become as frustrated as all of you about this. I'm sure the people in our sports department could bore you to death with the stories of the arguments I've had with them in the past over why we start ignoring racing just when championships are starting to be decided and extra-distance races are being scheduled.

It's one of the reasons I started blogging -- to have an outlet for all the stuff that couldn't find its way into the newspaper out of space constraints or a general lack of interest.

"(Travis) didn't seem to have a problem writing about another kid."

And to that jab, I say show me. I've never written a single feature story about kids racing cars. Not a one.

As a parent, I want my kids to get their fair share of praise, too. But I work for a company that has a certain policy about youth sports, and there's nothing I can do to change that. Period.

Big business holds New Hampshire's fate

It is the first question on everyone's mind.

What now?

Now that New Hampshire International Speedway has been sold off to corporate America, deftly renamed the New Hampshire Motor Speedway and put in the hands of people who count success by the millions, what's to become of the track's two annual NASCAR Nextel Cup Series races?

Do they stay or do they go?

Read the complete story in today's Kennebec Journal.

Bahre gets $340 million for track

Bob Bahre finally cashed in on his investment.

The 80-year-old businessman from Paris, Maine, sold New Hampshire International Speedway to Bruton Smith and Speedway Motorsports Inc. on Friday. The track in Loudon, N.H., which opened in 1990 and hosts two major NASCAR races annually, was sold for the price of $340 million.

Read the complete story in today's Kennebec Journal.

Racers chime in on New Hampshire sale

Here's a sampling of some of the thoughts circulating in the racing world regarding Speedway Motorsports Inc.'s purchase of New Hampshire International Speedway from Bob Bahre on Friday:

ANDY SANTERRE, 3-time Busch East Series winner at the track:

"There were a lot of race fans in New England before, but they could never go and see NASCAR racing up close (without traveling). Honestly, that’s where anybody from New England went. Guys like myself — or Ricky Craven wouldn’t have made it to Cup — if New Hampshire wasn’t there. We got noticed because it brought the big boys to New England. Without that, I don’t think a lot of us would have had the opportunity.

“The Bahres did a great job with the place, and to have two (Cup) dates, they were very fortunate. A lot of that was what they’ve done for NASCAR in past. But if (Bruton Smith) spent that kind of money, he might want to move a race to one of his tracks that only has one race.”

KURT BUSCH, who swept the two NHIS Cup races in 2004:

"New Hampshire has a great fan base. They sell out that race track every year we go up there. The Northeast loves their NASCAR. I would hope that racetrack keeps at least one date. I would like to see us go to a lot of race tracks just once a year and maybe trim the schedule down, but that’ll never happen.

"But (moving one of the dates), it’ll make every race that’s at their race track more important and drivers will feel more excited about winning each race — to do it when there is only one win that you can get at a track each year. But, Vegas would start off in the Chase. It would be a little warm out there the first of September. I don’t know. All of it is speculation."

BRIAN FRANCE, NASCAR CEO:

"The success of NHIS, and the desire of the Bahre family to sell, made the track very attractive to SMI and several other interested buyers. SMI has a highly regarded record for hosting some of the most successful and enjoyable race events in all of NASCAR, and there's no doubt that will continue.

"While we don't have any details about SMI's plans for NHIS, all sanctions for 2008 have been signed and finalized. As a result, there will be no location changes to the 2008 schedule that was released last month. This is important to the fans, competitors, broadcast partners and sponsors who have already made plans for the 2008 races.

"Looking beyond 2008, NASCAR will continue to consider requests by any track operator, including SMI, to relocate race dates. Under NASCAR's "realignment" plan, we have worked with track owners to relocate race dates to meet the needs of our growing national fan base. Ultimately, any change must meet NASCAR�s objectives and serve our fans.

"The industry owes Bob and Gary Bahre a debt of gratitude for their leadership and commitment to NASCAR. All of NASCAR wishes the Bahre family well during this time of transition. They will always be considered pioneers in NASCAR."

Smith buys NHIS from Bahre

It's official.

For the price tag of $340 million, Bruton Smith and Speedway Motorsports Inc. have purchased New Hampshire International Speedway from Bob Bahre. Less than half an hour ago, Smith said announced the purchase, which is expected to be completed early next year.

SMI now owns 7 tracks that will hold a total of 12 Nextel Cup Series races in 2008. New Hampshire first held a Cup race in 1993 and has held 2 races annually since 1997.

Smith didn't announce any change to the track's annual schedule, though did say he's already begun thinking about the facility after visiting with an engineer.

"I do not have any plans to share at this time," Smith said.

NHIS will also have a name change and will be known as New Hampshire Motor Speedway, putting it more in line with other SMI holdings, such as Atlanta Motor Speedway, Bristol Motor Speedway, Lowe's Motor Speedway and Texas Motor Speedway.