Model championship season on Friday night, and Wayne Helliwell, Jr. put an
exclamation point on his title run by scoring feature win number eight of
the season in the E Keys 4 Cars 25-lapper.
Helliwell was easily the class of the field and led flag to flag in the
Bruce Bernhardt Ford to pick up the victory, with Pat Floyd finishing a
distant second. Bobby Baillargeon, Steve Knowlton, and Tom Fuller rounded
out the top five finishers.
Tommy Tombarello, Jr. held a slim one-point lead over Billy Osborne in the
Small Block Super point standings headed into the night, and he hung onto
the top spot with a solid second place run in the feature event, giving him
his first career championship crown.
“Super Dave” Sanborn took advantage of a late-race caution to sneak past
Tombarello and score the win, with P.J. Stergios moving up late to grab
third. Dan Bowes, Osborne, Mike Netishen, Mike Caswell, Butch Valley, Jr.,
Tony Carroll, and Mike Spurling were the rest of the top ten.
Grant Aither looked like he was well on the way to another victory to cap
off his 2010 Prime Storage Late Model Sportsman championship run, but brake
problems late in the race forced him off the pace. Aither still easily led
all drivers at the track in feature wins for the year.
Ryan Green took advantage of the champ’s mechanical woes and grabbed his
first career Late Model Sportsman feature win over J.R. Baril. Tony
Kawejsza scored third, with Ron Bolduc, Jimmy Russell, Michele Fushpanski,
Aither, Jesse Bousquet, Bill Ahern, and Josh Ball next in the finishing
order.
Points leader Todd Bregy got caught up in a wreck early in the Picnic Table
Factory Hobby Stock main event, forcing him to watch from the sidelines as
the final race of the year finished up. Bregy accepted the championship
accolades in a post-race ceremony minus his racecar.
Stephen Dubois and Jim Piaseczny were battling hard for the lead most of the
way through the race, but Randy Carmichael slipped under the two to take the
lead just before the checkers waved. It was Carmichael’s first-career win.
Patrick Tanguay rebounded from the same early-race incident that eliminated
Bregy to finish second, followed by Piaseczny, Dubois, Steve Douphinette,
Rob MacRae, Chris Jacobson, Niko Manyati, and Scott Bregy.
The David’s Race Cars and Components Roadrunners ran twin feature events for
championship night, with Steve Nichols taking down his first career Lee
checkered in the opening race, and young Shaun Waites, Jr. grabbing his
second win of the year in the nightcap.
Lloyd Chapin scored a second and a third place finish in the two races to
lock down the 2010 Roadrunner championship, bringing car owner Paul Brown
and the Full Throttle Racing crew out to victory lane in full force to help
celebrate the title.
Jack Victoria was the only champion other than Helliwell who padded his win
total on championship night, running off to his sixth win of the year in the
Ironman feature event. Victoria was followed by Kyle Roy, Sean Martin, Glen
Billings, and Jason Hodgdon.
The New England Antique Racers entertained the crowd with close to 20 cars
taking to the track for their portion of the program, and the Northeast
Classic Lites were on hand as well, with George Helliwell taking his second
win of the year over Jimmy Ryder, Jr. and Eddie Gilman.