photo by Rich Hayes
The North East Mini Stock Tour kicked off its ninth season on Sunday at New Hampshire’s Lee USA Speedway. 30 cars entered the pit area for the largest car count in NEMST history at Lee USA. Following an early practice session the drivers would line up for time trial qualifying, something that has never been done before on the NEMST.
Qualifying kept the fans and drivers on edge with Brandon Gray turning a 17.08 lap early and holding the top spot while nearly 20 other competitors ran until he was knocked off by his NEMST veteran team mate and birthday boy Matt Sonnhalter. Sonnhalter ran a 17.04 lap barely beating his rookie team mate. Following time trials Sonnhalter drew the inversion chip of 3 rows which would put the Young Guns Racing teammates in 5th and 6th position and putting Mike Soucy and Glen Thomas on the front row leading the field to green.
The race fired off like a shotgun with a 6-7 car lead pack forming and picking off laps at an alarming pace. Glen Thomas broke out to the early lead with Sonnhalter, Gray, Trombley, Maniatis, Anderson, and Soucy in tow. On lap 17 after slight contact with Maniatis the 34 of Trombley went around out of turn 2 and both cars would restart at the rear of the field.
On the ensuing restart teams would be introduced to another new NEMST procedure for the 2017 season, the Lineup Cone. Much like many tracks in the south this season NEMST competitors will have the option of picking their lane on the restart opposed to the tradition cross over line up procedures.
The green would come back out with Trombley making daring moves 3 and 4 wide to dig his way back to the front of the field. The 63 would have engine troubles and the caution would fly again on lap 23 for a spin in turn 3 with Nic Skillings and Cris King involved. The green would come out once again but fly just 4 laps later on lap 28 for the spinning 33 of Matt Sonnhalter that had a flat, transmission issue, and a spin into the wall in the middle of turns 1 and 2. The 00 of Gray would relinquish 3rd position and pit to inspect the damage to his Volkswagen Truck.
The race went green for the remainder of the event with the 42 of Soucy stalking race leader Glen Thomas and the 34 and 00 making moves back into the top 5. With just a few laps remaining the 42 turned up the wick even further and in doing so made slight contact with the turn 2 wall slowing him over the final laps. Justin Trombley would rally from 25th position on lap 17 to take the 2nd finishing spot on the final lap of the race. Trombley would be followed by Soucy, Gray, and 2016 champion Haywood Herriott.
The NEMST is back in action on Friday May 5 2017 at the Claremont Speedway in Claremont, NH for additional race information please visit the NEMST Facebook page or NorthEast Mini Stock Tour