GENERAL RACING NEWS 2011
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SEPTEMBER 25, 2011 ..... Douville 2011 SCoNE Champ, Donnelly Bear Ridge Champ, Rich Takes Finale ..... When the final checkered flag fell for the Sprint Cars of New England season at Bear Ridge Speedway on Saturday night, three Granite State drivers each had something different to celebrate. Dan Douville of Bridgewater emerged as the 2011 SCoNE Series Champion, Chris Donnelly of Piermont claimed the Bear Ridge Track Championship and Tyler Rich of Lyme scored his career first Sprint Car win.
The 25 lap feature was slowed by only a single caution flag on lap 19 when Shawn Berry and Mark Cole were involved in a minor incident on lap 19.
After finishing second in his heat, Brandon Valley led the first 13 laps of the feature until Rich, who started ninth, took the lead. Rich held off a charge from his car owner Donnelly who finished second, followed by Douville, Jake Williams and Robbie Bodwell.
“I knew the car was good after the heat race,” said Rich, a rookie in Sprint Cars who nonetheless has a pair of Sportsman Coupe Championships on his racing resume. “We didn’t change anything for the feature. It was going good on the outside and then I had to go to the inside to pass a couple of cars and it was fast there too, so I knew I had a good car. It was pretty nerve wracking to know that Chris and Dan were both behind me - I knew I couldn’t make any mistakes. You don’t get to make mistakes with those guys behind you and still win a race.”
A total of 17 Sprint Cars signed in for the final event of the season, but only 14 made it to the feature. Three cars were eliminated on the first lap of the first heat in a spectacular wreck that saw Lacy Hanson flip twice after coming in contact with the spinning car of Matt Robie. The wreck also sidelined former SCoNE champ Shawn Lawler.
Only 13 points separated points leader Douville and runner-up Donnelly at the start of the feature and that circumstance forced the drivers to swap driving styles for the event. Usually Donnelly is more methodical and Douville more flamboyant, but Donnelly needed to drive all-out to gain every point and Douville had to drive conservatively to protect his point lead. Overlaid on that was the SCoNE system of handicapping the highest point earners to the back of the starting grid, placing Douville 13th and Donnelly 12th and casting a new light on the meaning of words like “methodical” and “flamboyant.”.
“I hate points racing,” a smiling Douville said after the race. “I knew all I had to do was finish fourth if Chris won so that’s the way I raced. I usually like to head right to the top of the race track if it’s working, but this time I stayed on the bottom and it was working for me. I got by Chris and Clay [Dow] and a bunch of guys by running the bottom. I told myself that I wasn’t going to go up until I started not being able to catch the guy in front of me. I didn’t go up there until I saw Chris’ green wing go by me so I followed him up there. By that time, it was pretty late in the race so I just settled in and finished there.”
“I can’t thank my car owner Mike Kondrat enough,” Douville continued. “After all he’s done for the club it feels good to be able to win a championship for him. My whole crew is just fantastic every week. Being able to have my wife and kids here every week.... it just doesn’t get any better than that.”
Donnelly had no complaints. "The car was good and we were really kind of hauling up through there. I wish it had stayed green. Tyler’s a good driver, but he doesn’t have much experience in Sprint Cars and I think I might have gotten by him in lapped traffic. But Tyler’s had some rough times here and it was good for him to get a win.”
“Winning the track championship is good and winning the overall championship would have been better,” Donnelly continued. “On the restart, when I heard over the radio where Dan was, I was resigned to the fact that, unless something catastrophic happened, he was going to be the champion, and that’s OK, we had a good year and congratulations to him.”
1. Tyler Rich, Lyme, NH, 2. Chris Donnelly, Piermont, NH, 3. Dan Douville, Bridgewater, NH, 4. Jake Williams, Center Tuftonboro, NH, 5. Robby Bodwell, Sanford, ME, 6. Kevin Chaffee, Fairlee, VT, 7. Will Hull, East Montpelier, VT, 8. Clay Dow, Barnstead, NH, 9. Tunk Berry, Center Ossipee, NH, 10. Jim Lowrey, Jr., Tilton, NH, 11. Brandon Valley, Center Ossipee, NH, 12. Bruce Kimball, Lebanon, NH, 13. Shawn Berry, Center Ossipee, NH, 14. Mark Cole, Lebanon, NH. DNS Shawn Lawler, Mason, NH; Lacey Hanson, Orwell, VT; Matt Robie, Hill, NH. Heat Winners: Dow and Donnelly.
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