BARRE, Vt. — Scott Dragon won the late model main event and Jon McKennedy stole the debut show of the New England Supermodified Series Friday night at Thunder Road Int’l Speedbowl.
Coming off the spectacular 125 Memorial Day Classic two weeks ago, anticipation was high for the Maplewood/Irving Oil Late Models and they certainly didn’t disappoint. With all-time wins leader Phil Scott on the outside front row and sophomore pilot Cooper Bouchard starting on the pole, so began a wild ride.
Vermont Governor Scott did not fare well on the outside, the handling getting away from him in the corners that allowed Marcel Gravel to capitalize to the top spot. With a straight-away lead over nearest challengers Scott Dragon, Christopher Pelkey and Darrell Morin, Gravel nearly had it in the bag.
It was a lap-38 caution that reset the playing field, pitting Gravel and Dragon head-to-head. In what may certainly be the best 10 laps at Thunder Road this season, Dragon held his own on the high groove while Gravel did the same below for the final circuits. In the end, Scott Dragon used the famous outside groove to secure his first Thunder Road victory since 2020, Gravel followed him for second and Pelkey for third. Montpelier’s Kyle Pembroke earned fourth with Tyler Cahoon nabbing fifth.
The debut of the New England Supermodified Series brought the fastest speeds of any car to ever grace Thunder Road. In all, eight of these winged behemoths launched into action but not one of them had anything for Jon McKennedy. McKennedy led from the beginning, facing his only major challenge by the open-wheel ace Russ Wood who threateningly stalked the Silver #79 throughout the event. Unfortunately for Wood, his ‘lay-back-and-wait’ strategy went up in smoke with a blown motor on lap-65. At the restart, it was no contest and McKennedy drove away, posting a fast lap of 9.73-seconds on the quarter-mile. Anthony Nocella and Rob Summers joined him in victory lane with second and third, respectively.
Fred Fleury won the road warrior feature and James Dopp claimed the street stock event.
Derrick Calkins won the flying tiger feature.