FONDA, N.Y. – Stewart Friesen closed a busy day by winning Saturday’s modified feature at New York’s Fonda Speedway.
Friesen opened the day by competing in the NASCAR Camping World Truck Series race at Richmond (Va.) Raceway, where he finished 13th. He then made the trip to Fonda, where he won his heat and before claiming the 30-lap feature by a whopping 8.3 seconds.
Some may think switching between the disciplines would be hard, not Friesen.
“Honesty, it’s not that hard,” Friesen said Saturday night. “It’s a dream come true to be able to do that. You see guys like Tony Stewart do it, fly back and forth and that would be so cool to do one day. Thanks to Chris Larsen at Halmar for letting me live my dream.”
Since his Fonda 200 win in 2019, Friesen has won nine out of the last 10 races he’s entered at the Montgomery County dirt oval.
“I wanted to be home for the opener in the worst way,” he said. “I knew it was gonna be a big deal since we are rounding the end with COVID. It’s excellent to see fans. The fans in this town are die hard race fans. It was amazing to see everyone come out for the opener. Even if it wasn’t a great day weather wise. Couple years ago on a day like today you wouldn’t have seen this many people so the racing is great here.”
Following the race at Richmond, Friesen hopped on a plane and traveled north to New York so he could make the race at Fonda.
“I was a little nervous,” Friesen said. “I know we have a pretty good baseline just from the amount of racing we have done this year. We have ran this car, this motor and starting one on a hammer down track was all you can ask for. She (wife Jessica Friesen) texted me, ‘I drew 10 for me and one for you.’”
It was the starting on the pole that allowed Friesen to turn a fast lap of 17.740 and become the first modified to hit sub 18 seconds at Fonda.
“I had to start next to Rocky (Warner),” he said. “He’s a good competitor. It was great. This car is just hooked up. This is the Short Track Super Series outlaw rules at its finest. Big motor, big doors, stick tires and tacky track.”
After winning his heat by more than a full straightaway, Friesen redrew the pole for the feature and had an uneventful first 16 laps. However, when the caution waved on lap 16, it bunched the field back up and brought Josh Hohenforst to his inside for the restart.
“I wanted to restart on the top and stay smooth,” Friesen said. “I figured if he got a good run he could. He looked good in his heat and is a tough competitor. He sent it in there as hard as he could in (turns) one and two and slid in front of me. I said, ‘OK, I better get back on this,’ and it stuck in three and four good. It was pretty wild, but I expected it.”
From that point forward, Friesen opened up a gap and went on to win the feature by a whopping 8.3 seconds Hohenforst and Mike Maresca
This was the first race Fonda since Jack Johnson, a winner of 149 features at the track, died. Friesen’s recent run of dominance puts him at 69 wins at the track, fourth on the all-time win list.
“I don’t know what it means, the win tonight is just big,” he said. “I’m glad Ronnie (Johnson) was here tonight. I was texting him this week and he was saying he was gonna come talk and didn’t know if he was gonna race. I was leaning on him to bring the car and come race, that’s what people wanna see. Just one at a time, you don’t know what will happen. When I was racing with Tad here, Jack had the record for 12 wins a year and we tried but blew motors and everything else. Some records are made to not be broken. Jack has 149 wins here, that’s a lot.”
In other action on opening night at Fonda, Chad Edwards won the 602 crate sportsman feature. Beau Billard won in the pro stock class, Jeremy Tyrell won the limited sportsman main event and Ken Hollenback and Tyler White picked up wins in the four-cylinder division.
The finish:
Stewart Friesen, Josh Hohenforst, Michael Maresca, Demetrious Drellos, Bobby Varin, Brian Gleason, Jack Lehner, Rocky Warner, Jessica Friesen, Ronnie Johnson, Craig Hanson, Mike Mahaney, David Schilling, Bobby Hackel IV, Brian Pessolano, JaMike Sowle, Patrick Dupree, Shane Jablonka, Rich Christman, George Foley, Matt DeLorenzo, Adam McAuliffe, Cory Lowitt, Ancel Collins, Steve Akers, Aaron Jacobs, Dave Constantino