STAFFORD SPRINGS, Conn. — Stafford Speedway’s street stock division took center stage on Friday with their lone extra-distance feature event of the season, the Midstate Site Development 30.
Frank L’Etoile, Jr. was the big winner of the night, outdueling Chris Meyer in the closing laps to score his fourth street stock win of the 2021 season in the MSD 30.
Kyle Johnson took the early lead with Bobby Stirk, III, Jeremy Washburn, and Bert Ouellette behind him but the caution flew with one lap complete for a spin coming out of turn two by Chris Danielczuk that collected the cars of Travis Hydar and Nickolas Hovey.
Johnson took the lead on the restart with Ouellette taking second. Chris Meyer quickly worked his way through traffic into third with Stirk back to fourth and Washburn in fifth. The caution flew with seven laps complete for a spin in turn one by Patrick Jenks.
Ouellette took the lead back under green with Johnson and Frank L’Etoile, Jr. side by side for second. Meyer was fourth in line with Adrien Paradis, III up to fifth while Stirk, who restarted fourth, was off the pace and fell to the rear of the field.
Ouellette slipped up the track in turn three on lap-11, which allowed Johnson to power his way into the lead. Meyer came up to second with Ouellette falling back to third with Paradis fourth and L’Etoile fifth.
Meyer went by Johnson to take the lead on lap 13 and his move brought Ouellette to second, Paradis to third, L’Etoile to fourth, and dropped Johnson from the lead back to fifth. Bill Cote and David Macha, Sr. came together and spun to bring the caution back out with 13 laps complete.
Meyer took the lead on the restart but Ouellette did a half spin in turn three, which collected several cars to bring the caution right back out.
Meyer took the lead after a lap of side-by-side racing with Ouellette with Ouellette slipping back to fifth in line as L’Etoile took second, Paradis third, and Nickolas Hovey, who was collected in the first caution flag incident of the race, back up to fourth.
L’Etoile was starting to apply heavy pressure to Meyer for the lead on lap 21 while Hovey got around Paradis to move up to third place.
L’Etoile was able to get alongside Meyer as they completed lap-23 and he took the lead in turn one on lap 24 only to have Meyer make a crossover move to get back to the inside of L’Etoile. L’Etoile held the lead by a half car length to complete lap 24 and on lap-26 Meyer went back to the front of the pack.
The jockeying between L’Etoile and Meyer allowed Hovey, Paradis, and Ouellette to close right in on the two leaders to make it a five-way fight for the lead.
L’Etoile went back to the front on lap 27 with Hovey still leading Ouellette and Paradis. Meyer couldn’t get close enough to L’Etoile over the final two laps as L’Etoile scored his fourth win of the 2021 season. Hovey finished third with Ouellette and Paradis rounding out the top five.
Other feature winners on the night included Michael Christopher, Jr. scoring his second consecutive SK Modified® feature win, Adam Gray beat Michael Bennett to the checkered flag in a thrilling photo finish to score his second Late Model feature win of the season, George Bessette, Jr. was a first-time winner SK Light winner, and Matt Clement scored his second Limited Late Model win of the season.