Column By: BRITTANY NUTILE / RPW – LOUDON, NH – This coming weekend will be the second attempt by New Hampshire Motor Speedway to have a big marquee short track division event. Full Throttle Fall Weekend is the name and the 2019 edition of the event has the makings to be even bigger than the first.
Classes racing this weekend include such divisions as the NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour and the K&N Pro Series East, the NASCAR Pinty’s Series, and the Legends cars. This is a big event for short track racing at NHMS.
This weekend showcases many of the other divisions of NASCAR…putting them in the spotlight as the headliner without having the Cup, XFINITY or Truck Series in town. The touring divisions of NASCAR will be on the big stage with more laps, more cars and an experience fans will remember for a long time.
With a reorganization in the NASCAR Cup Series schedule, NHMS had their fall date taken away. This weekend, the Cup and XFINITY are in Richmond, so the speedway found a way to use the date to bring in several of the other divisions of NASCAR to give the fans a great show, and this event doesn’t disappoint. Many fans come out to see the “groundpounders,” the NASCAR Modifieds, but all classes impress with the competitiveness of their races.
In these events, you’ll see a few familiar names in the top 10 in the point standings. Alex Tagliani has competed in the XFINITY & Truck Series in past seasons, but on a limited schedule. Alex has run the Pinty’s Series for 11 years now and has been quite successful.
DJ Kennington is also a familiar name, he has run Cup, XFINITY and Trucks. He also competes in the Pinty’s Series and has been very successful for the last 13 years.
The last familiar name is Alex Labbe, he has driven in the XFINITY Series for four seasons, running the full schedule in 2018 and select races the other three. Labbe has been in the Pinty’s Series for eight years and has had a good career racing those cars.
The K&N Series comes back to NHMS after competing in the July weekend along with the Tour Modifieds. The young guns are back and ready to roll again at NHMS with guys like Max McLaughlin, Ty Gibbs, Tanner Gray, Spencer Davis and point leader Sam Mayer, who leads Chase Cabre by 30, just to name a few.
Josh Berry will be making his debut for Visconti Motorsports, who won the race last year with driver Brandon McReynolds. Visconti Motorsports and Berry hope to have a successful trip to the Magic Mile like the team did one year ago.
Dirt Modified star Max McLaughlin is ready to head back to NHMS where his dad, Magic Shoes Mike McLaughlin, was very successful on the old Busch North Tour (now known as the K&N Series). Dad won four times at Loudon…once in 1990, twice in 1992 and another the following season.
Max is hoping to have another good run at NHMS as he finished fourth in July and is hoping to improve on that this weekend.
This has the makings to be a big event for everyone involved, but unfortunately, it will also be a sad one. Last Sunday, we lost a NASCAR legend, Mike Stefanik, in a plane crash. He had a very successful career on the Modified Tour as well as the K&N Series…even making his way to Trucks.
Stefanik won secen championships on the Mod Tour and was top point man in the K&N Series twice. The veteran from Rhode Island will surely be on the minds of everyone at NHMS during Full Throttle Fall Weekend and will be missed by all who knew him.
Everyone at RPW sends our thoughts are prayers to his wife, Julie, his two daughters and all of his family, friends, and fans.
