{"id":27878,"date":"2021-04-12T09:34:26","date_gmt":"2021-04-12T13:34:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/16\/?p=27878"},"modified":"2021-04-12T09:34:28","modified_gmt":"2021-04-12T13:34:28","slug":"scott-tapley-named-thunder-road-race-director","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/16\/2021\/04\/scott-tapley-named-thunder-road-race-director\/","title":{"rendered":"Scott Tapley Named Thunder Road Race Director"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Scott Tapley Named Thunder Road Race Director<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\"><figure class=\"alignright size-large is-resized\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/16\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/04\/Thunder-Road.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-21637\" width=\"249\" height=\"249\" srcset=\"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/16\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/04\/Thunder-Road.png 500w, https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/16\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/04\/Thunder-Road-150x150.png 150w, https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/16\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/04\/Thunder-Road-300x300.png 300w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 249px) 100vw, 249px\" \/><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><em>Barre, VT&nbsp;<\/em>\u2014 Thunder Road officials announced today that Scott Tapley has been appointed the track\u2019s Race Director for the 2021 season. The respected motorsports official will oversee the action for all of Thunder Road\u2019s local racing divisions. Tapley takes charge for a 19-event schedule that can be seen live in Barre, VT or worldwide on FloRacing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Tapley is also the race director at Connecticut\u2019s Stafford Motor Speedway and Thompson Speedway Motorsports Park along with New York\u2019s Riverhead Raceway. The Maine native got his first taste of the American-Canadian Tour (ACT) when late ACT founder Tom Curley ran Oxford Plains Speedway in 1994-1995. The addition of Thunder Road to his r\u00e9sum\u00e9 completes a circle that goes back nearly 30 years for the auto racing lifer and Maine native.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cAs a kid that sat in the pit stands for the very first time for a driver\u2019s meeting in 1994 at Oxford and listened to Tom Curley speak, I instantly became a \u2018Tom Curley guy\u2019,\u201d Tapley said. \u201cFrom that moment, I have followed intently what was going on with Thunder Road and ACT, and I\u2019ve always seen Thunder Road as one the top facilities in the country.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<!--more-->\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cI\u2019ve been very fortunate to be supported by great track operators like the Arute family at Stafford; Eddie, Connie Partridge and Tom Gatz at Riverhead; and Cris Michaud and Tom Mayberry at Thompson,\u201d Tapley continued. \u201cI\u2019m humbled and honored to add Thursday nights at Thunder Road to my responsibilities for 2021, and I look forward to being a part of it.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Tapley has been around auto racing since he was a kid. He started out helping with his dad\u2019s Street Stock for events at Oxford Plains Speedway. In 2001, Tapley graduated from the University of Northwestern Ohio with a Motorsports degree. Tapley subsequently spent nearly a decade working full-time for multiple teams in what\u2019s now known as ARCA Menards Series East. In 2008, he helped lead Mohegan Sun Racing and Matt Kobyluck to the series championship as aerodynamicist, fabricator, and spotter.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">After Mohegan Sun racing shut down following the 2010 season, Tapley transitioned to a track official role by accepting the Race Director position at Connecticut\u2019s New London-Waterford Speedbowl. Apart from a hiatus in 2019, Tapley has served as the Thompson Speedway Race Director since 2014. He took on the Stafford Motor Speedway and Riverhead Raceway Race Director roles in 2016.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Tapley has also worked for Lee USA Speedway, the Modified Racing Series, and the INEX Legends National Championship over the past decade. He currently lives in Poland, ME with his wife Susan and two kids Keiralyn and Owen.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cScott Tapley is a great addition to the Thunder Road staff,\u201d managing partner Cris Michaud said. \u201cI\u2019d heard a lot about Scott over the years and finally got the chance to work with him closely at Thompson Speedway in 2020. He was exactly as advertised \u2014 a knowledgeable person who runs a fair, no-nonsense show. We couldn\u2019t be happier to be working with him at both Thunder Road and Thompson Speedway this year.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Thunder Road opens its 2021 season on Sunday, May 2 at 1:30pm with the 23<sup>rd<\/sup>&nbsp;Community Bank N.A. 150. The stars of the ACT Late Model Tour and Maplewood\/Irving Oil Late Models will go at it for 150 green-flag laps. The Lenny\u2019s Shoe &amp; Apparel Flying Tigers, RK Miles Street Stocks, and Burnett Scrap Metals Road Warriors also have a full card of racing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Admission is $25 for adults and $5 for kids ages 6-12. The event will also be live-streamed worldwide on FloRacing. The annual Car Show and an open practice are scheduled for Saturday, May 1 followed by the 2020 ACT\/Thunder Road Banquet of Champions.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Scott Tapley Named Thunder Road Race Director Barre, VT&nbsp;\u2014 Thunder Road officials announced today that Scott Tapley has been appointed the track\u2019s Race Director for the 2021 season. The respected motorsports official will oversee the action for all of Thunder Road\u2019s local racing divisions. Tapley takes charge for a 19-event schedule that can be seen [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"off","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[26,13],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-27878","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-thunder-road","category-vermont"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/16\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27878","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/16\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/16\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/16\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/16\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=27878"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/16\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27878\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":27879,"href":"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/16\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27878\/revisions\/27879"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/16\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=27878"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/16\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=27878"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/16\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=27878"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}