Winchester, NH. \u2013 Defending Valenti Modified Racing Series Champion
\nJon McKennedy of E. Chelmsford, MA., took the lead on lap 64 and went on to
\nwin the 8th annual \u201cFirecracker 100\u201d Saturday night, July 2, at Monadnock
\nSpeedway, Winchester, NH. The win was McKennedy\u2019s first of the season,
\nhis first at Monadnock, and his 12thcareer victory with the series.<\/p>\n
McKennedy also becomes a guaranteed starter for the prestigious \u201cRicky\u2019s Race
\nFor Kids,\u201d July 16, at Canaan Fair Speedway, Canaan, NH. That race carries a
\n$36,500 purse.
\n
\nPole-sitter Lou Mechalides, of Tyngsboro, MA.,took the early lead yielding the
\ntop spot to three-time series champion Kirk Alexander, Swanzey, NH., on lap
\neight. Alexander, a six-time winner of the race, set a torrid pace and appeared to
\nbe enroute to his fifth consecutive win.<\/p>\n
Starting seventh in a 23-car field, defending series champion McKennedy methodically worked his way to the front moving to fifth by lap five, third
\non lap 40, second on lap 52, and the lead on lap 64.<\/p>\n
\u201cI owe a lot to the guys that work on this car. Three laps into our first practice we
\nblew the rear end, we had to replace the whole drive line, the guys did an awesome
\njob. I knew in the early stages of the race we had a good car,\u201d told the large
\nholiday crowd.<\/p>\n
McKennedy\u2019s strategy of slowly progressing to the front worked according to plan. <\/p>\n
\u201cAt lap 40 he (Alexander) was a few cars ahead of me and I thought he was just
\nriding around,\u201d he said. \u201cI did not use a lot of car to get to second. He looked like
\nhe was tight in the corners, the restart helped me, my car seemed to get better, its
\nfeels good to beat Kirk, he\u2019s the King of this place.\u201d<\/p>\n
Alexander settled for second, Les Hinckley III, Windsor Locks, CT., made a late
\nrace charge to finish third, with Rowan Pennink, Huntingdon Valley, PA., and Rob Goodenough, Swanzey, rounding out the top five.<\/p>\n
Sixth through tenth were, Dwight Jarvis, Ascutney, VT., Mike Holdridge, Madison, CT.,
\nChris Pasteryak, Lisbon, CT., Jim Boniface, Winchester, and Max Zachem, Preston, CT.<\/p>\n
The race, slowed by three caution flags, was completed in 40 minutes.
\n23 race teams entered the event, 17 cars were running at the conclusion,
\n14 on the lead lap. <\/p>\n
Russ Hersey, Swanzey, McKennedy, and Pasteryak won qualifying races. <\/p>\n
Race Summary:
\nRace # Monadnock Speedway, Winchester, NH
\nDistance: 100 laps
\nTime of Race: 40:19:792
\nMargin of Victory: 1.995
\nBest Lap Time: 12.669 (Jim Boniface))
\nBest Speed: 71.040 (Boniface)
\nLead Changes: 3
\nLap Leaders: Mechalides; (1-7) Alexander (8 \u201363) McKennedy (64-100)
\nCautions: Lap 17, 39,61<\/p>\n
Order of Finish: (1) McKennedy (2) Alexander, (3) Hinckley (4) Pennink (5) Goodenough
\n(6) Jarvis (7) Holdridge (8) Pasteryak, (9) Boniface (10) Zachem (11) Patnode (12) Mechalides
\n(13) Wrenn (14) Perry (15) Dore (16) McClay (17) Hersey (18) Doucette (19) Masse (20)
\nJordan (21) Norton (22) Annarummo (23) Bateman<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Winchester, NH. \u2013 Defending Valenti Modified Racing Series Champion Jon McKennedy of E. Chelmsford, MA., took the lead on lap 64 and went on to win the 8th annual \u201cFirecracker 100\u201d Saturday night, July 2, at Monadnock Speedway, Winchester, NH. The win was McKennedy\u2019s first of the season, his first at Monadnock, and his 12thcareer […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[152,126,112,5],"tags":[192,15766],"class_list":["post-5984","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-monadnock-speedway-new-hampshire","category-new-england","category-new-hampshire","category-pass","tag-monadnock","tag-pass"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5984","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5984"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5984\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5984"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5984"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5984"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}