Six Champions Crowned at Monadnock Speedway Season Finale
WINCHESTER,N.H. - What a night. What a season. Monadnock Speedway crowned six 2026 divisional champions Saturday as the northeast region’s premier quarter-mile oval closed out its 56th racing season on their final weekend.
Seven different drivers raced their way to victory lane, one of them - Tim Paquette - wrapping up his first career championship on the high banks Saturday night. While two of the 2026 titleholders have worn the crown before at the Route 10 speedplant, there were no carry-overs from a season ago.
Also on the speedway’s Championship Night event, two individuals whose talents helped shape the Monadnock legacy were inducted into the speedway Hall of Fame. They join the previous 15 inductees honored at last year’s inaugural ceremony.
Todd Patnode won the Modified feature Saturday, his third win in a row to close out the season, while race runner-up Tyler Leary, who took the night off a few weeks ago to get married, celebrated his third Monadnock championship by nipping Andrew Brousseau, fourth on the night, by only two points for the 2026 crown.
In the Limited Late Models, Nate Wenzel, who has dominated the Modified division in recent seasons, scored his first 2026 win in the full-fendered flyers. Racer runner-up JD Stockwell, who finished at Wenzel’s bumper Saturday, put together a blockbuster ten-win season to earn his first career Limited Late Model championship, that to go along with a previous Pure Stock title.
Tim Paquette entered Saturday’s Mini Stock season finale still winless on this season but atop the points parade. He put an exclamation point on his first career championship season by leading the last seven laps to score his first win on the high banks since a Pure Stock victory way back in 2016.
The Pure Stock race to the title was a nailbiter. Rookie star Josh Brigham did all he could do to win the crown by scoring his fourth win of the season, but Jimmy Zellman, who entered Saturday’s season finale five points ahead of Brigham, was content to follow him under the checkers in second, using the night’s runner-up finish to lock up his first career championship by a slim three-point margin.
Pro4 Modified hot shoe Ryan “Booger” McPartland scored his first victory of this season Saturday, easily outdistancing the field to top the prestigious 31-lap Norm Wrenn III Memorial Race. Many-time speedway winner Rob Richardi, like Leary, Stockwell, and Zellman before him, raced home second Saturday to win his first career Monadnock crown in the first season the Pro 4 Mods have competed here under the NASCAR Banner.
Matt Robinson won his fourth Pro V8 Sportsman feature of the summer, but it was Alstead’s second-generation pilot Aaron Thompson, third on the night Saturday, who earned the division’s first-ever Monadnock Speedway Pro V8 Sportsman Series championship.
And while the youth division Young Guns don’t compete for points or championships, Dylan Stati left little doubt who was tops in his class this year. Stati won again Saturday, wrapping up a 15-for-15 season on the high banks. Late-season entry Eli Elliott was second, and Mason Bezio third.
Inducted into the Monadnock Speedway Saturday were Rusty Ball and Fred Rosner. Ball, a star driver for many seasons on the high banks, was also a noted engine builder and parts purveyor. Rosner was famed for decades as one of the top car builders in the northeast. Ball’s famed number 20 Modified, driven Saturday by Bob Donahue, paced the night’s 40-lap 604 Modified main event.
Three of the speedway’s 2026 track championships were very much up for grabs entering Saturday’s Championship Night event. The Modified, Pure Stock, and Pro V8 Sportsman title races each featured top-two battles of seven points or less.
The Pro V8 drama went quickly out the window when Chris Kingsley’s ride detonated in practice, that left the Modifieds and Pure Stocks to feature battles until their final lap. And neither disappointed.
Eddie Gomarlo and Andy Major sat on row one in the Modified main event. Andrew Brousseau and Tyler Leary, two points apart for the title, shared row four. Gomarlo led the first six laps but then Todd Patnode took charge. Gomarlo, though, wasn’t going far, staying glued to Patnode’s bumper for much of the way before finishing third on the night. It was the spot he gave up on a lap-34 restart that would decide the championship. Leary charged up to second on that restart, moving him two spots - four points - ahead of Brousseau, and with Gomarlo holding rock-solid to sail home third, Leary took the title by only two markers. Sidelined earlier this summer by an injury, Patnode was not in the championship chase but put the field on notice for next season by sweeping the last three 2026 Modified features.
Jimmy Zellman fired from row four in the Pure Stock feature, two points ahead of Josh Brigham, blasting off from row five in the 19-car field. An opening lap multi-car dustup on the back chute, though, saw them both refire from the rear, then renewing their battle for the crown from deep in the pack while Michael Yeaton appeared headed for an easy win. And then the bomb went off. Dylan Zullo, victorious a week earlier, was suddenly on fire, charging into second on lap 11, he gobbled up a seemingly insurmountable deficit to catch Yeaton on lap 21 and then they tangled, launching Zullo, aboard the CJ Johnson entry, wildly into the wall and, when the dust had settled putting Brigham and Zellman side-by-side on row one.
Once in front, Brigham never looked back. Zellman, though, didn’t need to win, using Saturday night’s runner-up finish to earn his first career championship. Green Mountain Boy Chris Chambers, crowned Claremont’s Pure Stock king a week earlier, was third on the night, followed by Kyle Begos and Jordan Gonyea.
Saturday’s Championship Night event capped a hugely successful season at Monadnock Speedway; filled with incredibly competitive races weekly and dotted with numerous special events, the high-banked quarter-mile completed 18 NASCAR Local Racing Series events, and hosted one JDV NASCAR Whelen Series 200-lapper, while suffering only two rain-outs.
Six Champions Crowned at Monadnock Speedway Season Finale
BRATTLEBORO TOWING AND RECOVERY PURE STOCK drivers include Josh Brigham, Jimmy Zellman, Chris Chambers, Kyle Begos, Jordan Gonyea, Colton Hull, Sofia Rego, Bob Betourney, James Sallee, Michaela Krafve, Ben Smith, Ella Grabowski, Dylan Zullo, Chris Quin, Michael Yeaton, Thomas Lafayette, Markus O’Neil, Linsey Wenzel, Maya Bell, Timothy Lang, and Chris Judd.
LAVALLEY BUILDING SUPPLY PRO 4 MODIFIED drivers include Booger McPartland, Rob Richadi Jr., Randy Clark, Russ Hersey Jr., Sydney Cook, TJ Haggett, Fast Eddie, Doug Meservey, and Dana Darlington.
BECK’S AUTOMOTIVE PRO V8 SPORTSMAN drivers include Matt Robinson, Paul McCoubry, Aaron Thompson, Reagan Buffum, Ron Burgess Jr., Stephen LaPlante, Bob Crawford, Stephen Dubois, James Thompson, Keith Nelson, Mike Wollinger, and Hunter Duquette.
DOUG’S AUTO BODY YOUNG GUNS drivers include Dylan Stati, Eli Elliott, Mason Bezio, and Maeve Barry.
Photo Credit: Emily Miller. Tyler Leary (Hatfield, Ma) - 2026 Champion 604 Modifieds.