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Last season, Ben Rowe edged his father Mike by seven points to win his fifth Pro All Stars Series championship in the tour’s seven-year existence.
The Rowes will be in the title chase again when the 2008 season begins Saturday at Scarborough’s Beech Ridge Motor Speedway. Heats start at 3 p.m.
Ben Rowe is making the switch from Chevy Monte Carlos to Ford Fusions and likes his chances to repeat.
“I think our chances are good. We’ve got two cars ready to go and a third should be ready in a week,” said Ben Rowe, who drove a Fusion in the Easter Bunny 150 PASS South race and was running second when he was gathered up in a wreck involving lapped cars. He finished 13th.
“We were real happy with the car,” he said.
Mike Rowe will have a new crew chief in Roger Varney, who replaces Seth Holbrook.
The elder Rowe led the series in wins with five last year, four more than his son.
“But we finished worse than Benji in some of the other races. It doesn’t hurt my feelings that he beat me [for the title],” said Mike Rowe.
The Rowes expect the series to be very competitive.
“My dad, Cassius Clark and Johnny Clark are going to be the ones to beat,” said Ben Rowe. “Cassius has had the dominant car, hands down, the past couple of years but ran into some stupid little things [that hurt him].”
Mike Rowe said his son will have a good chance to defend his title but “all kinds of good cars” will also be in the hunt.
The Rowes said the key to winning at Beech Ridge is patience.
“You want to run up front [to avoid trouble],” said Ben Rowe.
That includes the heat races, he said.
The Rowes enjoy racing at Beech Ridge, and the PASS North tour will have three races there this season instead of just two.
“It’s the best track in the state,” said Mike Rowe. “[Owner] Andy [Cusack] and his staff do a heck of a job. It’s nice and clean.”
“They respect the track and keep it up and we respect it the same way. It’s a fun atmosphere,” said Ben Rowe.
One PASS South driver making the trip to Beech Ridge will be 18-year-old Alex Haase, who will drive for Kyle Busch, the NASCAR Sprint Cup driver who owns the team.
Cusack happy with 3rd PASS race
Cusack was pleased to land a third PASS North race on July 5. The others will be Saturday and Sept. 21.
“All the drivers and their teams are top flight. We’ve drawn well for the early race and the late race and those are typically off-peak times of year,” said Cusack. “Having one in prime time made sense to Tom [PASS president Tom Mayberry] and me.”
Beech Ridge’s regular Saturday night race card will begin April 25.
Beech Ridge will continue to have its Thursday night race card for entry-level classes beginning in June, and for the second year it will offer a Wednesday night class.
“Our Thursday series is for amateur drivers only, but they are allowed to race for just four years,” said Cusack.
That gives them a lot of experience and makes it unfair for the newcomers, he explained.
However, several drivers who were purged out of the Thursday night series expressed interest in continuing to race, but they didn’t want to commit to Saturday night.
“So we added a Wednesday night class for them,” said Cusack.
There will be eight Wednesday night race cards.
Five Friday night race cards will be added in August called Car Wars, which is a cross between demolition derby and racing.
Speedway 95, East Series debut
The Camping World (formerly Busch) East series and Hermon’s Speedway 95 will open their seasons this weekend.
The American Revolution 150 will be held at Greenville-Pickens Speedway (S.C.) on Saturday at 8 p.m.
Speedway 95 will debut on Sunday at 2.
Peyton Sellers and Austin Dillon will drive for Cherryfield native Andy Santerre’s Motorsports team in the Camping World East series.
Speedway 95 will have five divisions but no Pro Stocks.
lmahoney@bangordailynews.net
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