New ride works out for Hallowell’s Clark Local drivers enjoy racing at Wiscasset

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Hallowell’s Johnny Clark knows what he is going to do with the $30,000 he pocketed for his win in the Toyota Tundra 250 at Wiscasset Raceway Sunday night: pay off the brand new Chevy Monte Carlo he drove to Victory Lane. He hadn’t driven it until practice on Saturday.

“We spend a lot of money doing this. We don’t get it all back in sponsorship dollars,” said Clark. “If I could win one of these a year, it would set the checkbook up pretty nicely.”

It was the biggest payoff of his career: $5,000 more than he made when he won the DNK 250 at Unity Raceway in 2004.

“Everything meshed together halfway through the race. I couldn’t believe how good we were on old rubber [tires],” said Clark.

Clark gave up the lead on lap 198 to get fuel and take on four new tires and he was concerned that he pitted too late to make his way up through the pack. He had hoped to pit somewhere between laps 175 and 180.

But it took him just 19 laps to go from 13th to first, and he held off Boothbay’s Corey Williams for the victory.

“It turned out to be the best thing to happen to us. When we put on our new tires, the other cars had 100 laps on their tires,” said Clark, who easily made his way to the front.

“I’ve done a lot a laps around the place. I pulled a couple of three-wides [three cars side-by-side],” said Clark. “Once I committed to pass, I had to go. If you back out [of a pass], you could create more of a mess. I think everyone was being told on their radios that I was coming and no one messed around too long. They let me go.”

“Everyone was running their own race. No one wanted to hold someone up with new tires and 40 laps to go,” added Clark. “I’ll return that respect to them in another race.”

Clark will return to racing in the Pro All-Stars Series Super Late Model North division on Aug. 31 when he travels to Geary, New Brunswick, for the Peterbilt 250.

He is the defending champion.

“It’s a fast little track. It’s similar to Unity [Raceway], only it’s faster,” said the 28-year-old Clark, who hopes to annex a third PASS SLM North points championship.

Bangor-area racers like Wiscasset

Several Bangor-area drivers who used to race Pro Stock cars at Hermon’s Speedway 95 are racing at Wiscasset this season. Speedway 95 dropped Pro Stock cars after last season.

Town Hill’s John Phippen is leading the Pro Stock points at Wiscasset, Winterport’s Ryan Deane is eighth and Bangor’s Jesse Smith is 16th, but Smith has missed three races.

“I like racing here, but it’s a long haul,” said Phippen, who used to be a regular at Wiscasset years ago. “It’s 122 miles one way.”

“But I’m having a good time and most of the people seem to be happy I’m back,” added the 55-year-old Phippen, who is leading the Pro Stock points by four over Randy Turner and eight over Jeff Burgess.

“We’ve been pretty consistent. We’re having a pretty good year,” said Phippen. “We’ve got a couple of seconds and a third.”

“It’s pretty good other than being rough,” said Smith. “A lot of guys don’t have any respect [for other drivers]. There are so many variations based on where everybody comes from. You’ve got drivers from Oxford, Beech Ridge [Scarborough], Bangor [Speedway 95] and Unity,” said Smith. “It’s going to be a lot better once everyone knows how everybody else races.”

He said the purse money is much better than Speedway 95 and that helps defray the extra fuel costs.

“The way I look at it, last place here pays $100 more than Bangor. That pays my gas bill,” said Smith. “It pays you $225 just to start the race and that’s pretty respectable for any Saturday night racing. It’s fun, it’s a good group of guys and I’m getting a chance to race against people I shouldn’t be racing with yet.”

Deane concurred.

“It’s an hour-and-a-half ride, which costs you a little extra in fuel, but they pay better down here and there’s a lot more cars to race with. That makes it a little more exciting when you run up front,” said Deane.

“I like the competition. It makes you better,” added Deane.

Deane said he has learned that racing at night at Wiscasset is different than it is at other tracks.

“When the sun goes down, tracks usually tighten up. It gets more grip, so the cars get tight. But when the sun goes down at Wiscasset, the sea air blows in here. That puts so much moisture on top of the racetrack, it makes it loose,” said Deane. “You have to plan for it.”

lmahoney@bangordailynews.net

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