LOUDON, N.H. – Larry McReynolds has had a first-hand look at the remarkable growth of Winston Cup racing.

The former Winston Cup points championship crew chief has made the transition to the announcer’s booth for Fox Sports Net telecasts and he foresees continued growth for the series.

“I think the television package keeps it growing and changes like Nextel coming in and sponsoring the series next year [instead of Winston Cup] is going to help the growth of it. And venturing out to different venues as they continue to do. You hated to see a race go away from Rockingham because it’s the bloodline of our sport. But we also know we’ve got to go to venues that make more sense,” said McReynolds. “Going to Fontana, California, twice a year definitely makes sense.”

Rockingham (N.C.) will have just one race instead of two next year and Fontana will pick up a second date.

That will give California three races because there is another race over the road course at Infineon Raceway in Sonoma.

California is a huge media market.

He feels having 36 Winston Cup races is enough.

“Thirty-six races is all we can stand. It’s actually 38 races when you figure the Winston All-Star race and Budweiser Shoot-Out. I know we have 52 weeks but we can’t race 52 weeks,” said McReynolds. “They’re going to have to be very careful about letting tracks have two events. When you look at most of the major series, they mainly race at a venue just one time. I know they just added a Fontana race but we really don’t go to the West Coast that often. There are some racetracks that we go to right now that it really doesn’t make sense that go there twice. There are some racetracks we go to once that we probably ought to be going to twice. But I definitely believe for one to come on, one needs to go off.”

He feels New Hampshire International Speedway should keep its two races in July and September.

“Being here twice a year makes good sense because it’s a good market area. You look up in the grandstand just for qualifying, I know they have a modified race here. The people support the sport up here. We can’t do any more in the southeast. We’re pretty saturated right there.”

NHIS using SAFER barriers

For the first time, NHIS has the Steel And Foam Energy Reduction (SAFER) barrier in the corners between turns one and two and three and four.

They are designed to protect the drivers from crashes into the wall. Adam Petty and Kenny Irwin died several years ago at NHIS when their vehicles hit the wall.

Longtime Winston Cup driver Jimmy Spencer said the SAFER barriers represent the greatest improvement implemented by NASCAR in the history of the sport.

Indianapolis and Richmond were the first two tracks to implement the SAFER barriers for their races this season and NHIS is third. Homestead (Fla.) will also install them.

Gallo wins Busch North pole

Sanford’s Mike Gallo won the pole for the New Hampshire 125 Busch North race Saturday. Scarborough’s Ryan Moore, the rookie points leader, qualified sixth and points leader and defending points champion Andy Santerre of Cherryfield will start ninth.

Scarborough’s Kelly Moore qualified 10th, Morrill’s Travis Benjamin will start 24th and Eliot’s Carey Heath will start 36th.

In the New Hampshire 200 Craftsman Truck series race Saturday, Eric Jones, driving for Gardiner-based Team EJP (E.J. Prescott) will start 26th.