Kevin Douglass, far right, signs autographs in victory lane after winning a July 2019 Pro Stock feature at Wiscasset Speedway. Kennebec Journal photo by Travis Barrett
WISCASSET — There’s not likely to be much of a home track advantage on Sunday at Wiscasset Speedway.
“I wouldn’t think so, not with the level of teams that are coming,” said Scarborough’s Garrett Hall, one of nearly 40 entries for the Boss Hogg 150. “Everybody’s going to be on the ball.”
Since track owners Richard and Vanessa Jordan announced in August that this year’s version of the annual Labor Day weekend Super Late Model race would double the winner’s purse — to $10,000 — interest has piqued.
Only the Oxford 250, which guarantees $25,000 to its annual winner, offers a larger payout in the state of Maine.
It’s resulted in a starting lineup that will likely include Wiscasset Speedway champions, Pro All Stars Series race winners and a number of teams that last weekend competed in the Oxford 250.
Reigning track champion and current point leader Kevin Douglass of Sidney, who won last year’s Boss Hogg 150, admits the stakes have been raised.
“With the guys we race weekly, I know where I stack up with them. With this race now, I don’t know where I stack up. It’s going to be tough,” Douglass said. “I always feel like I’m at a disadvantage. We don’t have the knowledge that these other teams do. They’ve got specific tire guys, hired crew guys. It’s just us. We don’t have the ‘team’ these other guys do.”
Douglass, who made his first start in a Super Late Model in 2018, does have one thing in his corner. In four career Boss Hogg starts, he’s never finished worse than fourth.
This season, Douglass has five wins and eight top-two finishes in 10 races for the track’s weekly division.
“You can’t change everything you’re doing that works just to try to be successful in this race,” Douglass said. “If I can run top-five and be competitive, I’ll be happy. Do I want to go and repeat? Absolutely. I’ve always felt like I have something to prove.”
The Boss Hogg 150 has traditionally been a race featuring Wiscasset’s weekly division regulars with a small handful of outsiders mixed in. On Sunday, the speedway’s locals will be significantly outnumbered.
“You’re going to have to have a little luck,” Douglass said.
Nobody knows more about luck in this race — or the lack thereof — than Hall.
In 2017 Hall crossed the finish line first but was disqualified after the event for an illegal tire change. The next year, he was leading when eventual winner Mike Hopkins nudged him out of the way to steal the victory.
The following year, he was collected in a multi-car wreck while racing for the lead with Ben Ashline, the only driver to win both the Coastal 200 and Boss Hogg 150 in the same season.
“You never say ‘should have’ in this sport,” Hall said of the 2017 miss. “But you look back at it and we raced at Seekonk (Massachusetts) for 10 grand that year, too, and we had a chance to win that. That same year was the Mason-Dixon Meltdown and it paid $15,000 to win. We could have won all of those races, and when you count those all up — we would have had a really good, successful year.
“But I’ll trade all three of those Boss Hogg (losses) for the one that pays $10,000 this year.”
Notable entries Sunday include former winners Hopkins, Ashline, Nick Jenkins and Trevor Sanborn, as well as former Oxford 250 winners Joey Polewarczyk Jr. and Wayne Helliwell Jr. Previous Oxford Plains Speedway and Beech Ridge Motor Speedway champion Dave Farrington has filed an entry, as has current Oxford Plains point leader Max Cookson of Pittston.
Qualifying heats begin at 2 p.m. on Sunday afternoon. The Pro Trucks and Strictly Street division will also race.
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