With young winners and new partnerships stealing the Pro All Stars Series this season, seven-time champion Johnny Clark has spent the first couple months of 2023 in the shadows.
And he picked a rain-postponed race in which to step back into the spotlight.
Clark outlasted DJ Shaw in the final forty-lap stretch run to win Sunday’s PASS North bout at White Mountain Motorsports Park, taking his first win of the season at the Granite State bullring.
The sixth race of the PASS North season, postponed from its original May date, dodged another rainy weekend in the Northeast to run on schedule, avoiding yet another rain delay in a damp spring thus far.
The two multi-time titlists waged war at the front for most of the race, taking over from early contenders Garrett Hall and Joey Doiron well before halfway. Shaw, a seven-time winner and a WMMP alumnus, held the lead briefly before yielding to Clark on lap 65.
Brian Whalley’s spin on lap 110 set up the final sprint to the checkers, with Clark and Shaw leaning on each other to settle the score. Midway through the run, though, Shaw met with power steering issues, dropping him from the lead battle.
Rookie Max Cookson, rebounding from early-race damage, ascended to second, but was unable to reel in Clark in the final twenty circuits.
Instead, Clark held on to claim his fifth career win at WMMP under the PASS North banner and his first PASS win since last September at Spud Speedway.
Cookson finished second, his fourth top-five finish of 2023 and just enough to keep the young Mainer atop the points standings.
Jimmy Renfrew, Jr. crossed the line third, but was disqualified in post-race inspection, elevating Evan Hallstrom to third. Hallstrom has three prior third-place finishes, all at Thunder Road International Speedbowl.
Trevor Sanborn survived an early altercation with Mike Rowe to come home fourth, with Hall finishing fifth.
Shaw slipped to sixth at the finish with his mechanical woes. Behind Shaw, Mike Mitchell matched his career best with a seventh-place finish. Early leader Doiron was eighth in the revised rundown, with Whalley and Oxford Plains Speedway rookie Garrett Lamb rounding out the top ten.
NASCAR Cup Series spotter Derek Kneeland took advantage of an off-weekend to file a last-minute entry, finishing 12th in the 22-car field.
Sunday’s race was the sixth of a 2023 season that, like last year, has been tortured by inclement weather. Only the season’s second race at New Hampshire Motor Speedway and May’s visit to Thunder Road have not been postponed by rain thus far. June was structured as a lighter month on the schedule, but absorbed the WMMP rescheduling.
A rain-postponed event early last year kept Clark from defending his 2021 PASS North crown, but the veteran driver turned in a title-caliber season regardless, winning three times and finishing worse than tenth only once. Clark’s wins came at Seekonk Speedway, WMMP and Spud Speedway, where he celebrated a victory in the wake of a late-race controversy and penalty at the Oxford 250. Clark was absent, however, for three of the year’s final four races.
The popular driver was at Thompson Speedway in Connecticut in April, opening the year with a fifth-place finish and a third-place run a week later at NHMS. Finishes just outside the top ten in the last two races at Oxford, though, were not up to Clark’s usual expectations.
But a significant share of Clark’s wins have come at New England’s quarter-mile ovals. In addition to his five WMMP wins, the veteran has four wins at Riverside Speedway in Groveton, N.H., two at Star Speedway in Epping, N.H., and one at Quebec’s Autodrome Chaudière.
If ever there were a track for Johnny Clark to return to victory lane, WMMP is near the top of the list.
And with the season only getting started, the rookies and rising stars have plenty to worry about.
Unofficial Results
Pro All Stars Series North Father’s Day 150
White Mountain Motorsports Park
1. (54) Johnny Clark
2. (39) Max Cookson
3. (1VT) Evan Hallstrom
4. (44) Trevor Sanborn
5. (94) Garrett Hall
6. (60) DJ Shaw
7. (40RI) Mike Mitchell
8. (73D) Joey Doiron
9. (02) Brian Whalley
10. (38) Garrett Lamb
11. (41) Logan Melcher
12. (90K) Derek Kneeland
13. (11B) Matt Beers
14. (47) Gabe Brown
15. (25) Shawn Knight
16. (07) Nick Calvert
17. (09) Jeremy Davis
18. (12) Dennis Spencer, Jr.
19. (24) Mike Rowe
20. (50) Andy Shaw
DNS (90W) Craig Weinstein
DQ (00NH) Jimmy Renfrew, Jr.
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