Brown backs up 2025 ACT Tour success with Lee checkers

Gabe Brown led the Milton CAT American-Canadian Tour in wins last year, but a lack of consistency kept the 2024 series champion from repeating the feat.

He’s already hard at work on both ends of the spectrum.

Brown picked up his first win of 2026 in the return of the New Hampshire Governor’s Cup 150 at Lee USA Speedway, the first ACT-sanctioned event at the Granite State oval since 2023.

Last Saturday’s race, the second of the Milton CAT American-Canadian Tour season, brought back the Governor’s Cup moniker that was bestowed upon the series’ Lee season opener in the 2010s. A series of delays and postponements late in the decade spelled the end of the event after the 2018 edition, won by Scott Payea.

Brown, then a rising Super Late Model prospect, had yet to strap into an ACT Late Model.

The Center Conway, N.H. native had no trepidation about this year’s return to the speedway, with a Granite State Pro Stock Series win at Lee in 2021 and a runner-up finish to Brandon Barker in ACT’s 2023 appearance.

A heat win staged Brown on the outside pole for the feature alongside Kaiden Fisher. Brown peeked out to lead the first lap, with Fisher powering back to the front to lead through a lap-seven yellow flag. Jimmy Renfrew, Jr. nabbed the point on the ensuing restart.

Renfrew showed the way until lap 52, when his rival Brown closed the gap to take back the top spot. Quebec’s Jonathan Bouvrette joined the lead battle, posting fast times out front but not enough to threaten Brown for the lead.

A rash of late-race yellows kept Brown in check, with 2023 winner Barker moving into second. But Brown kept Barker at bay in the final 21-lap sprint to the checkered flag.

Indeed, Brown had stretched his advantage to a whopping 2.942 seconds as he took his first win of the year, his seventh career Milton CAT American-Canadian Tour victory and his second touring win at Lee.

Barker, who finished ahead of Brown to win the Pro All Stars Series North Strafford County 150 that afternoon, swapped the outcome around to finish second.

Early leader Renfrew was third at the finish, with Massachusetts’ Jake Johnson backing up a top-five run at New Hampshire Motor Speedway a week earlier with his fourth-place finish for Hartwell Motorsports. Geoff Rollins earned a career-best fifth.

Polesitter Fisher settled into sixth at the finish, ahead of Quebecers Bouvrette and Alexendre Tardif. Bryan Mason was ninth with Jesse Switser rounding out the top ten.

Reigning Série ACT champion Jeff Côté finished 13th, one of ten racers in the field from La Belle Province, but one of only three to crack the top twenty at race’s end.

With two very different race tracks in the rear-view mirror, and plenty of racing out the windshield, Brown and Johnson sit atop the early points standings, two of nineteen drivers who have started both races so far. NHMS winner Connor Souza opted not to continue his Tour run at Lee, sticking to a limited schedule. Bouvrette sits third in points after an uncharacteristically strong start to the season.

Looming large on the calendar, though, is the third race of the season, a tilt at Thunder Road International Speedbowl. ACT’s home track has a reputation that precedes itself, with local experience often paying out over Tour prowess. With a strong contingent of weekly regulars on hand, the Tour regulars have a big challenge ahead in the Green Mountains.

And with finishes of 18th and 11th in last year’s Tour dates at the “Nation’s Site of Excitement,” Brown has plenty to build on.

That early win at Lee may be worth its weight in gold.

Unofficial Results
Milton CAT American-Canadian Tour | New Hampshire Governor’s Cup 150
Lee USA Speedway, Lee, N.H.
1. (47NH) Gabe Brown
2. (0ME) Brandon Barker
3. (00NH) Jimmy Renfrew, Jr.
4. (91CT) Jake Johnson
5. (02WP) Geoff Rollins
6. (18VT) Kaiden Fisher
7. (41QC) Jonathan Bouvrette
8. (31CT) Alexendre Tardif
9. (10MT) Bryan Mason
10. (25NH) Jesse Switser
11. (27MA) Chase Curtis
12. (30RI) Jacob “Rowdy” Burns
13. (51QC) Jeff Côté
14. (10NH) Nate Leclair
15. (36NH) Erick Sands
16. (27NH) Cam Huntress
17. (15VT) Hayden Bushey
18. (47MA) Justin Storace
19. (23NH) Craig Smith
20. (29NH) Aaron Fellows
21. (33QC) Rémi Perreault
22. (73MA) Cole Littlewood
23. (72QC) Louis-Philippe Lauzier
24. (21VT) Reilly Lanphear
25. (03QC) Sébastien Couture
26. (90QC) Zackary Fauteux
27. (78QC) Michaël Lavoie
28. (45QC) William Larue
29. (92ME) Colby Meserve
30. (0NH) Holdyn Sullivan
31. (0VT) Scott Dragon
32. (19QC) Dany Trepanier

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