Chase Dowling will have the best view of anyone for the green flag in the inaugural Musket 250.
The 20-year-old scored his fourth career NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour pole award on Friday at New Hampshire Motor Speedway.
Dowling, a Roxbury, Connecticut, driver, earned the pole for the inaugural Musket 250 with a lap of 29.447 seconds (129.344 mph) behind the wheel of the No. 15 S&S Paving Chevrolet. The pole was his fourth career in Whelen Modified Tour competition, his third of the season and first career at New Hampshire.
“Obviously, good way to start the weekend, getting the pole tonight, and it’s gonna be a long race tomorrow, see what we can do,” Dowling said.
“It’s gonna be a lot of crew chief role of this race and seeing when to pit and who else is gonna pit with you… It’s gonna be a crazy race. No one ever did this before, in the past. It’s gonna be, obviously, a new race for everyone. We’ll see, I think it’ll be ear-to-ear play, and we’ll see what we can do. The track’s completely different when the Cup guys were here, with the VHT, and we don’t really have that this time, so we made some adjustments throughout the day, and it obviously worked, and hopefully we do the same tomorrow.”
Dowling will be joined on the front row by Whelen Modified Tour championship points leader Justin Bonsignore. The Holtsville, New York, driver, who paced both practice sessions earlier in the day, qualified on the outside of the front row.
Bonsignore’s quick time of 29.509 seconds (129.072 mph) came up just short of scoring his fifth pole of the season. With seven victories in the first 13 races, Bonsignore enters Saturday’s event 81 points ahead of Dowling in the championship points standings as he looks for his first title.
Patrick Emerling, who has one career Whelen Modified Tour win at Bristol Motor Speedway, qualified third. Former New Hampshire winners Ron Silk (twice) and Doug Coby (four times) rounded out the top five.
Andy Seuss was sixth, followed by Timmy Solomito, Burt Myers, Jon McKennedy and Matt Swanson. Bobby Santos III, who is seeking his fourth straight New Hampshire victory, qualified 11th.
The NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour returns to the track for the inaugural Musket 250 at 3:30 p.m. on Saturday afternoon. The race will air via a live stream on FansChoice.TV. The starting lineup can be found below.
- Chase Dowling
- Justin Bonsignore
- Patrick Emerling
- Ron Silk
- Doug Coby
- Andy Seuss
- Timmy Solomito
- Burt Myers
- Jon McKennedy
- Matt Swanson
- Bobby Santos III
- Rob Summers
- Tommy Catalano
- Ronnie Williams
- Craig Lutz
- Jeff Rocco
- Woody Pitkat
- Dave Sapienza
- Blake Barney
- Gary Putnam
- Chris Pasteryak
- Anthony Nocella
- Calvin Carroll
- Eric Goodale
- Ken Heagy
- Todd Cooper
- Jamie Tomaino
- Gary McDonald
- Dave Salzarulo
- Wade Cole
- Melissa Fifield
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