Well, this is a reversal of recent fortune, both this spring and in previous years.
Matt Hirschman won the NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour race last season but had never won opening night in the World Series of Asphalt until Monday — overcoming a general dissatisfaction from this year’s NWMT race in the process.
Hirschman finished third on Saturday but methodically worked his way up from sixth on Monday and was the clearly dominant force over the 50 laps, his starting spot notwithstanding. That makes four straight World Series victories for Hirschman, who won the final three last season as well.
“It’s good to get a win,” Hirschman said. “I’m proud of our team’s effort so far. Wasn’t happy with our performance Saturday but this is a good start to this week for the World Series here.”
He drove away from Patrick Emerling in convincing fashion over the final couple of restarts, but there was a reason for it, as he was either down a cylinder or burned a plug wire or some other slow burning mechanical gremlin.
“That’s a pretty lucky second place there,” Emerling said. “We started the race and the car was good. Maybe a little bit snug. We thought it would come to us. We weren’t bad. … We did drop a cylinder. It’s just a testament to how good the car was.”
The race featured a good bit of attrition, but not in the form of big crashes, but instead of a series of small ones or various mechanical issues.
Joey Coulter clawed his way to a podium having a car that was at least good enough to race in the top-five all night. It was a testament to a driver who is still new to the Tour Type Modified game.
“That was intense and a lot of fun,” Coulter said. “It’s so cool to be able to mix it up with these guys. This is all still brand new to us and the team.”
The only real challenger Hirschman seemed to have was the winner on Saturday night in Ron Silk, who ran first or second throughout most of the first half, before falling out of the race with 18 laps to go with a mechanical failure.
“It seemed like it was a two-car race,” Hirschman said. “Obviously [Silk] dropped out for whatever reason. The two of us were the class of the field tonight. They won Saturday night. They obviously were off to a real good start. Whatever happened, that took the pressure off there.”
This also marks the seventh year that Hirschman has won at least one race at New Smyrna during Florida Speedweeks.
“Every year I’ve come here with Peedee Motorsports, we’ve won at least once,” Hirschman said. “This makes seven consecutive years of winning at least one race. To get a win, and several years we’ve gotten multiple years, so we’ve got plenty of chances to see what we can do the rest of the week.”
The World Series of Asphalt continues on Tuesday for the Tour Type Modified division with another 50 lap feature that precedes the ASA Southern Super Series points opener that is also a World Series points race for the Super Late Model division.
- Matt Hirschman
- Patrick Emerling
- Joey Coulter
- Tyler Rypkema
- Eric Goodale
- Jimmy Blewett
- Craig Lutz
- Anthony Bello
- Brian Robie
- Spencer Davis
- Jeremy Gerstner
- Burt Myers
- Ronnie Williams
- Kyle Ellwood
- Cam McDermott
- Eddie McCarthy
- Tom Martino, Jr.
- Tyler Catalano
- Nicholas Halkowicz
- Chris Hatton
- Rich Parker
- Brett Meservey
- Caleb Heady
- David Sapienza
- Anthony Nocella
- Ron Silk
- Norman Newman
- J.R. Bertuccio
- Andrew Krause
- Paul Hartwig, Jr.
- Casey Roderick
- Dillon Steuer
- Justin Brown
- Anthony Sesely
- Amy Catalano
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