Doiron’s new car pays dividends in PASS Star 150 rout

Joey Doiron usually waits for the end of a race to go to the front.

But as carnage unfolded in his mirror throughout Sunday’s Pro All Stars Series Star 150, the lead was the safest place to be.

Doiron took command on a lap-27 restart, then kept the field at bay on subsequent green flags to claim his first PASS North win of 2025 and his second PASS-sanctioned victory of the season.

Yet not even the Berwick, Me. veteran could escape Star Speedway unscathed.

“I guess I got a little bit more damage back here than I thought I did,” Doiron said, acknowledging a tire rub that developed late in the race. “What an unreal car. We came here and tested probably a month ago. We just haven’t been able to race.

“It’s a brand-new car. It’s the first ever brand-new car I’ve ever had.”

Sunday’s race was PASS’ first event in nearly a month, as a frustrating pattern of wet weekends delayed the season’s second race by a day and washed out the series’ Oxford Plains Speedway homecoming two weeks in a row. With races at Thompson Speedway and New Hampshire Motor Speedway out of the way, Sunday’s tilt at the Epping, N.H. quarter-mile marked PASS’ return to short-track normalcy for the first time since March’s Easter Bunny doubleheader at Hickory Motor Speedway.

Doiron, who sat out the big-track shows, was eager to showcase his new car, a Dale Shaw Race Cars chassis he had teased for nearly a year. Doiron foreshadowed its potential with a heat race win, but his win at Hickory in March meant he could start no better than 11th in the feature.

Instead, gridding for the green flag alongside fellow heat winner Jeremy Sorel was PASS newcomer Kendrick Kreyer, a Wisconsin native racing for Florida-based Grant Thormeier Racing.

Sorel shot out to the early lead as Bobby Therrien got the better of Kreyer for second, but Kreyer slipped past Therrien on an early restart to reclaim second. As Sorel and Kreyer stretched their advantage, Therrien came under fire from Jimmy Renfrew, Jr., throwing blocks down the frontstretch as Renfrew looked for an opening.

Kreyer chased down Sorel, taking the lead from the Bay State star as the field battled door-to-door for third on back. Renfrew ultimately forced Therrien to the outside groove, while multi-time champions D.J. Shaw and Johnny Clark were shuffled out of the top ten.

Doiron took advantage of the chaos, leading Thompson winner Trevor Sanborn through the traffic to emerge with third and fourth. Doiron pressed forward, slipping past Sorel for second with twenty-five laps on the scoreboard.

Doiron powered to the point on the restart, overtaking Kreyer and leaving the visitor to fend off Sanborn. The field continued to shuffle behind them, Shaw and Clark making up the ground they had lost earlier. Sanborn settled into second before Jeremy Davis’ second spin of the afternoon brought out the day’s fourth caution.

Two laps later, the yellow flag unfurled for Skip Stanley’s stalled ride in turn four, bunching up the field and staging Doiron to Kreyer’s outside for the restart.

A long green-flag run allowed Doiron to build his lead over Sanborn as Kreyer and Sorel began to falter in traffic. Renfrew, who earned his first Pro Stock victory at Star in 2018, moved to third with Shaw and Clark in tow. Sorel had slipped to sixth when the yellow flew for Therrien’s spin in turn four on lap 65. Two laps later, the early frontrunners’ fortunes turned sour as Sorel spun through turn three, collecting Mike Scorzelli and Ryan Kuhn. Sorel and Kuhn soldiered on, but Kreyer and Scorzelli both pulled off the track under the yellow flag.

Shaw got around Sanborn for second after the restart, but Doiron was untouchable out front, once again stretching out a comfortable lead under green. The field had settled into a single-file rhythm when Garrett Hall slowed with a flat tire, looping his car in turn two while trying to get out of the racing groove.

Clark had swapped third with Sanborn before the lap-108 yellow, but the two Mainers were far from done battling. On lap 110, Sanborn turned the seven-time champion in turn four. Kuhn tried to dodge the spin, but drilled Clark in the rear, ending the day early for both racers. Clark was fine, but delivered a single finger of disapproval to Sanborn for the contact.

With the field thinned almost by half, Doiron led the shortened pack to the green flag one last time. And while Shaw put up a fight at first, no one had an answer for Doiron down the stretch.

In his first start in a new chassis, Doiron coasted to a 2.553-second win over the defending PASS North champion, earning his 16th career PASS North checkered flag.

Renfrew was third at the line, another second and a half back. Brandon Barker avoided drama to come home fourth, while Brandon Varney raced his way to an uneventful fifth place.

Sanborn, despite plenty of damage to his Richard Moody Racing entry, drove back to sixth at the checkers. Cole Robie finished a strong seventh after drawing competitors’ ire at Star and White Mountain Motorsports Park late last year. Sorel limped home in eighth, while Therrien earned a lap back on the final yellow flag to round out the nine cars left at the finish.

Clark was scored tenth after the lap-110 fracas.

Doiron extended a successful streak for car owner Peter Petit, who has won Star Speedway’s last three season-opening Super Late Model races. Travis Benjamin won Granite State Pro Stock Series features at Star in 2023 and 2024.

Sunday’s win is Doiron’s second at the speedway, following his own GSPSS victory in 2021. The bullring has been kind to Doiron in the past; despite only winning twice, he has not finished worse than seventh in a Super Late Model race at Star since 2018.

Shaw was the big-picture winner Sunday, easily vaulting ahead of Kuhn and Sanborn in the PASS North title chase. Shaw had already pulled off a win of sorts a week earlier; faced with a head-to-head conflict between the rain-adjusted PASS and American-Canadian Tour schedules, Shaw had sided with his ACT Tour program. When both races were ultimately postponed for rain, Shaw’s championship double remained in play.

Doiron, on the other hand, is unencumbered by points racing this year. While both team and driver are more than willing to race every week, their focus is on taking home trophies, especially in the year’s biggest shows at tracks like Oxford or Lee USA Speedway. Disregarding points championships also frees Doiron and Petit to test the waters at bigger road shows, something Doiron has been vocal about wanting for a while.

Doiron already has a home win and a road win in 2025. It’s only a matter of time before he picks up another.

Unofficial Results
PASS North | Star 150
Star Speedway, Epping, N.H.
1. (73D) Joey Doiron
2. (60) D.J. Shaw
3. (00) Jimmy Renfrew, Jr.
4. (88) Brandon Barker
5. (12V) Brandon Varney
6. (44) Trevor Sanborn
7. (29R) Cole Robie
8. (7) Jeremy Sorel
9. (5X) Bobby Therrien
10. (54) Johnny Clark
11. (72) Ryan Kuhn
12. (09) Jeremy Davis
13. (94) Garrett Hall
14. (64) Skip Stanley
15. (18) Michael Scorzelli
16. (66) Kendrick Kreyer
17. (44) Rusty Poland

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