The Pro All Stars Series unveiled the 2020 schedule for the PASS North Super Late Models on Monday, setting a preliminary itinerary for New England’s premier Late Model touring series.
A high-profile return to New Hampshire Motor Speedway, a first visit to a rejuvenated track, and a reduced focus on PASS’ home venue are the immediate takeaways from the fourteen-race schedule.
The new PASS North schedule features fourteen events at seven different tracks in the states of Maine, New Hampshire, Massachusetts and Vermont. And while the season’s focus is once again directed at its biggest event in August, the PASS North champion will be crowned in late October for the third year running.
The longest track on the schedule will open the season for the first time in PASS history, with New Hampshire Motor Speedway welcoming the Super Late Models for the inaugural Northeast Classic on April 17th and 18th. Modeled after the NASCAR Twins doubleheaders of the early 1990s, PASS’ third visit ever to the “Magic Mile” will be a collaborative effort with the American-Canadian Tour, whose Late Models return for their second points-paying race at NHMS and their first event at the track since 2017.
TOURING SCHEDULES: CARS Tour | CRA Super Series | Midwest Tour | TUNDA SLM Series| PASS North & National | NASCAR Modified Tour | Pretoria Race Alliance | Southern Super Series | ACT | Tri Track
The two tours will head to Oxford Plains Speedway the following weekend, with the legendary Maine oval hosting the second of six scheduled double-bills for the PASS North and ACT Late Models. PASS’ home venue will see the series four times in 2020, after hosting seven points features and a non-points event last year.
The third race of the season is an inaugural trip for the PASS North teams to Hudson Speedway in New Hampshire. Track owner Ben Bosowski invested in major renovations for the quarter-mile last year, including a backstretch wall, paved pit area and new grandstands. The PASS Modifieds visited twice in 2019, setting the groundwork for the Super Late Models to make their Hudson debut on May 3rd.
A mid-May event at White Mountain Motorsports Park is the first of three scheduled visits to the northern New Hampshire oval. A one-month layover will give teams time to prepare for the fifth race of the season, the annual trip to Speedway 95 outside Bangor, Maine on June 14th. The month of June ends with a visit to Star Speedway, as ACT and PASS collaborate for their third doubleheader of the season on the 26th and 27th.
After opening the season at six different tracks, PASS returns home to Oxford on July 3rd to mark the season’s midway point with a rare Friday-night feature. Two weeks later, PASS heads back to WMMP for their second visit, an event that coincides with the major NASCAR weekend just down the road at NHMS.
REGIONAL SCHEDULES: South Boston | Langley | Motor Mile | Hickory | Stafford
July concludes with the ninth race of the year and the fourth PASS-ACT doubleheader of the season, as the two series visit Seekonk Speedway for a Wednesday feature on July 29th. The “Cement Palace,” Massachusetts’ only paved speedway, is one of few tracks in New England that host both Pro Stocks and ACT-type Late Models as weekly divisions.
The schedule swings back home for the next month, with Oxford hosting the touring cars on August 9th. The 150-lap event is a final tuneup and the last scheduled event before the 47th Annual Oxford 250. The biggest single-day show in Super Late Model racing will go green just before dusk on the 30th of August, the climax of a busy weekend that also features the ACT Late Models in their fifth shared weekend with PASS.
Three points events remain after the 250’s completion, spaced through the months of September and October. PASS’ only September date is a mid-month trip back to WMMP on the 19th. With NHMS’ fall weekend moving up a week on the schedule, the annual fall visit to WMMP now coincides with the open-wheel Star Classic at Star Speedway.
October kicks off with PASS’ only visit of the year to Vermont’s Thunder Road Speedbowl. The Friday-night feature will pair the Super Late Models for a third year with Thunder Road’s annual Vermont Milk Bowl, the biggest race of the season for ACT-type Late Models.
For the third year running, the PASS North Super Late Models will wrap up their season alongside the Tri-Track Open Modified Series at Seekonk Speedway. The double-feature finale will take place on the 24th of October, with the PASS North champion crowned that afternoon.
Thompson Speedway, where the PASS North schedule has opened since 2016, is not on the schedule for 2020. The high-banked Connecticut oval was absent from the ACT schedule announcement last week as well. While last year’s Thompson date was added after the initial schedule announcement, it seems unlikely that PASS would supplant their newly-announced Northeast Classic after promoting the event as the season lidlifter.
Also absent is a date for the recently-renamed Riverside Speedway in Groveton, N.H. Last year’s scheduled visit to the former Speedway 51 was called off early, replaced with an event at Oxford and tentatively rescheduled to this coming May. Riverside changed ownership late in the year, and while there is space on the schedule for a May visit to the track, perhaps the change made a PASS visit unlikely.
And after well-received visits to Spud Speedway in 2018 and 2019, the Caribou, Maine oval is not on the schedule for next year.
PASS did indicate that as many as three additional dates could be added to the schedule by early January. This suggests that negotiations could be underway for races at either Riverside or Spud, or another track that had not yet finalized its schedule for next year.
It bears mention that there is no PASS Open in July at Oxford Plains Speedway, nor are there any events scheduled at PASS’ home track after the Oxford 250. Indeed, the original schedule published on Monday listed an Oxford event on October 24th with the Seekonk finale on the 31st. That oversight has since been corrected with the Seekonk event now on the 24th. It seems unlikely that PASS would not return to Oxford in September or October, when weekly competition is over and car counts tend to rise.
PASS has also shared dates for two events outside New England, though a complete listing of PASS National Championship dates has not been officially announced.
At first glance, it seems that PASS has effectively spread some of the competition around, shifting the burden of the schedule from its own Oxford Plains Speedway to other tracks that have supported the series in recent years. The pending dates that have yet to be confirmed could continue that trend, introducing new tracks like Hudson Speedway to the schedule, or they could bolster the series’ Maine presence with one or two more home-track appearances.
But with no major surprises and few significant hurdles presented to the teams, the new schedule promises to test New England’s top Super Late Model racers all year as they battle for the championship in PASS’ nineteenth season of competition.
2020 Pro All Stars Series North Super Late Model Schedule (current as of 12/12):
Fri-Sat | Apr 17-18 | New Hampshire Motor Speedway | Loudon, NH
Sun | Apr 26 | Oxford Plains Speedway | Oxford, ME
Sun | May 3 | Hudson Speedway | Hudson, NH
Sun | May 17 | White Mountain Motorsports Park | North Woodstock, NH
Sun | June 14 | Speedway 95 | Hermon, ME
Fri-Sat | June 26-27 | Star Speedway | Epping, NH
Fri | July 3 | Oxford Plains Speedway | Oxford, ME
Sat | July 18 | White Mountain Motorsports Park | North Woodstock, NH
Wed | July 29 | Seekonk Speedway | Seekonk, MA
Sun | Aug 9 | Oxford Plains Speedway | Oxford, ME
Fri-Sun | Aug 28-30 | Oxford Plains Speedway | Oxford, ME
Sat | Sept 19 | White Mountain Motorsports Park | North Woodstock, NH
Fri | Oct 2 | Thunder Road Speedbowl | Barre, VT
Sat | Oct 24 | Seekonk Speedway | Seekonk, MA
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