Teras charges to monumental win in 52nd All That’s Metal Oxford 250

Austin Teras has been trying to win the Oxford 250 since 2018. His father, Jay Cushman, has been trying since before Teras was born.

In a race that favors experience over youth, Teras and Cushman had both on their side.

Teras took the lead on a lap-185 restart and held off two-time winner Eddie MacDonald over the final fifty laps to win Sunday’s 52nd annual All That’s Metal Oxford 250 in his eighth attempt.

And from the powerplant under their hood to the strategy that put them in position to win, the pair from nearby Gray, Me. put their own mark on New England’s most prestigious Super Late Model race.

“We did it our way,” Teras said after the race.

“And that’s what matters to me.”

The crown jewel of Oxford Plains Speedway and its resident Pro All Stars Series has been atop Cushman’s wish list for decades. Fielding top-flight cars for a formidable roster of drivers over the years, Cushman had invested countless hours and dollars in pursuit of an Oxford 250 trophy.

Teras has been at the center of those efforts for eight years, taking over the Cushman Competition-prepared Super Late Models after earning Legends championships in 2017. In the last few years, Teras had channeled his potential into results, reeling off three PASS wins at Oxford in 2023 along with his first Oxford 250 top-ten. A fifth-place finish followed last year.

But to win the Oxford 250, Teras would first have to lock himself into a field scrambled by a random pre-race draw and sorted by rounds of qualifying heats.

Eddie MacDonald, rookie Cole Robie, Ryan Kuhn, newcomer Alexendre “Fireball” Tardif and Brandon Barker won the five qualifying heats to set the first 25 positions on the grid. Teras, third behind Barker in the fifth and final heat, would roll off fifteenth. Kate Re and Celebration of America 300 winner Garrett Hall won the two consi races, setting another ten positions in the field. Wiscasset Speedway ace Josh St. Clair won the last-chance qualifier, helping to finalize the 41-car starting lineup.

Six drivers, including multi-time Oxford track champion Dave Farrington, Jr. and defending Vermont Milk Bowl winner Marcel Gravel, loaded up early.

MacDonald and Robie led the field to the green flag, with “The Outlaw” poking his nose out front to lead the opening circuits. Only three laps in, Ryan Littlefield was sent for a spin in turn one, collecting Troy Patterson and Tom Abele, Jr. to bring out the evening’s first caution.

MacDonald pulled away on the restart, but Robie quickly chased the veteran down, testing the outside groove before Colby Benjamin’s lap-22 spin brought out another caution. MacDonald again eluded Robie on the restart, but Robie closed in lap by lap. Robie was working the high line around the leader as the yellow flew again on lap 41, sparing MacDonald from the pass.

Robie jumped out front on the restart, leading his first laps of the evening as Teras cracked the top five. When Michael Scorzelli’s spin slowed the field a few laps later, Teras was already up to second.

The two black cars brought the field back to race speed, with Teras pressuring Robie for several laps before taking the point for the first time on lap 59. The race settled into a long green-flag run, with Robie holding down second while D.J. Shaw and Joey Doiron broke into the top four. Teras, unchallenged, worked through lapped traffic as 100 laps clicked past on the scoreboard.

On lap 107, Milton CAT American-Canadian Tour winner Jimmy Renfrew, Jr. tagged Scorzelli in turn two, sending the New Yorker for his second spin of the night and bringing out the yellow flag. Almost all the lead-lap cars dove into the pits for tires and fuel, leaving only Teras, Tardif, Sylas Ripley and Derek Griffith on the track with Abele lining up among the leaders for the restart.

Abele faltered on the restart, though, with Teras driving off while the field scrambled around the slower car. Renfrew emerged in second with 2018 Oxford 250 winner Bubba Pollard third. Pollard, who started 12th, charged past Renfrew and ran down Teras, taking the lead at halfway on fresh tires.

Only four laps later, Dennis Spencer, Jr. spun in front of the field. The leaders filed past under Spencer, but two cars shifted low to avoid Spencer and ran Mike Hopkins down into the curb, dealing damage to the Hermon, Me. racer’s ride. Pollard and Teras brought the field back to green, but Spencer went around again two laps later, giving Tardif an opportunity to pit.

When Re spun on lap 135, Pollard was securely in the lead, with Teras second on old tires and Robie back up to third. 

Pollard and Teras took the green flag once again, but sixth-place Johnny Clark faltered after the restart. The seven-time PASS champion and 2020 Oxford 250 winner drifted high and dropped to the tail of the field, eventually slowing to a crawl down the frontstretch to bring out the caution on lap 143. Clark limped to the pits for service, but as he returned to the track, his right front wheel came free, bouncing down the track. While a crew tended to Clark’s disabled car, heat winner Barker’s car came to a sudden stop with transmission trouble, nearly collecting Shaw and Doiron in turn two.

Pollard continued to show the way, but Robie diced his way to second, pressuring the veteran for the lead as they worked through traffic. On lap 165, Robie got back to the lead, with Renfrew sitting in third. Teras, still on old tires, was keeping pace with the leaders, but the urgency of their pit strategy was beginning to weigh on them.

A lap-184 caution was Teras’ saving grace. Renfrew stayed on the track to inherit the lead as most of the field came in for their final planned pit stop of the evening. Weekly racers Scott McDaniel and Scott Moore cycled through to second and third, with Trevor Sanborn fastest off pit road to emerge in fourth.

As the field came up to speed on the restart, Griffith got shipped into turn one, executing a Joie Chitwood-style recovery as the field scattered behind him. Kuhn spun over the turn-two banking while Doiron slammed the curb trying to dodge Griffith low. Renfrew took the yellow flag with McDaniel and Vermonter Bobby Therrien in his mirror, while Pollard had climbed back to fifth.

But Teras, on four fresh tires, had the advantage. On the restart, Teras went to the high line, clearing traffic in a big hurry as he rocketed to the front. Teras drove around Renfrew effortlessly to lead lap 194, with polesitter MacDonald following through a few laps later.

With clear race track ahead, Teras quickly built an advantage on MacDonald, until trouble for Therrien brought out the yellow on lap 212. Shaw took the yellow in third, with Pollard and Gabe Brown rounding out the top five.

But no one had an answer for Teras, who powered away in the lead with MacDonald left to fend off Shaw. Veteran Mike Rowe, who was closing in on the top ten, slowed with an issue and fell through the pack, pitting late in the run to eliminate himself from contention.

Renfrew was climbing through traffic on new tires himself, but with 20 laps to go, he and Doiron made contact, with Renfrew going for a spin. Doiron was sent to the rear under yellow, burying the pre-race favorite’s hopes of salvaging a decent run.

Teras again distanced himself from the field, the laps clicking down slowly as he inched closer to a coveted Oxford 250 win. With twelve laps left, rookie Carson Brown spun in turn four, his first Oxford 250 over with a hard impact. Teras survived another restart, building another advantage over second-place MacDonald.

But with three laps to go, Gabe Brown and Robie got together in turn three, sending Robie for a spin and into the path of Brandon Varney. Varney slammed into Robie, the rest of the field scrambling through the turns to dodge calamity. The yellow flew once again, Teras and team left to weather another late-race restart with the victory within their grasp.

With the green waving at last, Teras checked out on MacDonald, cruising to a .790-second victory and delivering an emotional Oxford 250 win at long last to father Cushman and an elated crew.

Teras said they had committed to the one-stop strategy from the outset.

“We planned on one-stopping, unless things went south,” he said. “Like, two stops was the backup plan. For some reason, you weren’t that good, and you were moving backwards, you come in and put two tires on, make an adjustment, and take another shot at it. And I didn’t feel as if we needed much adjustment.”

But the one-stop commitment requires the yellow flags to fall when they are needed. And Teras admitted to feeling the tension.

“About lap 170 clicked off, and I was like, ‘All right, this is my window, I’m ready,’” he said. “And then [175] went by. Five laps doesn’t sound like much, but when you’re thinking this is your opportunity to win a race, it’s a long time. And I was like, “ooooooh.” And then [180] went by, and I was like, ‘I don’t know.’

“But staying disciplined…in the 300, Joey and me pit with 48 to go and came through the field. So it’s doable. It’s absolutely doable. I can’t believe the amount of cars that stayed out, like I’m not sure how that strategy played out. Maybe that was the better one. But sometimes you don’t want to overplay your hand and get too aggressive. You just want to play safe and give yourself enough time to go racing about it.”

Teras celebrated with frontstretch donuts, pouring smoke over the frontstretch as he completed a victory lap, checkered flag in hand.

“I like to do ‘em,” he said of his celebration. “I have a lot of excitement, and this race justified a big one.”

MacDonald, whose two Oxford 250 wins came under ACT rules in 2009 and 2010, finished second, his fourth top-six finish in the race’s Super Late Model era. Shaw finished third for a third straight season, an incredible yet frustrating streak of consistency. Since 2016, Shaw has only finished outside the top ten twice.

Pollard came home fourth, marking the first time in eight starts that the Senoia, Ga. all-star has recorded back-to-back top-ten finishes. Despite his transmission trouble, Barker raced his way back to fifth, a career-best 250 effort.

Hopkins rebounded from a Friday-night crash to finish sixth, best among the King Competition-backed entries in the field. Ripley backed up last year’s fourth-place run with a seventh-place finish. Oxford weekly racer Littlefield was eighth in his first 250 start. Cory Hall carried the Canadian torch in ninth, while two-time winner Ben Rowe rounded out the top ten in his 28th Oxford 250 start.

Mid-race leader Renfrew recovered from his late spin to finish 11th. Friday-night winner Garrett Hall was 15th. Gabe Brown brought car owner Bobby Webber’s ride home in 17th. Kate Re, who locked herself into the grid with a consi win, was 20th, her best result thus far in the 250. Derek Kneeland, who arrived by helicopter after spotting in the NASCAR Cup Series race in Daytona Saturday night, finished 21st.

The late-race wreck left several contenders deep in the final rundown. Doiron’s tough night ended in 26th, his first finish outside the top six since 2017. Griffith spent the last few laps on the sidelines and was scored 27th. Robie, who led 37 laps in his Oxford 250 debut, was scored 29th after the crash.

With tough nights for his closest competitors, Barker unofficially clinched the Oxford Crown Jewel Triple Crown, the newly-minted miniseries uniting May’s Memorial Day Clash, July’s Celebration of America 300, and the Oxford 250.

Teras, who turns 23 in September, is the youngest Oxford 250 winner since Jeremie Whorff in 2006. In the last twenty years, only Teras, Whorff, and 2012 winner Joey Polewarczyk managed the feat before their 25th birthday.

Teras’ win was also the fourth straight for chassis builder Distance Racing Products, despite a run of success for Dale Shaw Race Cars entries in Oxford’s major events. Distance owner Jeff Taylor scored his long-awaited win last year, with Cole Butcher scoring back-to-back wins in 2022 and 2023.

Neither Taylor nor Butcher were in the pits this year, joining other high-profile absences like that of 2021 winner Cassius Clark.

And by leading 123 laps, Teras boosted his evening’s payout to over $37,000.

Teras’ victory was monumental for Cushman, whose tenure as a car owner long predates his progeny. A Ford aficionado who deals in high-performance parts, Cushman bucks the trend of crate-engined cars, favoring built engines and Ford power. His name is as synonymous with the Blue Oval as the racing family from whom his longtime car number is borrowed.

“I started racing with the Dions in the ‘80s,” Cushman said. “When they ran Busch Grand National full time, I had a Pro Stock for them. When they ran the Pro Stock ACT Tour full time, I had a Busch car. We ran the 250 here with the Busch car, my Busch car, in ‘89, maybe ‘88. I’ve been with them a long time. Still very good friends today.”

Cushman told a local reporter years ago that he estimated he had spent well over a million dollars in pursuit of the Oxford 250.

“From ‘98 to 2008, I spent a hundred grand a year racing,” he explained. “Ten years is a million dollars. And it was all about…I’ve raced a lot of races, but this is the race I wanted to win.”

Indeed, Cushman Competition fielded cars for some of New England’s top talent, drivers like “Dynamite” Dave Dion, Louie Mechalides, Scott Chubbuck and Trevor Sanborn.

How did it feel, then, that his Oxford 250 victory came with his son at the wheel?

There was little Cushman could say that topped the smile on his face.

“It’s awesome.”

He paused, taking in the moment.

“Yup. It’s been a long time coming.”

Unofficial Results
Pro All Stars Series | All That’s Metal Oxford 250
Oxford Plains Speedway, Oxford, Me.
1. (29T) Austin Teras
2. (17MA) Eddie MacDonald
3. (60) D.J. Shaw
4. (26) Bubba Pollard
5. (32B) Brandon Barker
6. (15) Mike Hopkins
7. (09) Sylas Ripley
8. (29L) Ryan Littlefield
9. (00H) Cory Hall
10. (5R) Ben Rowe
11. (00R) Jimmy Renfrew, Jr.
12. (14M) Scott McDaniel
13. (44) Trevor Sanborn
14. (21) Alexendre Tardif
15. (94) Garrett Hall
16. (8) Calvin Rose, Jr.
17. (47) Gabe Brown
18. (72R) Scott Robbins
19. (03) Scott Moore
20. (10) Kate Re
21. (90) Derek Kneeland
22. (32CT) Tom Abele, Jr.
23. (14S) Josh St. Clair
24. (72K) Ryan Kuhn
25. (18VT) Kaiden Fisher
26. (73D) Joey Doiron
27. (12G) Derek Griffith
28. (BV52) Colby Benjamin
29. (29R) Cole Robie
30. (12V) Brandon Varney
31. (63) Kyle Salemi
32. (24) Mike Rowe
33. (12S) Dennis Spencer, Jr.
34. (18) Michael Scorzelli
35. (28) Carson Brown
36. (5X) Bobby Therrien
37. (38) Garrett Lamb
38. (54) Johnny Clark
39. (5P) Troy Patterson
40. (153) Travis Stearns
41. (12X) Corey Bubar

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