The All-Star Shootout has become a welcomed addition to an already jam-packed July racing schedule at the New Hampshire Motor Speedway the last two years. The third annual NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour/Whelen Southern Modified Tour event, which will be held on Friday, July 15, should be another door-to-door battle among the tour's best drivers. The field for the 35-lap invitational was announced on Thursday.
The All-Star Shootout has a 30-minute time limit and will feature two segments with a mandatory caution displayed at Lap 20. The race will be restarted by the car's last completed green flag lap except for those cars involved in a random number selection that will determine the number of cars to be inverted for the restart.
Any car finishing the first segment of the race in positions 1-8 will be subject to the inversion. No tire changes or fuel will be permitted. The winner's purse will be $4,000.
"It was really cool to win the All-Star Shootout. Just to be involved is pretty special when you consider the field of drivers out there," said Woody Pitkat, the defending All-Star Shootout champion. "It took a last-lap pass to win that race and I expect it will take something like that again this year."
The mods will also be on the track on Saturday, too, as the NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour will have its first of two points races at the Magic Mile in 2016. Todd Szegedy is the reigning New England 100 winner, which will be the first on the docket of a tripleheader Saturday of racing that includes the NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour, NASCAR XFINITY Series and the NASCAR K&N Pro Series East.
Also expected to be a heavy favorite will be Doug Coby, the defending Whelen Modified Tour F.W. Webb 100 September race winner. His win last September was his third in his last seven starts at New Hampshire Motor Speedway.
"This is the biggest stage that we're on and we equate that to the Daytona 500 in terms of what it means to win here," said three-time NHMS winner Doug Coby during a test session at the Magic Mile on Wednesday. "We just want to give the fans as good a show as we can. I think we do that. There's always a lot of excitement about our series and we take that very seriously."
The All-Star Shootout will drop the green flag at 2:10 p.m. on Friday, July 15, while the New England 100 will get underway at 2 p.m. on Saturday, July 16.
For more details and ticket information on events at New Hampshire Motor Speedway, or to purchase tickets to the July New Hampshire 301 or September New England 300 NASCAR Sprint Cup Series weekends, please stop by our Ticket Office, visit the speedway website at www.nhms.com, or call our Ticket Hotline at (603) 783-4931.
