The changes to the Bahre family’s New Hampshire Int’l Speedway were subtle as it made its debut under Speedway Motorsports ownership as New Hampshire Motor Speedway.
New logos, new paint on the tunnel  and a message board out front caught my eye, but all the places and most of the faces looked familiar for one who has missed only a couple of NASCAR race days here since 1990. Much more is to come, of course, but this weekend will be remembered for its racing and its weather, not necessarily in that order.
We, as a nation, love an upset winner, a come-from-behind winner and most of all, an underdog. The good guy underdog is best, but we can give out hearts to the bad guy underdog, too, rationalizing that victory will purge the demons of the past. If loyalty and family can enter into the equation as well, so much the better.
Tony Stewart’s win in Saturday’s Nationwide Series race was as predictable as, well, summer rain in New England. The other three races on the first weekend of the NHMS era all had upset/underdog plot lines that will have the fans talking long after their waterlogged walking shoes have dried out.
Friday’s rain during the Sprint Cup qualifying session nearly made the Camping World East Heluva! Good 125 a night race at a track without lights. In overtime, it came down to Matt Kobyluck, a series veteran well before his age reaches his car number (40) and a driver of legendary Loudon misfortune, Trevor Bayne, a high a school junior with the power of the DEI development program behind him, and Eddie MacDonald, a talented young driver who has had more teams fold under him than Fran Tarkenton did in the NFL.
Since 2006, Eddie Mac and crew chief Rollie Lachance have fielded their own car with bare fenders, family support, a couple of loyal associate sponsors, and a ton of guts. When the checkered flag waved, it was MacDonald, Bayne, Kobyluck. Score one upset, with no reservations.
Fast forward to a gray Saturday and the usual frenetic NASCAR Modified event. A division where the drivers and the fan base are so intertwined that like old-time CB radio names are hardly needed. Say “TC” or “The Reg” or “Steffy” and everybody gets the point.
Chuck Hossfeld was one of the few modified drivers to move south since Steve Park, thanks to Jack Roush’s gong show. It didn’t work and he came home, still young and talented. That talent needed harnessing, and it came when the seat again opened in a former ride, the Mystic Missle of patriarch Bob Garbarino, following Donny Lia’s championship last year.
Hossfeld pitted for tires, Ted Christopher didn’t. Hossfeld sliced through the field, got to TC’s bumper, fell back and did it again. Two turns from the checkered, Hossfeld went to the bottom. This writer was standing in victory lane as close to lined-up with the finish line as it is physically possible to get, and I had no idea who won. The camera said Hossfeld by a bumper, the timer said .001 second.
Not an underdog win to be sure, the point leader winning in the championship car, but a measure of redemption in front of the car-owning establishment which had given him such a high and such a low just three years ago. Not to mention, with apologies to Friday’s sponsor, one hell of a race.
You don’t get upsets like Eddie Mac’s in the Sprint Cup Series, because there aren’t any little guys left, and feel-good stories like Chuck Hossfeld and Bob Garbarino are few and far between. The presence of a Petty car on the front row may have rekindled a dormant flame, but in reality, Bobby Labonte, as good as he is, caught the track at the perfect time in qualifying, as did pole-winner Patrick Carpentier. Looking for underdogs in the Cup Series is like looking for cheap gas — it’s all relative.