WISCASSET — Don’t expect the General Lee to be tearing up Wiscasset Speedway on Saturday, but the Boss Hogg is ready to go — the Boss Hogg 100, that is.

The race will make its return under current owners Richard and Vanessa Jordan on Saturday with a $3,000 purse going to the winner. As for St. The event gets its name from former track owner Dave ‘Boss Hogg’ St. Clair, who more than 30 years ago acquired the nickname when the ‘The Duke of Hazzard’ was in its heyday.

“That goes way back to the (1980s),” St. Clair said. “I had a guy working for me and that’s when Boss Hogg was on TV. The guys started calling me that and It just kind of stuck.”

In honor of St. Clair, Vanessa Jordan said the drivers would draw cigars — a signature of the former owner — in order to determine the order of the field. Expected to compete are Wiscasset regulars Will Collins, Darren Ripley, Dylan Turner and Maggie Ferland, as well as potential front runners Andy Saunders, Scott Chubbuck, Kyle DeSouza, Charlie Colby and Kevin Douglass.

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Ralph Nason never quit racing, he just kind of stopped.

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“It’s kind of a funny deal with me,” the 74-year-old Nason said. “It’s like smoking cigarettes, I just stopped doing it. I didn’t say I quit, I just stopped doing it. If I want a cigarette tomorrow I’ll have one, I just haven’t wanted to.”

Nason may not want to start smoking again, but he is itching to get back behind the wheel — an itch he intends on scratching very soon.

The owner of Unity Raceway, Nason is set to compete in the track’s first event of the season — and his first in “three or four years” — on Aug. 17, the Super Stock Enduro Twin 100s.

“I’m looking forward to this. I think it’s going to be fun,” he said. “I’ve already got a good car and I think it’s going to be fun. Everybody’s got a chance.”

That is the biggest reason why Nason is getting back behind the wheel — fun. Over the past 10 years Nason said the increasing cost of competing took the enjoyment out of the sport, but with this type of car it offers a less expensive alternative more akin to racing’s roots.

“This is starting racing all over again,” he said. “These aren’t too expensive. You don’t have to have 6,000 or 10,000 worth of horsepower. I really think this is where racing is going to go to get started again.”

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Like Nason, Waterville’s Jon Weeks has no intention of leaving racing anytime soon.

The 61-year-old is once again competing in the bikes and sleds division at Winterport Dragway, but so far things have not gone according to plan as he entered this week fifth in points.

“I’m not having a good year,” Weeks said. “I was trying to get a new to me bike up there and have had a lot of minor issues that have kept it from being up there. Sometimes plans don’t go the way they should but we all get through it.”

At the beginning of the season Weeks made a switch in bikes from a 1984 Kawasaki GPZ 1100 to a 1978 Honda Hondamatic 750, the model of bike on which he used to compete.

“In calendar years it’s definitely older,” Weeks said, “but it’s a better vehicle for what I do.”

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•••

One person who is going somewhere is Oxford Plains Speedway General Manager/Marketing & Promotions Manager Dick Therrien — he’s just not sure where just yet.

Therrien left his post earlier this week, citing a difference in philosophy with track owner Tom Mayberry on the direction of Oxford Plains.

“We’re in a rebuilding stage at Oxford. This year has been a great stride forward,” Therrien said. “Tom had some ways he thought he would like to go, I have a different philosophy on my thoughts. We assessed the situation. There’s two roads to take and when you have two roads to take, you take whichever road you want. He has his plans on how he wants to take it. I didn’t feel in my mind that was a direction I could go in.

“We talked about it, discussed everything. It was not an easy decision. It had to be made for the best of the speedway. We all had that in mind here. The whole situation was with the best of the speedway in mind.”

Therrien is not entirely sure what the future holds for him, although he did say he wants that future to be in auto racing.

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“I want to stay in the racing game,” he said. “I love the sport and I love the people that are involved in it. I’m just going to take things one day at a time.”

Evan Crawley—621-5640

ecrawley@mainetoday.com

Twitter: Evan_Crawley


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