Rick Young's 'Rick at the Races' Aug. 14-15, 2010

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Rick Young - Aug. 14-15, 2010

August 14 - Unity Raceway, Maine

This past week was another busy one at work, which saw me not only miss out on Friday's racing but three good midweek opportunities too. I didn't make it to any of them , which included , the Airborne or Capital City Speedway's on Wednesday or the Late Model Special at Brockville on Thursday. It seems like a regular thing these days is for me to finish late on Friday's so that rules out attending my local Mohawk Int Raceway.

By the time Saturday came round, I was determined to treat myself, and decided to take off on a road trip to add a new track to my TRACK CHASING totals.

Way back in the 1970's when I was living in the UK, I had a letter entitled 'Good ol English Boy' published in the American HOT ROD MAGAZINE. It described BriSCA F1 and F2 stock car racing in England , and at the end of the story I invited North American Modified fans to get in touch.

As a result, I received quite a lot of feedback. There were two guys in particular that I corresponded with on a regular basis. One was Bill Goodrich of Ft Montgomery (NY) who was an Orange Country Fair Speedway fan, and Bob Paulin from Gardiner in Maine.

Bob attended most of his local tracks in the Maine area which included Beech Ridge Speedway, Oxford Plains and Unity. He sent me decals from all of these tracks which I stuck on the side of my BriSCA F1. A few years ago I managed to visit the Beech Ridge Speedway which still left Unity and Oxford on my must do, 'hit list'.

This weekend I decided to head for Unity. I set off from my home in Cornwall, Ontario at 10-30 am on Saturday morning for trip that would take me into unfamiliar territory. I traveled up to Sherbrooke, Quebec where I then drive down to the Canada/USA border crossing at Woburn. ( For many years, I lived close to Woburn, England, home of the Duke of Bedford, so this was quite a novel experience. As a school kid, I actually witnessed motor racing events in Woburn Park).

As I crossed into the USA the route south would take me through the breath taking scenery of the Sugar Loaf Mountain resort area. After a steady drive down, I reached the Unity Raceway, at 5-30 pm , just as the first race was starting.

Unity is a third of a mile paved oval, which I believe was a dirt track many years ago. The program consisted of the typical Late Model, 4 and 8 Cylinder divisions. What had attracted me on this occasion, were the scheduled Vintage Modifieds but unfortunately there was only one in the pits, ( which stayed on it's trailer) . I guess this class had to be scratched.

I took a few photo's from the middle, before watching the Late Model Feature from the Grandstand. After two or three stoppages for wrecks, the 35 lapper was won by # 15 Frank Moulton.

My original plans were to stay overnight at the track and drive back in the morning, but with the show moving on quite quickly, I decided against it. After the Late Model Feature I made my departure, with a different route planned for the return run. I didn't fancy taking the mountain roads late at night so took the longer way back via Burlington, Vermont. I crossed back into Canada at Lacolle in the early hours of Sunday morning and pulled into a truck stop at Napierville ( Quebec) to sleep. The bed was already made up in the back of my HHR where I crashed out for a few hours. Once on the road again I was back in Cornwall, by mid-morning.

UNITY RACEWAY , Maine, became track # 182 on my TRACKCHASING totals

Following a few more hours of sleep in my own bed , I woke up to early afternoon rain. After checking my e-mail , I found out that for the second week running, the Cornwall Motor Speedway had to cancel the Sunday night races due to wet conditions.

PIC 1      My BriSCA F1 stock car, with the yellow Unity Raceway decal on the side

PIC 2     Not the Woburn I remember

PIC 3    Still the same logo on the current  Unity Raceway decal

PIC 4 to 16     A selection of shots from the Unity Raceway