LOUDON, N.H. — Tyler Rypkema darned his first NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour victory in Saturday’s Mohegan Sun 100 at New Hampshire Motor Speedway.
Justin Bonsignore put on a defensive clinic during the final 20 laps, ensuring that Rypkema and anyone else behind him could not get to his inside. An overtime restart gave Rypkema one final opportunity to go on the offensive and deny Bonsignore a third consecutive New Hampshire win.
Out of patience while simultaneously running out of time, Rypkema muscled Bonsignore out of the groove in Turn 3 to take the lead on the final lap, only for Bonsignore to get back to his bumper. The ensuing scuffle to the checkered flag saw Rypkema emerge battered and bruised, but a winner.
“Every race at New Hampshire seems to be a race to Turn 3 and who could get to the bottom,” Rypkema said. “Justin protected really early and really low, so I hooked back to the top and got a better arc down into [Turn] 3. We made a little contact there, but nothing I haven’t seen [Bonsignore] do many times here.
“I knew we were really good, we just had to get up and be there going into [Turn] 3 [by getting] a run off of [Turn] 2.”
Rypkema’s breakthrough NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour triumph was eight years and 83 starts in the making.
Knowing that Bonsignore would not give him the bottom on the final lap, Rypkema charted his own path to the lead. The aggressive maneuver on Bonsignore in Turn 3 got Rypkema the top spot, but it also left an opening for Bonsignore to get back to his outside on the frontstretch.
Rypkema attempted to block Bonsignore’s momentum and the two made contact. Rypkema and Bonsignore both ended up against the outside retaining wall, but it was Rypkema who got to the finish line first, albeit without his right-front tire.
“[Rypkema] had too good of a run and I didn’t have a good [Turns] 1 and 2,” Bonsignore said. “There was not much I could do. I tried crossing him over and didn’t get a good exit. He had me clear off of [turn] four and I don’t know why he decided to go to Victory Lane junked. But congrats to him, he executed well.”
By holding on to the lead with a destroyed car, Rypkema successfully continued Ole Blue’s winning legacy that has been ongoing in the NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour for decades. Prior to Saturday, the most recent driver to win in Ole Blue was Jake Johnson, who did so at Monadnock Speedway last May.
Bonsignore brought his damaged car home in second, with Craig Lutz, Andy Seuss and Matt Hirschman following him to round out the top five.
The rest of the top 10 finishers included Woody Pitkat, Anthony Nocella, Eric Goodale, Austin Beers and Jon McKennedy.
