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Andy Santerre will race in Peterbilt 250

Andy Santerre will be back in a race car for the first time since he hung up his NASCAR Camping World East Series helmet in 2005.

Santerre has entered the 8th annual Peterbilt 250 at Speedway 660, the track formerly known as New Brunswick International Speedway, in Geary, New Brunswick. The race is scheduled for Sunday, Aug. 31.

Santerre is a 4-time CWES champion who fields a current entry in that series for Peyton Sellers.

ON PIT ROAD: Sanborn, Sprint Cup and soggy shoes

It's Thursday again. That means it's time to roll the old Mini Stock out of the garage, wipe the dust off and shake down the setup with a spin around the dirt track at the end of the street. With that, here's the latest list of notes collected in a dog-eared notebook over the last few weeks...

* EVERY TIME A non-Sprint Cup-affiliated team wins a NASCAR Camping World East Series race, it should be celebrated, particularly by fans who lament the significant changes the series has undergone in the last few years.

When the CWES was still a northeastern-based series, Matt Kobyluck’s Mohegan Sun team was one of the better funded teams there was. These days, with Cup teams putting East cars on the dyno every day – every day! – it’s impossible for "regular" guys to keep up.

Rollie LaChance returns for another shot at the Oxford 250

Rollie LaChance remembers watching race haulers from all over the country roll through his hometown of Auburn. He carries that feeling of excitement with him today.

"When racing is in your blood, (the 250) is something that you know about and you want," LaChance said this week, taking a break from working his full-time job as a shop foreman and preparing both NASCAR Camping World East Series and Late Model cars for driver Eddie MacDonald. "Certainly the race has lost some of its luster. I remember when there was no Loudon, and growing up in Auburn, I remember the southern teams coming into town with their cars.

Ricky Rolfe, Eddie MacDonald suprise no one as Oxford 250 favorites

You have to love the way Ricky Rolfe is embracing his role as favorite to win this year's Oxford 250.

Where most drivers have cringed when their peers have named them to win the prestigious race, well aware of the history of carrying the label of 'favorite' for guys like Jeff Taylor or Tracy Gordon or any dozen other guys, Rolfe just grins that wide grin -- practically opening his arms as if to suggest "Bring it On."

When Oxford Plains Speedway owner Bill Ryan skirted offering a definitive choice for who he believed would win Sunday's 35th version of the event, he said he simply hoped to see a local weekly Oxford competitor have the chance to host the trophy.

Joey Pole runs uneventful 16th in East Series debut

Joey Polewarczyk essentially got just what he wanted out of his only scheduled Camping World East Series race this season.

Polewarczyk completed every lap of the Pepsi Full Fendered Frenzy 100 at Thompson International Speedway, rolling to an uneventful 16th-place finish. The 19-year-old driver from Hudson, N.H., and a 2-time winner on the American-Canadian Tour this year, was driving for longtime series East Series owner Barney McRae.

"I just want to have a clean race and earn some respect out there," Polewarczyk said before qualifying. "I'm just hoping that if I have a good race, then some team or someone will say, 'This kid has some talent' and maybe want to have me do some more races."

ON SITE: Trevor Bayne picks up 1st Camping World East Series win

Trevor Bayne made the No. 1 popular on Saturday night at Thompson International Speedway.

Bayne's No. 1 DEI car swept the day's honors, setting fast time in afternoon practice, winning the pole and then winning the NASCAR Camping World East Series Pepsi Full Fendered Frenzy 100.

It was the first career win for Bayne, who was beaten by Eddie MacDonald at New Hampshire Motor Speedway last time out.

ON SITE: Good thing I drove with the full fenders

This portion of the program is being brought to you by Monster energy drink, CLIF bars and the I'm-Gonna-Run-You-Over 225 at Interstate 95 Speedway.

Seriously folks, I know we joke all the time about tourists driving like it's Talladega out there, but I lived and breathed it today. Put it this way -- if you were going 85 mph, you were in the middle lane being passed on both sides, with hand signals flying your way like Denny Hamlin and Kyle Busch were about to wreck each other in Nationwide Series cars.

It was that bad.

Corey Williams returns to PASS North this weekend

Corey Williams will pull double duty of a different kind on Saturday.

Williams, a Boothbay native and the PASS South Series points leader, will run in the 75-lap PASS North event at Thompson International Speedway. Williams will drive the No. 29 Ford of longtime PASS owner Jay Cushman.

Williams was slated to be at Thompson anyway. He works at Andy Santerre Motorsports, which fields cars in the NASCAR Camping World East Series for Peyton Sellers.

ON SITE: Little Al says "Just say no to rain"

Who says you can't race in the rain?

Besides, with a passing sprinkle at Oxford Plains Speedway, this is a fine time to pass along a public service announcement from old friend Al Unser Jr. There's Little Al, his mug joining nearly a dozen other racing personalities from the early 1990s, on a poster in the Oxford press box.

The message? Well, of course, silly -- it's "Just Say No."

Ricky Carmichael draws a Cup-sized crowd at New Hampshire

Ricky Carmichael says he wants to be a NASCAR Sprint Cup Series driver some day. That being the case, he already knows who to hang with.

Kevin Harvick, Clint Bowyer, Juan Pablo Montoya and Joe Nemecheck were all present and accounted for at Carmichael's race hauler after Carmichael finished 5th in the Heluva Good! Summer 125 for the Camping World East Series at New Hampshire Motor Speedway on Friday.

Team owner Ken Schrader said he sees great things from Carmichael, a 15-time AMA national champion with 150 career motocross and supercross victories.

BREAKING NEWS: Bruton Smith says New Hampshire race dates are safe

Camping World East Series, Whelen Modified Tour part of the future, too

Bruton Smith uttered the words New England race fans have longed to hear.

During a press conference on Sunday morning at New Hampshire Motor Speedway, Smith, whose Speedway Motorsports Inc. purchased the track from Bob and Gary Bahre last fall, said that the facility is in no danger of losing either of its 2 annual Sprint Cup Series dates.

"No," Smith said when asked if he was going to move either of the races to either Kentucky Speedway or Las Vegas Motor Speedway. "We'll try to accomplish that in another way. We're working on some stuff."

DAY 2 AT NHMS: The economy is a convenient scapegoat for NASCAR

Quite frankly, I'm tired of hearing that the economy is the reason we're seeing so many empty seats at NASCAR Sprint Cup Series races these days.

And I'm equally tired of hearing Cup drivers being asked about how high gas prices are affecting them, as if multi-million dollar annual salaries don't cover a $70 tank of gas.

Most of all, I'm tired of NASCAR blaming everything but the on-track product for the attendance problems the sport faces right now. We're just about 36 hours from the green flag for the Lenox Industrial Tools 301 at New Hampshire Motor Speedway, and we still don't have an announced sellout. And even if there is a sellout, it's all but a guarantee not all of those sold seats will have fannies in them.

ON SITE: Brad Leighton, Brian Ickler trade shots and barbs

Brad Leighton summed things up succinctly in the aftermath of an entertaining NASCAR Camping World East Series race on Friday at New Hampshire Motor Speedway.

"You can probably figure out that this is a pretty selfish sport," said Leighton, an 8-time East Series winner at NHMS. But Leighton, who is running a very limited schedule, didn't win his 9th.

Two of the fastest cars running in the Heluva Good! Summer 125 belonged to Leighton and 2-time winner this season Brian Ickler. But they swapped some sheet metal on a lap 102 restart and suffered the consequences.

ON SITE: Eddie MacDonald, Rollie Lachance team up for win at New Hampshire

Call it the "2-Post Rig" success story.

Competing against teams with backing from NASCAR Sprint Cup Series superteams, Rollie Lachance and Eddie MacDonald teamed up to win one for both the little guy and a little Yankee ingenuity at New Hampshire Motor Speedway. Lachance crafted a handmade version of the latest and greatest suspension machine in stock-car racing, and MacDonald took car of repeated challenges from rookie Trevor Bayne to win the Heluva Good! Summer 125 for the NASCAR Camping World East Series on Friday.

In an age where it's nearly impossible to compete with the money Cup teams have, the crew chief Lachance and the driver MacDonald clicked off half of their summer "to-do" list.

DAY 1 AT NHMS: Fresh paint and fresh faces

Even the concession stands have more life.

New England's only superspeedway, which has been both lovingly and critically labeled "a big short track," New Hampshire Motor Speedway underwent some changes this offseason under its new ownership. New general manager Jerry Gappens promised recently that fans would see more color, and Speedway Motorsports Inc., which bought the track from Bob Bahre, delivered.

It's everything from the subtle to the serious.

FEATURE: Ickler calls East Series home

Move from the West paying dividends with victories

LOUDON, N.H. -- With cool temperatures and a driving rain on Thursday at New Hampshire Motor Speedway, Brian Ickler was a long way from his native San Diego, Calif.

Ickler may be a long way from home, but he's making himself at home, nonetheless. The 22-year-old has won 2 of the 4 NASCAR Camping World East Series races so far this season, and as a rookie he sits 2nd in the East Series standings.

In the end, he thought coming to the East coast was just what he needed.

ON SITE: Thursday is a washout at NHMS

We've, uh, lost the track.

Intense track-drying efforts at New Hampshire Motor Speedway took place early this afternoon, allowing the NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour to get out on the track for approximately 30 minutes of practice before steady rains pelted the facility yet again.

Jet dryers returned to the track shortly after 4 p.m., but ceased trying to dry the track shortly thereafter.

Austin Dillon says he didn't criticize ASM's preparation

Austin Dillon said he never criticized Andy Santerre Motorsports for a lack of preparation at the race track.

Dillon departed ASM to run the NASCAR Camping World East Series out of his family's own Team Dillon Racing. According to a report in the Boston Herald, Dillon said he felt good about the move because, with ASM, "We weren’t as prepared at the race track as we wanted to be."

Dillon refuted that on Thursday, after earning the pole for the Heluva Good! Summer 125 at New Hampshire Motor Speedway when qualifying was rained out.

ON SITE: Rain washed out Camping World East Series qualifying

Since we're not allowed to say the word "rain" here, let's just say we're having "weather issues" at New Hampshire Motor Speedway today.

The only thing that's been on the track has been jet dryers, and it's rained so hard for most of the day that even they weren't broken out until shortly after 1:30 p.m. NASCAR Camping World East Series qualifying has been rained out.

Officials are still hoping to dry the track in time to hold practice sessions for both the East Series and the Whelen Modified Tour, as well as an entire Modified Tour qualifying session.

ON SITE: Look out for the golf carts, dude

Some things never change.

Despite all the new signage, logo placements and vibrant color schemes, it's still the same old New Hampshire. How do I know this?

Because it took all of 3 minutes of being in the infield this morning before I was nearly run over by another one of those golf carts on steroids.