Scott Robbins is ready to defend his True Value 250 championship.
By Kalle Oakes
Sports Editor

OXFORD – Maine’s largest sporting event and the nation’s richest single-day short track auto race, the True Value 250, is the centerpiece of the regional racing scene for the 30th consecutive summer when the green flag falls at around 7 p.m. tonight.

Scott Robbins of Dixfield is defending champion of the event, which is worth $25,000 to the winner plus an additional $100 for each lap led.

Less than five minutes after crossing the finish line last July, Robbins stood in victory lane and recited from memory the list of drivers to win the prestigious race. That elite includes Geoffrey Bodine, recently named one of the 50 greatest NASCAR Winston Cup drivers of all time, and Ricky Craven, as well as short track legends Bob Pressley, Butch Lindley and Mike Rowe.

“I sat in the grandstands and watched those guys every year when I was kid,” said Robbins. “It was Mike Rowe who taught me how to pass people at Oxford by sliding up the track in the corner and diving to the inside going down the back stretch.”

Equally impressive is the list of drivers who made the journey to New England but did not win the race. On that roster: 37 Winston Cup racers, including seven series champions and eight Daytona 500 winners.

Since Joey Kourafas won the inaugural race in 1974, the only year it followed a 200-lap format, 364 different drivers have qualified for the True Value 250.

Eighty or more are expected to begin qualifying at 2 p.m., with less than half making it to the main event.

Robbins’ victory marked the seventh straight victory by a Maine driver and the second in a row by an OPS weekly racer. Gary Drew won in 2001, with Robbins second.

In addition to those two recent champions, Ben and Mike Rowe, Jeff Taylor, Tracy Gordon, Joe Bessey and Larry Gelinas are among the favorites to keep the title in the Pine Tree State.

Andy and Dale Shaw of Center Conway, N.H., lead the out-of-state contingent, while Scott Fraser of Nova Scotia tops a list of a half dozen maritime challengers.

“Scott Fraser is my pick,” said Ben Rowe. “He’s always fast down here, and he beat me (in a Pro All Stars Series race) at Fredericton last weekend.”

OPS will employ the same, fan-friendly qualifying format it has used throughout most of the race’s history.

At a meeting one hour before the start of the day’s activities, each prospective qualifier will draw a numbered chip from a basket. That lottery will set the starting grid for six 20-lap qualifying races.

Four drivers will transfer to the True Value 250 from each heat, while up to three times that number are relegated to one of three consolation races. Four more make the cut from each of those 20-lap skirmishes.

Anyone else whose car remains intact and up to the task then competes in a 50-lap, last-chance race, with only the winner earning the right to start 37th in the finale.

Up to four provisional starting spots may be added in order to squeeze a past champion or high-ranking OPS regular into the field.

The “big show” features 250 green-flag laps of competition. Caution laps do not count toward that total but will be scored, meaning that a slow pit stop under yellow-flag conditions could cause a driver to fall off the lead lap.

Due to the length of the race, every driver will need to make at least one stop for a tank of fuel and four fresh tires.

“Pit stops are important. Track position is going to be crucial, because everybody’s fast,” Robbins said.

Robbins hopes to join Bodine (1980-81) and Ralph Nason (1998, 1999 and 2000) as the only drivers to win consecutive 250s.

Mike Rowe, Jamie Aube, Chuck Bown (two titles each) and Dave Dion (three wins in three different decades) are the other repeat winners.

koakes@sunjournal.com

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