By Justin Pelletier,Staff Writer

LEWISTON – The tires are worn down, the back seat is missing and Jay Dufour’s Honda Prelude has only one window intact – the windshield.

The headlights, which on a Prelude normally pop up from the front of the car, are bolted shut, as is the trunk. This may not sound like a fun car in which to ride on a trip to the beach, but for Dufour, it does well to get him around the 3/8-mile oval at Oxford Plains Speedway every Wednesday night.

“It’s a little beat up,” said Dufour, pointing to the donut-shaped rubber mark on the right front door panel, and the dent into the white No. 39 painted on the side. “But she goes.”

Dufour, the junior varsity and assistant varsity hockey coach at Lewiston High School never raced cars growing up. In fact, the 28-year-old Lewiston native only got into it at all when his older half-brother, Curt Dumais, started building cars for friend Jeff Beaule.

“We had just one car when we first started,” said Dumais. “Jay would come and watch, and I just kept telling him he needed to get behind the wheel one of these days. He’d just laugh at us and never give us an answer. I told him I’d build him one and he was going to drive it.”

That was three years ago, and Dufour hasn’t slowed down since.

“He kind of dragged me into it, really,” said Dufour. “He basically told me I didn’t have the guts to do it. It was like a dare, so of course I had to do it. Then I got addicted.”

The hobby, which is all the racing is to Dufour, seemed like a perfect fit. During the school year, he coached and taught, and had no time for much else. In the summer, though, he was free. There was nothing, really, taking up his time. More importantly, there was nothing providing him with a sense of competition.

“The similarity between (hockey and racing), for me, is the competition, really,” said Dufour. “I’m a competitive guy, whether it’s varsity or JV hockey, I like to win every game. In the summer, I have the chance to have that competitive edge. Instead of having it as a coach of something, I get to do it on my own as a driver.”

Dufour isn’t alone on the track, even among his own teammates. In all, four drivers are affiliated on Dufour and Dumais’ nameless team. Dumais doesn’t drive, though.

“I build them and keep them running,” said Dumais. “That’s where I get my joy.”

Instead, Beaule, Dufour, Rick Giguere and Brian Nason drive the Dumais-built cars. Nason is the newest driver of the bunch, and the youngest. In fact, this year, Nason is the odds-on favorite to take over as the starting goaltender for the Lewiston hockey team.

“He actually came to us and asked if he could help out,” said Dufour. “He helped out in the garage and stuff for a year.”

“After the year was up, I asked him if he wanted to drive and old car we had (a Pontiac Grand Am), and he jumped at it,” added Dumais. “He did about as good as you possibly could with that thing last year, and this year, we built him one of his own.”

Nason now drives a Prelude identical to Dufour’s. His number? 01, just like his hockey jersey, and the paint scheme is blue with gray, exactly opposite Dufour’s gray with blue scheme.

And while Nason has been steady this year in his new car (he and Dufour are currently tied for 12th in the point standings), Dufour does have one edge – he won his first race last week.

“I got into a bit of trouble the first week,” said Dufour, again peering at the dent in the side of his car. “So I had to work my way back up to get into the high-points race.”

Once Oxford Plains Speedway shuts down for the season, Dufour hasn’t ruled out taking his act on the road, either, to places like Unity or Wiscasset, or even out of state. For now, though, he’s just savoring that first bite of victory.

“It’s great to finally have a win,” said Dufour. “That was the goal of the season, coming in, to win at least one race. Last week I took the lead on lap 10, and held on. I was counting down the laps. They seemed to come slower and slower. Now that I’ve done that, though, I want another win.”