Entry List For NASCAR Modified Tour At Riverhead Raceway

The NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour heads to one of its oldest race tracks this Saturday night for a bullring showdown under the lights. 200 laps at the unfriendly confines of Riverhead Raceway, and a healthy crop of local drivers ready to defend their home turf awaits the regulars of the Tour.

Local drivers Chris Young and Mark Stewart have already visited Riverhead’s victory lane this season in weekly competition. They’re joined by Dylan Slepian, who has finished in the top five at Riverhead in NWMT competition twice in his career, Roger Turbush, who finished third back in 2021, and Matthew Brode as drivers who are looking to pull off what Kyle Soper most recently accomplished back in 2022, and that’s beat the NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour at their home race track.

But to do so, they’ll have to beat the likes of Justin Bonsignore, Ron Silk, Matt Hirschman, Craig Lutz, Eric Goodale, Austin Beers, Patrick Emerling, and Luke Baldwin.

We’ll start off by shining our spotlight on the four-time and defending NWMT champion, Justin Bonsignore. The veteran driver has 45 career victories, and 11 of those have come at his home track of Riverhead Raceway. Should Bonsignore add another one on Saturday night, he’d break a tie with Mike Ewanitsko for the most NWMT wins at Riverhead Raceway. However, Bonsignore has not visited Riverhead’s victory lane since September of 2023, as he went winless last season. He’s also been struggling a bit (for Bonsignore’s standards) to get good finishes so far this season. Bonsignore has been caught up in incidents in all four races so far this season, which is why he finds himself third in points so far.

Meanwhile Silk, who has missed the last two races as part of their partial schedule this season, heads to a Long Island track that gave him fits for many years of his career, but is now one of his best race tracks. Silk has three victories at Riverhead and all three have come in the last seasons. In fact, Silk swept 2024 at Riverhead and has won three of the last four races there. His non-wins at Riverhead? Dating back to 2022 he has finishes of third (four times), and a runner-up finish in 2023. Normally the win at Riverhead goes through the No. 51, but right now it’s fair to say that the win goes through Ron Silk, Phil Moran, and the No. 16.

We have to go all the way back to 2022 to find a race that was won by someone not named Ron Silk or Justin Bonsignore. In 2022 the two Riverhead races were won by six-time NWMT champion Doug Coby, and local hero Kyle Soper. But we have to go back to 2021 to find a race that was won by someone who is entered in this Saturday’s race.

On September 18, 2021, Orchard Park, New York’s Patrick Emerling took the checkered flag over Bonsignore and local drivers Roger Turbush and Soper. Eric Goodale finished fifth. Since that win, Emerling has been strong at Riverhead. He’s posted finishes of second (twice), seventh, ninth, and fourth. Emerling started this season off strong with an impressive win at New Smyrna Speedway and a rally to finish second at Thompson Speedway. Things haven’t been as good since. He crashed at North Wilkesboro and finished 28th, and crashed at Seekonk and finished 14th. He’s fallen the points lead to seventh in points, 26 points back of Austin Beers entering Saturday’s race.

And that leads us to Austin Beers, the current points leader, who is seeking his first victory at the Riverhead quarter-mile bullring. In nine starts at Riverhead, he’s finished in the top five in three of them, and in the top 10 in six of them. He won the pole and led 63 laps in the summer race of 2023 before fading to finish tenth that night. But he’s finished no worse than fifth in his last three trips, including a second-place finish in the spring race last season. 

There’s one remaining driver on the entry list that has been to NWMT victory lane at Riverhead Raceway that we haven’t mentioned until now, and that is Riverhead’s own Eric Goodale. Goodale scored his first NWMT victory in front of a packed house at his home race track now 11 years ago in June of 2014. But his NWMT results have been a mixed bag ever since. In the last four years, Goodale has been pretty strong, posting finishes of fifth (three times), and ninth (twice). But he’s also had finishes of 11th (twice), and he finished 16th in the fall 2023 race after getting caught up in a crash.

Saturday’s 200-lap race is expected to see the green flag fly at 8 p.m. ET live on FloRacing. Fans can watch with a FloRacing subscription, and those that are not currently subscribers can join the platform by clicking here.

NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour at Riverhead Raceway Entry List