TOLEDO, Ohio (May 3, 2016) – The ARCA 150 is coming back to New Jersey Motorsports Park (NJMP) Saturday, May 28 for its annual road course adventure on the 2.25-mile Thunderbolt Raceway course. The event will mark ARCA’s ninth consecutive trip to the state-of-the-art facility in Millville, N.J. and marks the first leg of the prestigious Bill France 4 Crown championship.
The event at NJMP marks the 21st time the ARCA Racing Series has raced on a road course since debuting on the now defunct Meadowdale Int’l Raceway road course just outside of Chicago in 1958.
“The ARCA Racing Series has long been recognized for the diversity in the types of venues on the schedule,” said ARCA President Ron Drager. “Having road courses on the schedule, in the form of New Jersey Motorsports Park, truly rounds out the full range of venues to include paved short tracks, superspeedways, intermediate tracks and the mile dirt state fairgrounds ovals.”
The ARCA 150 will also mark the first leg of ARCA’s prestigious Bill France 4 Crown championship, which represents ARCA’s diverse schedule of events. The NJMP road course joins Lucas Oil Raceway (paved short track), the DuQuoin State Fairgrounds dirt-mile and Chicagoland Speedway as part of the Bill France 4 Crown in 2016.
Bowsher, Schrader, Waltrip, Allgaier, Buescher, Weatherman among ARCA road course winners
NASCAR / ARCA winner Fred Lorenzen, in a Ford, won the inaugural 220-mile road course event at Meadowdale on October 19, 1958. In the most recent ARCA road course event at NJMP in 2015, Wentzville, Missouri’s Kyle Weatherman battled back from a couple off-road excursions to earn his career-first and hard-fought ARCA victory at New Jersey. Cherry Hill, New Jersey favorite Tom Hessert finished second.
Complete list of ARCA road course winners from 1958 through 2015…..:
1958: Meadowdale Int’l Raceway – Fred Lorenzen
1960: Meadowdale Int’l Raceway – Nelson Stacy
1962: Virginia Int’l Raceway – Curtis Turner
1964: Meadowdale Int’l Raceway – Elmer Musgrave
1965: Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course – Jack Bowsher
1986: St. Louis Int’l Raceway – Bob Schacht
1991: Heartland Park – Ken Schrader
1992: Heartland Park – Darrell Waltrip
1994: Des Moines Grand Prix – Scott Lagasse
2001: Watkins Glen Int’l – John Finger
2008: New Jersey Motorsports Park – Justin Allgaier
2009: New Jersey Motorsports Park – Patrick Long
2010: Palm Beach Int’l Raceway – Justin Marks
2010: New Jersey Motorsports Park – Casey Roderick
2011: New Jersey Motorsports Park – Andrew Ranger
2012: New Jersey Motorsports Park – Andrew Ranger
2013: Road America – Chris Buescher
2013: New Jersey Motorsports Park – Andrew Ranger
2014: New Jersey Motorsports Park – Andrew Ranger
2015: New Jersey Motorsports Park – Kyle Weatherman
Weekend Schedule:
Practice for the ARCA 150 is scheduled in two sessions Saturday, May 28. The first practice is from 10:15 a.m. – 11:00 a.m. followed by final practice from 11:15 to 12 noon. Menards Pole Qualifying presented by Ansell (group qualifying) is scheduled at 2:00 p.m. Saturday. The ARCA 150 is set to get underway Saturday afternoon at 5:00 p.m.
About Automobile Racing Club of America:
The ARCA Racing Series presented by Menards features 20 events at 18 tracks on its 2016 schedule. The series has crowned an ARCA national champion each year since its inaugural season in 1953, and has toured over 200 racetracks in 28 states since its inception. The series tests the abilities of drivers and race teams over the most diverse schedule of stock car racing events in the world, annually visiting tracks ranging from 0.4 mile to 2.66 miles in length, on both paved and dirt surfaces as well as left- and right-turn road courses.
Founded by John and Mildred Marcum in 1953 in Toledo, Ohio, the Automobile Racing Club of America (ARCA) is recognized among the leading sanctioning bodies in the country. ARCA administers over 100 race events each season in four professional touring series and local weekly events.
