NOTEBOOK: Austin Beers chasing more than consistency at Oxford Plains Speedway

In racing, consistency has a habit of leading directly to championships. Several of the NASCAR Cup Series’ top stars through the years have proven that sentiment. Benny Parsons and Matt Kenseth both won Cup Series titles with just one win but relied on incredible consistency to outclass the competition. With that in mind, Austin Beers and the KLM Motorsports team have taken the consistent approach to a completely different level on the NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour. RELATED: Everything to know before Saturday's Mod Tour race at Oxford Plains Beers and KLM Motorsports have finished in the top 10 in 35 consecutive Modified Tour races. His last finish outside the top 10 was a 26th-place run at Richmond Raceway in 2024, which was the result of a crash. That consistency helped carry Beers and KLM Motorsports to the Modified Tour championship last year; the team won twice while securing 12 top-five and 16 top-10 finishes across 16 races. [caption id="attachment_513825" align="aligncenter" width="1300"] Austin Beers has finished in the top 10 in more than 70 percent of his NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour starts. (Photo: Ted Malinowski/NASCAR)[/caption] In fact, in 75 Modified Tour starts to date, Beers has finished outside the top 10 in just 16 events. That means he’s finished in the top 10 in an astounding 78.66 percent of all Modified Tour races he’s run. Beers is once again off to a consistent start to the Modified Tour season. Through five events, he has three top-five and five top-10 finishes with a worst finish of seventh, which came last Saturday night at New York's Riverhead Raceway. That’s all fine and dandy, but Beers and KLM Motorsports don’t enter races to finish in the top 10. The goal is to win, and Beers hopes to get back to his winning ways during Saturday’s All States Materials Group 150 at Oxford Plains Speedway (6:15 p.m. ET on FloRacing). “The streak is definitely cool and a good stat to have. It shows the consistency our team brings every time we touch the race track,” Beers said. “With the being said we come to the track to win, and we want to start doing that again.”

35 years later, the Modified Tour is back at Oxford Plains

It’s been a long wait, but this Saturday, the Modified Tour returns to one of the tracks that appeared on the inaugural Tour schedule in 1985. Oxford Plains Speedway, located in Oxford, Maine, has a long and storied racing history that dates back to 1950. The track opened as a half-mile dirt track but eventually evolved into the current 0.375-mile asphalt oval we see today. The track is perhaps best known for the popular Oxford 250, a marquee late model race that has been won by drivers like Kyle Busch, Geoff Bodine and Kevin Harvick. The Modified Tour made its debut at the track during the Tour’s inaugural season in 1985, with Richie Evans earning his final series victory prior to his passing in a crash at Martinsville Speedway a few weeks later. Jimmy Spencer won the next two Modified Tour events at the track, with Mike McLaughlin and Jeff Fuller also collecting victories. Fuller’s triumph, which came in 1991, is the most recent stop by the Modified Tour at Oxford Plains Speedway. [caption id="attachment_513826" align="aligncenter" width="1300"] Anthony Nocella has won multiple races at Oxford Plains Speedway during his career, which could give him an edge ahead of Saturday's NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour event. (Photo: Adam Glanzman/NASCAR)[/caption]

Hirschman, McKennedy and Nocella have an Oxford Plains experience edge

Of the drivers entered in Saturday’s All States Materials Group 150 at Oxford Plains Speedway, only a select few have ever turned laps at the historic race track. The three with the most experience are undoubtably Matt Hirschman, Jon McKennedy and Anthony Nocella. Hirschman, a 10-time Modified Tour winner, has visited Victory Lane at Oxford Plains as recently as 2019, when he won a Modified event that also featured drivers like Ronnie Williams, Andy Jankowiak, Ron Silk, Woody Pitkat and Matt Swanson. McKennedy has multiple Supermodified triumphs at Oxford Plains Speedway, with his most recent coming during the 2024 season. Nocella, a part-time Modified Tour competitor, is a victor in both a Midget and a Modified at Oxford Plains Speedway. His most recent Oxford Plains win came in 2021.