At the start of the season, SMART Modified Tour officials changed the championship format from a winner-take-all single race to a three-race playoff. And even with that, there’s still five drivers heading to the season finale at North Wilkesboro Speedway with a chance to claim the championship.

Danny Bohn leads Jake Crum and 2008 Daytona 500 winner Ryan Newman by three points. Brandon Ward sits a close nine points back, while Burt Myers sits a bit further back with 21 points separating him from Bohn.

To make things even more exciting, every driver in the top four in the points standings is looking to score their very first SMART Modified Tour championship.

Bohn accumulated his lead on the backs of his three victories on the season. Bohn has scored wins at Anderson Motor Speedway, Hickory Motor Speedway, and Wake County Speedway back in late April. But Bohn’s lead took a big hit last race at Orange County Speedway where he suffered his only DNF of the season. 

Fortunately for Bohn, the only driver that was able to come close to capitalizing on his misfortune was Brandon Ward, who finished fourth to get to nine points back. Crum and Newman both finished outside the top 10 at Orange County.

If you’re unfamiliar with how the points system works for the SMART Modified Tour, we’ll give you a bit of a “SMART 101” right now.

Each position is a point, with the winner receiving 40 points, second place receiving 39, and so on back down the line. Saturday’s race has 33 cars entered, with last place set to receive a total of 8 points. One bonus point is paid out for leading a single lap, and another is paid to the driver who leads the most laps. At the end of the first stage, the leader will receive three bonus points. Second place will receive two points, and the third-place driver will receive one bonus point. On top of all of that, the winner of the race receives five more bonus points. That means that the minimum number of points the race winner can score is 46 (winning the race plus one lap led bonus point), and the maximum number of points they can score is 50 if they led the most laps and won the stage.

So what does Bohn have to do on Saturday to win the championship? To put it simply, Bohn needs to score as many bonus points as possible in the first stage to give himself a buffer should things get crazy in the final stage. And at North Wilkesboro, things usually get crazy for the SMART Modified Tour.

Race fans can watch all of the action from what is sure to be an unforgettable season finale for the SMART Modified Tour at North Wilkesboro Speedway live on FloRacing with qualifying kicking off the day at 1 p.m. ET. The green flag is expected to wave at approximately 5:30 p.m. ET.

SMART Modified Tour at North Wilkesboro Speedway Entry List