First off I want to thank the thousands of people who showed up for the birthday bash that the Arute’s threw for Scott Running and I Sunday afternoon. I wasn’t expecting such Pomp and Circumstance with the Governor of Connecticut and the owner of the Boston Red Sox appearing to make speeches in our honor. Just kidding folks. Yes Sunday was my birthday and Scott’s too. I’ve got Scott covered by a few years but it was great to meet him this weekend. Mr. Running is the Stafford Speedway Communications Director. Thank you Scott for asking me to write the story for the program.

Sunday morning I don’t think there were very many people that would have wagered that the Arute’s would have gotten the 34th Annual Tech-Net Spring Sizzler in. As a matter of fact, many in the garage area at Stafford Motor Speedway were lobbying vociferously for the Arute’s to postpone the whole thing. After all, it had been raining hard all night and the infield appeared to be flooded, where is all of this water going to go?

It started on Saturday. The heavens opened up over me as I headed for the ferry to venture across Long Island Sound. As the weather outlook appeared to be so poor, I ventured up Rt. 32 instead of hustling about on the major roads. I pulled into the camper area around 4:30 PM.

I had the privilege of hanging around with Brad LaFontaine’s crowd. Those guys know how to party. Butch cooked up some great steaks. Ted and I enjoyed a meal in one of their motor homes while the other guys were happy to be kibitzing out in weather that was better suited for ducks. I left shortly thereafter wondering, how will we ever get this show in?

I stayed at a hotel in Vernon that has been a favorite of many Long Island racers for years. Let’s just say the name starts with a Q. There was a Cup race on TV. How quaint.

Sunday morning started with a continental birthday breakfast. If these bagels get any smaller we’ll be using them for poker chips. One look out of the window in my room told me to go back to sleep. The rain was pouring down.

I awoke an hour later and the rain had slowed to a mist. The consensus of the competitors appeared to be leaning toward postponing the race. It seemed as though that was what the NASCAR officials were trying to convince Mark and Rob Arute to do. They had other ideas in mind and would not be denied.

Some of the competitors complained that it was, ‘stupid to have us wait out here when we’re just going to go home anyway’. Others bitched that if the show were to be completed, that it would take all night. The most palpable reason for a postponement was for safety reasons.

In the wake of Tom Baldwin’s accident last August, there were legitimate concerns about racing around a track that had a soaked or flooded infield. There were a number of people that were quite adamant about that point. Ultimately there was only one competitor that had the backbone to ‘just say no’.

Howie Brode pulled his rig out of the garage area right when everyone else was getting their cars out. Tommy, Jr. had told us all that ultimately safety is up to the competitors and that if anyone didn’t feel conditions were safe that they should decide not compete. Apparently Howie really felt it was unsafe and decided to leave. That took (expletive deleted) Howie, way to go. That took every excuse away from anyone else that was complaining.

Bones Bourcier had made the trek from Indiana once again to personally autograph books for his publisher Lew Boyd and coastal181.com. Around the time that Brode left, we walked up to the track to see how wet it really was. Although there were a lot of puddles in the infield and the bottom groove was still damp, Bones thought that we would get the show in. The next time you see my favorite scribe, ask him about the ‘Stop sign rule’.

I got the opportunity to speak with Todd Szegedy before things got started. Todd had flown up to drive the ‘Ole Blue’ #3 for Michael Boehler. Eric Beers, who had been tabbed to drive for the BRE team this season, will likely drive the #3 in the Haynes Connecticut Classic, Memorial Day weekend. Michael had asked Szegedy to wheel the family racer as Eric recuperates from injuries he suffered at the Thompson Icebreaker.

Todd has been working as a shock specialist for Robert Yates Racing in Mooresville, NC. My conversation with the 2003 Whelen Modified Tour champ confirmed my suspicions about one of our Tour alumni. Former Tour competitor and Tom Baldwin disciple, Ed D’Hondt was hired as General Manager of RYR last season. Eddie is hard working, detail oriented and committed to insuring great communication among his staff. This is another example of a Modified competitor who has helped a Cup team drastically improve their performance.

Later I met Jack Arute by Lew Boyd’s booth. Jack was in great spirits and was actually surprised as anyone that his sons were going to pull this one off. The Arute patriarch has had to limit his travels due to some health maladies. It was great to see him up and walking around.

While Bones and I were chatting with Jack, a young man approached. He introduced himself as a serviceman who had just returned from Iraq. He wanted to thank Jack for sending racing videos to him while he was overseas. Jack retorted, ‘the pleasure is all mine and it is we that need to be thanking you’.

Before you knew it the sun was out, the cars were practicing and it was a whole new day. I met Rich Pallai from CarQuest across from Lew Boyd’s booth. This race is a big deal for CarQuest and all of their Tech-Net affiliates. Rich was a great host. Thanks for the hospitality!

When I got up to the press box, I discovered that there was still qualifying to come for the Whelen Modified Tour competitors. With all of the bellyaching I had heard of how long this event might run, I wondered, why they didn’t just start straight up points? The particularly wet infield conditions led to perhaps the fairest time-trial qualifying session in recent memory at Stafford.

One of the challenges that our racers normally face in time-trial qualifying is that dust from the infield invariably blows onto the track before the qualifying session begins. This puts those who draw a low number at a distinct disadvantage. The damp infield made that point moot as only one competitor of the first ten to attempt qualifying was ‘bumped’ during time-trials.

Perhaps the biggest surprise in qualifying was that Mike Stefanik who holds the record for the most Spring Sizzler victories and Jerry Marquis, the defending champion of this event failed to turn times fast enough to get into the show. Both were awarded provisional qualifying positions. Partially because of that, rookie-of-the-year campaigner Tyler Haydt and the King Racing team, who had performed so well at the Thompson Icebreaker, wound up on the ‘go home’ list. Haydt missed the show by eighty-seven thousandths of a second.

As the beginning of the Tour race drew nearer, my cell phone rang. It was Jerry Moran, my former crew chief. He and his buddy Gino from New Jersey were racing up I-95 to help Jamie Tomaino. Jerry called several times in the next hour including one call when he asked me to ‘buy him ten minutes’. ‘Walt, go streaking down the front straightaway!’, he exclaimed. How ironic, he was asking me to run in front of the crowd in my birthday suit on my birthday. They arrived just in time and no I wouldn’t have done it.

The race was to be soon underway but the pre-race ceremonies were great. There was a celebration of the World Series Champion Red Sox with their owner John Henry. Connecticut Governor, M. Jodi Rell addressed the crowd and CarQuest and Stafford Speedway put together a very nice video compilation as a salute to 1996 CarQuest 300 winner the late Tom Baldwin.

Nevin George started from the pole after the redraw and led the first twenty-eight laps. Right about the time that Todd Szegedy found his way by George for the lead, Tony Hirschman spun the #48 between turns three and four. It looked like Nevin might have pinched him a bit and I think that Tony spun himself to keep from causing a big wreck. Hirschman continued on despite losing nearly twenty spots.

On lap forty, Jerry Marquis had a tire go down and the caution flew as he limped along the backstretch. Several competitors swerved to avoid the #4 car. Renee Dupuis and Mike Stefanik were collected in the incident and Stefanik wound up backed into the turn three fence bringing out the red flag. That would end the day for the #00 and the Brady Bunch.

The race returned to green on lap forty-eight. There was a big wreck between turns one and two on lap fifty. There were too many cars involved to mention. One of the racers that suffered damage was the #10 of Eddie Flemke. Hey, Eddie’s birthday was this weekend too! He turned the big five-0!

The race went back to green on lap fifty-six. Flemke was black flagged for running without sidebars and returned to the pits for repairs. The lead changed on the restart as Icebreaker winner Ted Christopher dashed to the top spot.

Three cautions later, Tony Hirschman decided to pit after Ken Barry spun in turn one. This was the turning point of the race. Hirschman thought that his car was strong enough at Thompson to go the whole distance on tires. He took the blame for that but took this opportunity to hit pit road and bolt on four new Hoosiers.

The yellow flew again on lap eighty-six for an accident in turns one and two involving the Flemke, Bo Gunning, Ken Barry and Kevin Goodale. Chuck Hossfeld, Zach Sylvester, Tony Ferrante and Tom Bolles took to pit road for their services under caution on lap eighty-eight. Ted Christopher still led at that point in front of Rick Fuller and Todd Szegedy with Reggie Ruggiero charging toward the front now in fifth.

After a lap ninety-two restart the race went nearly thirty laps before a flat right-front tire put Rick Fuller into the turn two fence. Ted Christopher, Szegedy, Ruggiero and several other leaders chose to pit at this point. Ted’s brother Mike pitted at that time as well and he exited the pit dragging a fuel can out to the pit-out official. Mike would serve a drive-thru penalty after the race returned to green.

Thus the pitting had cycled around and the leader of the race at that point was Jamie Tomaino. The restart was on lap one twenty-seven. On lap one twenty-nine, Tony Hirschman found his way by Tomaino for the top spot and he was never headed from that point forward. Hirschman and Sylvester ran away from the pack at this point and Tony did a masterful job of negotiating lapped traffic to cushion his lead over Zach.

Mike Molleur spun in turn one on lap one ninety, which brought out the yellow for the first time in over sixty laps. Pole sitter, Donny Lia and Nevin George, who led the opening twenty-seven circuits of the event, chose to pit. Lia was on the lead lap and still had a couple of tires left in the bank. The late race restart would put Donny at the tail of ten lead lap cars on the restart.

When the green flew on lap one ninety-five Lia stormed to the outside. Unfortunately that put him three wide with Tom Bolles and Charlie Pasteryak. The three made it through turn two down the backstretch and thru turn three THREE WIDE! All good things come to an end and Lia wound up in the fence coming off of turn four. It was an outstanding effort.

Donny’s wreck lead to a green, white, checker finish. The restart came on lap two hundred and one. None of the leaders were able to advance in the final two laps and Hirschman put the #48 in victory lane as he took down his first Spring Sizzler victory.

Throughout the event I was calling in updates to Vicki. When it became clear that my cell phone was running out of power, I chose to call her back every few minutes to give her the rundown. When the race was over, my phone was dead. I have contingency plans secured for phoning in the next event.

However, Vicki will not be able to post updates for the next race. We are looking to find someone who might be interested in posting live updates for the Haynes Connecticut Classic and other events down the road. All of those who might be interested please send an email to Amie or myself so that we might be able to coordinate future updates.

Zach Sylvester leaves the Sizzler with the Whelen Modified Tour point lead by virtue of his back-to-back second place finishes to start the season. Sylvester is very confident that his team can improve and that their venture to New Smyrna in February has really helped his performance. Zach also wanted to thank Performance Engines by Billy the Kid for providing him with such great horsepower.

Todd Szegedy was pretty happy finishing third. Todd felt that he might have had something for Zach and Tony had he not punished his tires so hard on his way to the front. Let’s all hope that Todd gets a big opportunity shortly.

Tony was very business like through his interviews. One gets the feeling that the #48 team will improve their performance by the time the Tour returns to Stafford for the Memorial Day weekend event. Word of that won’t make the other competitors too happy.

I stayed around to watch the NEMA race. I wanted to watch my buddy Adam Cantor to see how well he finished. Ben Seitz won the race beating the ‘Jersey Jet’ Joey Payne to the line. Adam finished third but was subsequently disqualified for a weight infraction.

Staying around for the Midget race delayed my departure enough that I just missed the eight o’clock boat to Long Island. I got there just in time to see them shove off. There wasn’t a racer to be found on the final ferry that left at 8:45.

One never knows whom they might meet during their travels. On that final boat I met a long time racing fan who was just doing his job. Todd Christianson drives a truck for Conproco out of Dover, NH.

We had a great conversation about old school Modified racing. Todd has a degree in mechanical engineering and had quite a successful career as an engineer. He is happier doing what he is doing now as he winds up spending more time at home in his current venture.

I kind of wish that the ferry would have gotten stuck out there for a couple more hours. We talked about Stafford, Oxford Plains, Lee USA, Beech Ridge and Loudon. His story of meeting Bob Bahre three years ago is a classic that I will enjoy for years to come.

Looking back I still have to commend Howie Brode for making the decision to stand up for what he thought was right. Ultimately the infield had dried considerably by race time. Who would have known that the sun and the wind would have dried the infield so rapidly? In fact dust on top of my shoes came from walking across the infield for the NEMA victory lane.

Thanks to the Arutes for their determination and perseverance to get this show in. I will be celebrating my birthday next week and my travel arrangements would have kept me away from this race had it been postponed. Thanks to everyone who stopped by to send me their good wishes and thanks most of all to our loyal readers who keep me inspired.