| By
Scott Running |
Photos By Driscoll Motorsports Photography |
(Stafford
Springs, CT)---When the NASCAR Whelen Modified
Tour comes to Stafford Motor Speedway next
weekend for the 40th Annual CARQUEST Fall Final,
Doug Coby will be looking to put his recent
string of bad luck behind him. After he
finished 8th in the season opening race, Coby
ran off a string of seven consecutive top-3
finishes, including wins in all three Stafford
races thusfar. But after finishes of 17th,
13th, and 22nd in the last three races, Coby has
seen his points lead shrink from 54 points down
to 9 points.
“I think winning the first
three doesn’t make us the favorite to win the
fourth,” said Coby. “I feel confident we have a
car that will contend for the win, but whether
we do win or not will come down to the factors
that go into racing. We’ve had a little streak
of bad luck, we’ve had 3 races in a row out of
the top-10, but only one of those was a bad
race. The Thompson race we missed the setup,
but at Bristol we were running in the top-5 with
20 to go and got wrecked and at Riverhead we
were up to second battling for the lead 60 laps
into the race and we lost the motor. What are
you going to do, that’s just one of those
deals. If the bad luck continues, the
championship will be right out the window, but
we’re hoping to have a solid run at Stafford.
If we had got the finishes we deserved at
Bristol and Riverhead, I think we would still
have had a 50-something point lead, but I’d
still rather be 9 points up than 9 down.”
While the recent down turn in
luck might be tempting for Coby and the #52
Furnace and Duct team to change things up, Coby
says it will be business as usual and he is
confident in his team’s ability to make changes
on his car if the car is not where he wants it
to be with the setup.
“It’s
going to be business as usual for us,” said Coby.
“I don’t think we were planning on using the
motor we blew up at Riverhead in the last three
races, so we still have the motor we planned on
running. Obviously my guys are going to
quadruple check things on the car, and make sure
it’s how they want it to be. The last couple
races, we’ve had to make some serious changes to
help the car qualify decent and then we keep
making changes for the race that are working out
in our favor. Like at Riverhead, I wasn’t
thrilled with the car in practice and John
McKenna made some changes for the feature and
the car was awesome. I’m really confident in my
team’s ability to take a bad car and make it
good. But you never know what you’re going to
have when you show up. We showed up at Thompson
with what we thought was a race winning setup.
We were fastest in practice, we qualified third,
just shy of the pole, and then we went out for
the race and we were terrible. So that puts a
little doubt in your mind, but we’re going to
come to Stafford with the same general setup
that we’ve won the three races with. We’re
going to bring the car that we won the Sizzler
with, it’s a good car and we’re hoping it’s
going to be good for the Fall Final. I’ve seen
too many times where people change what they do
and it ruins what they accomplished all year
long because they tried to do something
different.”
Although Coby says he and his
team will be preparing the same for the final
races just as they have all season long, he
knows that he has to be aggressive on the track
and get every position he can.
“The
way it looks, it’s going to come down to three
teams and drivers that will have a chance to win
the championship,” said Coby. “You really can’t
give up any spots to anybody and you’re going to
have to get every spot you can because it’s
going to come down to literally a couple spots
on the track as to who wins the championship.
It’s such a competitive series, if you look at
the top-7 in the standings, I think we all have
the same number of top-10 finishes. The only
reason why we’re still leading is we have a
couple more wins than everyone else. It’s just
a couple of spots here and there that gets you
those extra points, and leading laps is
important for bonus points.”
Tickets for the September
29th & Sept. 30th 40th Annual CARQUEST Fall
Final Weekend are priced at $38.50 for adult
general admission tickets, $5.00 for children
ages 6-14, and children ages 5 and under are
admitted free of charge when accompanied by an
adult. Reserved seating will be priced at $42.00
for all ages. All CARQUEST Fall Final tickets
are good for admission on both Saturday and
Sunday. All ticket prices include 10% CT
Admission Tax and Stafford Motor Speedway offers
free parking with overnight parking available.
For more information on the
40th Annual CARQUEST Fall Final Weekend, or to
order tickets, contact the Stafford Motor
Speedway track office at 860-684-2783 or visit
us on the web at www.staffordspeedway.com.