(Stafford
Springs, CT)—With only 2 races left on the 2018 NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour
schedule, Eric Goodale and the #58 GAF Roofing team are still in search of
their first victory of the season. Goodale comes into this weekend’s NAPA
Fall Final at Stafford as the defending race champion and there couldn’t be a
better track on the schedule than Stafford for Goodale to record his first win
of 2018. Goodale and the #58 team won the Open Modified Bud Light 80 at
Stafford back in July and they recorded their best NWMT finish of the year at
Stafford in August with a third place run.
“I’m
welcoming racing at Stafford with open arms,” said Goodale. “That’s been
primarily one of our better tracks lately and as the defending winner of the
Fall Final we’re looking forward to getting back there. I know we have a
fast car at Stafford, we just need to put everything together. I’m going
to be real disappointed if we get to the end of the year and we don’t have a
Modified Tour win to show for the season. We’re going to come in with
guns blazing and try to come out of Stafford with a checkered flag. I
feel like our Stafford program is better than our Thompson program so this is
our best shot at getting a win before the end of the season and we’ll be doing everything
that we can to come out on top.
I
love racing at Stafford and we’re all excited to get back there and hopefully
we can have another good day.”
Last
year’s NAPA Fall Final saw Goodale drive to victory despite qualifying 18th.
While Goodale proved that races can be won from that far back in the starting
lineup, he will be looking for a better qualifying effort to make his job of
driving to the front easier.
“We
certainly shot ourselves in the foot last year in qualifying,” said
Goodale. “We failed prequalifying inspection so we only got one lap for
qualifying and ended up starting 18th. Fortunately we were able to win
the race but there was a lot of green flag racing and time for us to make it up
on the track but circumstances might not be the same this year. Track
position is so important in this series that you’re going to want to start as
close to the front as you can so you don’t start the race behind the 8
ball. We showed last year it can be done but we didn’t make it easy on
ourselves for sure.”
The
2018 NAPA Fall Final could prove much more difficult to win than the 2017
race. Last year there were 6 drivers in the running for the championship
while this season sees Justin Bonsignore with the opportunity to clinch the
championship with a 21st place finish or better. Goodale says
the mindset of the entire field will be totally different compared to one year
ago.
“It’s
going to be tough this year,” said Goodale. “Last year there was a big
points battle with 6 drivers still mathematically in the running for the
championship so there were a couple of guys who were rolling the dice to try to
pick up as many points as they could and there were some guys who ran
conservative so they wouldn’t lose any points. Taking that dynamic out of
the race this year, everyone is going to show up looking to win.
Certainly to win any race on the Whelen Modified Tour is not easy and it’s not
going to be easy to win this race either.”
The
key to winning the NAPA Fall Final 150 could lie in a team making the correct
calls on pit road. The Starrett 150 in August at Stafford saw 12 lead
changes among 6 different drivers and with drivers only allowed one tire per
pit stop, teams are still unsure as to what will be the winning calls to make.
“It’s
all a spur of the moment thing,” said Goodale. “It depends on a lot of
different factors. You have to see how good your car is, how much track
position you’re going to give up if you take 2 or 3 tires verus 1, and you’re
always paying attention to what other cars are doing and how well they’re
running. If you have a third or fourth place car, you’re going to need to
do something to help make you better than the cars in front of you. You
also have to take into account what stage of the race that cautions fall at and
how many cars are on the lead lap. I believe this was the first race last
year where the Tour instituted the new one tire rule per pit stop and guys have
seen how that has played out and have been able to adapt to that so we’ll see
what happens.”
Tickets
for the 46th Annual NAPA Auto Parts Fall Final Weekend are priced at $40.00 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 is priced at $42.00 for all ages. All NAPA Fall Final tickets
are good for admission on both Saturday and Sunday and ticket prices include
10% CT Admission Tax. Discount tickets are available at your local
participating NAPA Auto Parts Store. The NAPA tickets include general
admission for both days along with a luncheon buffet on Sunday, all for only
$38 per person. For a list of participating NAPA Stores, please click the
PARTICIPATING NAPA STORES link found at the top of the www.staffordspeedway.com homepage.
For
more information on the 46th Annual NAPA Auto Parts 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.
