{"id":2851,"date":"2010-07-24T06:26:58","date_gmt":"2010-07-24T11:26:58","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/blog\/?p=9076"},"modified":"2010-07-24T06:26:58","modified_gmt":"2010-07-24T11:26:58","slug":"eric-berndt-seeks-first-career-whelen-modified-tour-victory-in-town-fair-tire-150-at-stafford-speedway","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/blog\/2010\/07\/eric-berndt-seeks-first-career-whelen-modified-tour-victory-in-town-fair-tire-150-at-stafford-speedway\/","title":{"rendered":"ERIC BERNDT SEEKS FIRST CAREER WHELEN MODIFIED TOUR VICTORY IN TOWN FAIR TIRE 150 AT STAFFORD SPEEDWAY"},"content":{"rendered":"

ERIC BERNDT SEEKS FIRST CAREER WHELEN MODIFIED TOUR VICTORY IN TOWN FAIR TIRE 150 AT STAFFORD SPEEDWAY<\/strong><\/p>\n

(Stafford Springs, CT)—With the NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour returning to
\nStafford Motor Speedway on August 6 for the 20th Annual Town Fair Tire 150,
\nthe race presents another opportunity for Eric Berndt and the #54 North End
\nAuto Parts team to collect their first Whelen Modified Tour victory.
\nBerndt nearly won the Whelen Modified Tour\u2019s previous visit to Stafford, the
\nTSI Harley-Davidson 125 in May. Berndt started the race in fourth and he
\ntook the lead from Bobby Santos on lap-11. Berndt had built up a large lead
\nover the rest of the field, but a caution with 22 laps to go erased Berndt\u2019s
\nlarge lead and he lost the lead to Santos one lap after the restart and
\nfaded back to 6th place at the checkered flag. Berndt led 101 of the race\u2019s
\n137 laps and he is looking forward to returning to Stafford and taking
\nanother shot at capturing his first career Whelen Modified Tour victory.
\n\u201cWe were real happy with how we ran the last time out at Stafford, but
\ndisappointed at how we finished the race,\u201d said Berndt. \u201cI think I beat the
\ncar up a little too much early on and I didn\u2019t have anything left. We weren
\n\u2019t happy to see that caution flag for sure. I feel like we\u2019re right on the
\ndoorstep to that first win and hopefully we can knock that door down when we
\ncome back to Stafford.\u201d
\nWhile racing in selected Whelen Modified Tour events since the 2004 season,
\nStafford would seem to be the best bet for Berndt to record his first
\nvictory on Tour. In 38 career Whelen Modified Tour starts, two of Berndt\u2019s
\n4 career top-10 finishes have come at Stafford and Berndt recorded his first
\ncareer Coors Light Pole Position in last year\u2019s Town Fair Tire 150 at
\nStafford. Berndt comes to Stafford fresh off of his first career Whelen
\nModified Tour top-5 finish, giving him and his team a big shot of momentum.
\n\u201cOur program has gotten better every year and we\u2019re coming off a fourth
\nplace finish at Monadnock, which gives us some big momentum going forward to
\nStafford,\u201d said Berndt. \u201cLast week was the first time I had ever raced at
\nMonadnock and we qualified well and we ran in the top-5 all race long, so we
\n\u2019re looking forward to coming back to race at Stafford. With my crew chief
\nRicky Rotundo and Bob Horn, who helps me with the SK car as well as the Tour
\ncar, we have a lot of knowledge for Stafford. It would mean a lot to be
\nable to get our first win at Stafford with running there weekly and to join
\nthe list of winners at Stafford.\u201d
\nBerndt also says that the race strategy for the Town Fair Tire 150 will be
\ndifferent from the Whelen Modified Tour\u2019s previous visit to the Connecticut
\nhalf-mile.
\n\u201cI think we\u2019ll probably have to pit, where we didn\u2019t pit the last race at
\nStafford,\u201d said Berndt. \u201cThe pit stop can be a big factor for us in the
\nrace. Teddy and Santos are going to be good, you can never count out Mike
\nStefanik at Stafford, Ryan Preece has been fast at Stafford for three years,
\nand Szegedy is good at Stafford. You just never know who is going to hit it
\njust right, there\u2019s probably about 8 cars that you have to look at as
\npotential winners.\u201d
\nWith a crew familiar with Stafford on his side, and his great run the last
\ntime out at Stafford, you can count Eric Berndt as a contender for the Town
\nFair Tire 150 checkered flag.
\nTickets for the 20th Annual Town Fair Tire 150 are on sale now at the
\nSpeedway Box Office and are price at $30.00 for adult general admission
\ntickets, $5.00 for children ages 6-14, and children ages 5 and under are
\nadmitted free of charge when accompanied by an adult. Reserved seating is
\npriced at $32.00 for all ages. As always, Stafford Motor Speedway offers
\nfree parking with overnight parking available.
\nFor more information, or to order tickets, contact the Stafford Motor
\nSpeedway track office at 860-684-2783 or visit us on the web at
\nwww.staffordspeedway.com .<\/http:><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

ERIC BERNDT SEEKS FIRST CAREER WHELEN MODIFIED TOUR VICTORY IN TOWN FAIR TIRE 150 AT STAFFORD SPEEDWAY (Stafford Springs, CT)—With the NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour returning to Stafford Motor Speedway on August 6 for the 20th Annual Town Fair Tire 150, the race presents another opportunity for Eric Berndt and the #54 North End Auto […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[196,45,126,197],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2851","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-connecticut","category-nascar","category-new-england","category-stafford-connecticut"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2851","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2851"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2851\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2851"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2851"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2851"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}