{"id":9244,"date":"2012-03-09T19:17:02","date_gmt":"2012-03-10T00:17:02","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/blog\/?p=9244"},"modified":"2012-03-09T19:18:01","modified_gmt":"2012-03-10T00:18:01","slug":"stafford-motor-speedway-carquest-champions-for-charities-driver-spotlight-stan-mertz","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/blog\/2012\/03\/stafford-motor-speedway-carquest-champions-for-charities-driver-spotlight-stan-mertz\/","title":{"rendered":"STAFFORD MOTOR SPEEDWAY CARQUEST CHAMPIONS FOR CHARITIES DRIVER SPOTLIGHT: STAN MERTZ"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Stafford\"(Stafford Springs, CT)—Stafford Motor Speedway has again lined up an
\nimpressive field of current and former open wheel champions for its CARQUEST
\nChampions For Charities Event as part of CARQUEST Super Saturday on June
\n30th. During the coming weeks, SMS will offer a profile on each of its
\nchampionship winning drivers and the charity they will be racing for and
\nthis week\u2019s CARQUEST Champions For Charities spotlights falls on 2-time
\nPro-4 Modified Limited champion Stan Mertz, who will be racing to support
\nthe Connecticut chapter of Autism Speaks.
\n
\nFor Mertz, the 2012 CARQUEST Champions For Charities race will be his second
\ngo around representing the CT Chapter of Autism Speaks. Last year, Mertz
\nwas selected for the race as a last minute fill in for Donny Lia, meaning
\nthat Mertz only had a few days in which to raise enough money to earn
\nhimself a good starting spot for the feature event. This year, Mertz is
\nlooking forward to having all the time he needs to raise money and he has
\nhis sights set squarely on raising enough money to start in the front.
\n\u201cI\u2019m honored to be invited to participate in the CARQUEST Champions For
\nCharities race again this year,\u201d said Mertz. \u201cLast year we only had a short
\namount of time in order to raise money, so while it was encouraging that we
\nwere able to raise the money we did last year, we\u2019re looking forward to
\nhaving more than a couple of days to raise money for Autism Speaks. We\u2019re
\nworking on a couple of fund raising ideas and we started 7th last year, but
\nwe\u2019re hopeful that we can raise enough money this year to start as close to
\nthe number one spot as we can.\u201d<\/p>\n

In the vein of raising money, Mertz has himself off to a great start. Mertz
\nis making a personal $500 donation to Autism Speaks and he is the current
\nleader in the clubhouse in the race for pole position. Mertz is also
\nlooking forward to having a better race experience than last season, when he
\nlost a motor in a practice session.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m going to make a $500 personal donation to match the first $500 that we
\nare able to raise,\u201d said Mertz. \u201cI know it\u2019s very early on, but so far we\u2019
\nre on pole. I\u2019d like to start as close to the front as we can so we can
\ngive it a good run in the feature. Last year, we broke a motor in practice
\nand the car didn\u2019t really go anywhere in the feature because the backup
\nmotor wasn\u2019t quite up to par. I\u2019m really looking forward to the race. I
\nhad such a blast at last year\u2019s event and I thought it was going to be a
\none-time deal to be able to race against the other champions, but now I get
\nto do it all over again. The biggest thing is I get to work with folks from
\nAutism Speaks again. Even though we didn\u2019t have a lot of time last year, I
\nwas able to make some contacts and I\u2019m looking forward to working with them
\nagain this year.\u201d<\/p>\n

While Mertz looks to have everything planned out to a T with his fundraising
\nefforts, he has one final trick up his sleeve should he need to utilize it
\nfor the CARQUEST Champions For Charities feature event.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think I\u2019m one of the largest guys that will be racing, so I might have to
\nsecretly go around and add weight to my competitor\u2019s karts to level the
\nplaying field a bit,\u201d said Mertz. \u201cBut in all seriousness, the race should
\nbe a lot of fun and I can\u2019t wait to get out on the track.\u201d<\/p>\n

Can you imagine hearing the words, “Your child has autism”? In a split
\nsecond, life – as you know it – has changed. For a different family every
\n20 minutes, tomorrow will never be the same. By donating to Autism Speaks,
\nyou are helping to change the future for all who struggle with autism.
\nDonations help get one step closer to finding what causes autism, how to
\nprevent and treat it, and ultimately a cure so no family ever hears those
\nwords again. Until then, Autism Speaks continues to strive to find answers
\nand raise awareness about the devastating toll that autism has had on
\nfamilies.<\/p>\n

To make a donation to the Connecticut chapter of Autism Speaks and for more
\ninformation on the event, please refer to Stan Mertz\u2019s CARQUEST Champions
\nfor Charities donation page located at www.staffordspeedway.com. Stay tuned
\nto www.staffordspeedway.com for more driver spotlights and exciting
\ninformation regarding the CARQUEST Champions for Charities event.<\/p>\n

CARQUEST Extreme Tuesday will take place on Saturday, June 30, 2012 and will
\nfeature the ISMA Super Modifieds, NEMA Midgets, and Pro-4 Modifieds in
\naddition to the Senior Outlaw Wild Thing Karts. Tickets for CARQUEST
\nExtreme Tuesday are on sale now at the Speedway Box Office and are priced at
\n$33.00 for adult general admission tickets, $5.00 for children ages 6-14,
\nand children ages 5 and under are admitted free of charge when accompanied
\nby an adult. Reserved seating is priced at $35.00 for all ages. All ticket
\nprices include 10% CT Admission Tax. As always, Stafford Motor Speedway
\noffers free parking with overnight parking available.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

(Stafford Springs, CT)—Stafford Motor Speedway has again lined up an impressive field of current and former open wheel champions for its CARQUEST Champions For Charities Event as part of CARQUEST Super Saturday on June 30th. During the coming weeks, SMS will offer a profile on each of its championship winning drivers and the charity they […]<\/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":[196,126,197],"tags":[6795,14992],"class_list":["post-9244","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-connecticut","category-new-england","category-stafford-connecticut","tag-stafford-motor-speedway","tag-stan-mertz"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9244","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=9244"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9244\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9244"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9244"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9244"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}