Ted Christopher celebrates victory in the SK Modified division at New London-Waterford Speedbowl Saturday (Photo: Getty Images for NASCAR)
WATERFORD – On May 16 Ted Christopher completed a two year plus mission to return to victory lane in the SK Modified division at the New London-Waterford Speedbowl.
Saturday night the Plainville driver made sure there wasn’t another years long delay in returning, and did it in dramatic style.
Christopher held off a charging Keith Rocco on the final circuit to win the 35-lap NASCAR Whelen All-American Series SK Modified feature Saturday at Waterford.
Rocco, of Wallingford, held on for second and Tyler Chadwick of Ledyard was third.
Christopher’s win on May 16 was his first in the SK Modified divisiona t the Speedbowl since July 3, 2004. After more than a decade away from the track as a regular, Christopher returned to the division as a full-time driver in 2013.
Rocco’s 66 career SK Modified division victories at Waterford tops the track’s all-time list. Christopher is fourth on the list. Saturday’s victory was his 35th SK Modified win at the shoreline oval.
“Keith is one of the best here, that’s for sure,” Christopher said. “I definitely don’t have enough years in me to catch up to him.”
Christopher inherited the lead when Ed Puleo was spun out of the top spot by Paul Kusheba IV on lap nine. Rocco was involved in an early incident, but rallied back through the field and was up to second with 19 laps remaining.
After moving to second, Rocco worked over Christopher’s bumper briefly, but Christopher was able to pull away from him as the laps ticked closer to the finish. But the caution flew with two laps left to set up the intense green-white-checkered finish.
Coming to the white flag, Rocco got under Christopher and briefly held the lead in turns one and two, but Christopher powered back to the front off of turn two for victory.
“[The team] gave me a great car,” Christopher said. “I knew it right from practice. Keith and I were mirroring each other. Once we could run a bunch of laps I was pulling away from him, but I knew it was going to be pretty interesting with a green-white-checkered.”
Said Rocco: “I think I had a second place car tonight, but we weren’t giving up. Ted was running me up a little bit and I figured I had one shot to get him into [turn] one. I don’t know how it was for the fans or for Ted, but that was pretty fun.”
It was a great race !
. Imo Waterford is the best track for side by side racing . Shawn any word on how that lady is doing that fell from the pit stands ? hopefully she will be ok .
Jim,
All I heard is that there was a broken bone of some sort, nothing more than that. Never heard all the details on the incident.
What a great show..One of the best.
Funny how Preece did’nt get posted for jumping Lia on the restart like Coby did.
That was a great race. What a move Rocco made to try to pass TC. If they were two rookies that would have been a wreck. I hope the TC -Rocco thing lasts all season.