Sean Foster
Sean Foster went to Stafford Motor Speedway last Friday like a gambler looking to make one big score to stay in the game.
Unfortunately for Foster, he never even got on the table to show his hand.
On the first lap of practice Friday prior to the NAPA SK 5K at Stafford Motor Speedway, Foster blew a motor in his SK Modified.
The blown motor will mean cutting the 2015 season short at Stafford for the Willington driver.
“The bank account had pretty much run dry, or very close to it, two weeks prior,” Foster said. “It was going to be about getting 100 percent situated for the big money race, that way we’d be able to figure out how far into the season we’d take it after that. We knew big money was on the line so we figured that should be able to keep us flowing.
“It’s pretty tragic. The thing that sucks the most is that we had just started putting ourselves in position to win races after dealing with a bunch of crap early in the season between mechanic failures and a couple wrecks, we were finally able to start working on the car setup and started making progress with that. … We definitely had a car that was on the verge of being race winning worthy.”
Foster has been competing in the SK Modified division at Stafford since 2009. He has one career victory in the division coming on Aug. 31, 2012. He was the Limited Late Model division champion at Stafford in 2007 and finished second in the division in 2008 before making the jump to the SK Modified.
Foster said issues late in the July 3 feature at Stafford likely led to his motor expiring last Friday.
“The week prior I think I had overheated the motor,” Foster said. “I have a feeling that’s what happened. We overheated at the end of that week’s race and I got spun out on the last lap and when I got to the pits [the temperature] had started climbing. I thought it was still in the safe zone to the point that I didn’t think it had harmed the engine. But we found out during the first practice that that was likely what did it.
“The week leading up to the SK 5K, it was countless hours. I had never put so many hours into a racecar when it came off the track not wrecked the week prior. But unfortunately those hours didn’t go into taking the motor apart to see if it was harmed.”
Foster is unsure at this point what the future holds for his racing career.
“I’m not putting the white flag up by any means,” Foster said. “That wasn’t the first time that I sat in a racecar after something almost tragic happening to the car itself, and sitting there saying ‘Wow, this could be it, this might be my last race. This might be it for me.’ It’s happened plenty of times and I’ve always rebounded from it. I’m not really sure where the future is going to take me at this point. But I don’t think that this is going to be the end of it.”
Sean sorry to hear that your season is cut short you be greatly missed your good guy and a good racer. please hurry back
That sucks. Sean is one of our favorite drivers on and off of the track. It’s been a blast watching the 25 team dial that car in over the last month or so. It’s been great watching Sean running up front this season. I hope the money figures itself out, and Sean gets back on the track sooner than later.
Should be about 15 SK’s tonight. Fun.
it is just another sign that sk racing is too expensive for the average guy…. I used to have two competitive engines back in the 90’s – now i have zero…..they keep making changes so the engine builder gets rich and the racer poor.
Agreed, Stafford took an epic loss of cars this week.
Sad to hear this! Sean was looking stronger every week. Here’s hoping he can get back sooner than later.
Yes, there will be a short field tonight. From the already mentioned – 21, 50 and 25, I’m also hearing the 10 and 82 probably won’t be back after their hard wrecks last week. Each and every one of you are what makes racing what it is and there is no doubt that Stafford’s SK Modified division has put on the best show in the region. As a fan, you will all be missed.
Steve stop taking the victim mentality and get real, no one is getting rich in this game.
Years ago Jack Arute SR. Took the bold move and made the SK division Staffords premier modified class after dropping the tour type cars. It’s time again for another bold move. The SK lites is a better concept but even the crate motors now are getting out of hand. It’s time for some big changes. Hope Foster gets back soon
So Carl, it make sense to spend 10-15k for an SK engine and $160-170 per tire, and ten bucks a gallon for fuel? Wasn’t the reason the SK’s came about was to make it cheaper to race? Maybe a SK spec/crate motor is needed. You can still spec the engine out for more HP than a Lite car. Also, no need to have the engine builders charge 5k to change out bolts and fasteners. Bring back the days of home-built powerplants or a real crate engine, without engine builders “needing” to be involved.
Sackett you hit it right on the head.
Sk division is very important to area auto racing,we need to keep this going,at any cost…..if we lose this say goodby to racing in New England…..
sackett what you say looks good on paper, but on the race track it’s a different story.
As someone who has seen the ACT Late Model both before and after the introduction of the crate engine, I can tell you if everyone is forced to run crate engines, and then spec shocks & springs later on, the racing will suck and the promoters will go to scheming up ways to start the front runners closer to the front because nobody can pass. You will end up with Cup lite as far as passing and lead changes go. Stafford has been down that path before (little to no passing) and I don’t think it would be very much fun for anyone to go down it again.
Stafford has increased the expense so much in that last few years it just not helpin the cause . Stafford is going to a spec shock next year which may or may not be good in the long run… 1) they have not stated what it will be next year, sure would b smart if they told us what it will be so if I needed to buy shocks this year I could get something I can use next year. 2) now everyone has to throw away at least $800 worth of shocks and purchase new ones, big expense that I don’t need just b4 the season starts. They also let teams buy 10 tires b4 the start of the season, and if you don’t, you can’t buy them later in the season???? So $1600 in tires, $800 for shocks plus basic expense, u need to cough up 3k just to run the sizzler, this is what Scott is up against plus a 12k for a new engine, my guess you may see single digit fields next year
No more than 14 cars in each division tonite… Time to start cutting the cost or say good bye
Its always been expensive thats why sk came to be and quess what, it will always be expensive if you want competitive racing