STAFFORD – When it comes to the statistical superlatives involved with the NAPA SK 5K, Keith Rocco ranks right up there in some interesting categories over the first 10 years of the event.
Rocco came into Friday’s event as one of just three drivers – along with Todd Owen and Michael Gervais Jr. – to have competed in the first 10 runnings of the NAPA SK 5K.
Rocco’s fifth place average finish in the first 10 NAPA SK 5K events also topped that list.
Though missing from the accomplishments for Rocco when it came to the NAPA SK 5K was a trip to victory lane.
Friday night the Wallingford driver finally checked off that box.
Rocco scored victory in the rain-shortened NAPA SK 5K Friday at Stafford.
The race, which was scheduled for 111 laps, was stopped with 69 laps complete.
Rocco’s first victory in the event paid him a $5,000 winner’s purse.
It was the first victory of the season for Rocco and his 71st in the SK Modified division at Stafford. It was his 82nd career victory overall at Stafford, tying him for third place on the track’s all-time win list with Tom Fearn.
“It’s pretty awesome,” Rocco said. “We had a great strategy here. Great crew chief, Mike O’Sullivan, spotter, everybody that works on this car. I really owe it to … everybody that worked last night. They put a fresh motor in this thing and it definitely paid off. They busted their butts and I can’t thank everybody enough and everybody that comes here and supports us every week.”
Gervais, of Wolcott, was second and Mikey Flynn of Hampden, Mass. was third to complete a Keith Rocco Racing team podium.
“I tried to stay up front from the beginning and try to save tires,” Gervais said. “I kind of just rode the same pace that Keith had from the beginning. I guess that worked out for both of us there with the pace that we were running. He was definitely a little better than me in [turns] three and four and I was a little better in [turns] one and two, but I was just a little bit too free behind him.”
Said Flynn: “Especially in the SK 5K, coming out strong and getting a good run is really important us. It’s the biggest race of the year. Congratulations to Keith on winning. He’s one of the best to do it. [Keith Rocco Racing cars] in the top-three, that’s pretty cool in the biggest race of the year.”
Pole-sitter RJ Marcotte controlled the pace early with Todd Owen staying on his bumper. By lap 14 Marcotte and Owen had checked out from third place running Rocco.
By lap 26, little had changed besides Marcos and Owen checking out by half a straightaway on Rocco in third. By lap 38 Marcotte began having to work through lapped traffic, with Owen straight with him.
The first caution of the event flew on lap 46 for the stopped car of Glen Reen off of turn two.
On the lap 46 restart it was Marcotte getting away, leaving Rocco and Owen to battle for second. Rocco was able to take the position before caution flew once again on lap 48 for the spinning car of Dylan Kopec on the backstretch and the stopped car of Wesley Prucker on the frontstretch.
On the lap 48 restart Marcotte and Rocco went side-by-side with Rocco leading to complete the lap. On lap 49 Rocco cleared Marcotte for the lead, leaving him to battle Gervais for second place.
Caution was back out on lap 54 with Rocco leading, Marcotte in second and Gervais in third. But under caution, Marcotte was black flagged for not holding a racing line.
Rocco held the top spot on the lap 54 restart, but the action was short-lived. Caution was back out on lap 56 for the stopped car of Prucker.
On the lap 56 restart Rocco and Gervais battled side-by-side, with Gervais leading on the outside at the completion of the lap. Rocco fought back on lap 57 and was able to clear Gervais for the lead once again. Behind them, Flynn was up to third place on lap 59.
By lap 68 Flynn had found the bumper of third place Gervais with the top-three cars running nose to tail. Caution returned on lap 70 for the spinning car of Glen Reen. While under caution rain began falling on the track and officials called the event.
The SK Light Modified and Late Model features were not run due to the rain.
Ill start by saying i feel bad for Stafford’s weather luck lately. And i commend them for trying to push through with the event. Simple reality is they were going to have a lighter than hoped for crowd given weather. doesn’t matter if they got the whole thing in or not.
I wouldn’t have disagreed with the choice at all if they pulled the plug this afternoon. It’s tough but would have been understandable.
But if you are gonna push through the weather with a race like this, you have to commit and do everything possible. They adjusted once, but not a second time when it was clear there was a very real chance the new sk race slot would still be impacted by weather.
2 divisions and top 3 interviews for both is just a head scratcher. Even just scratching the interviews would have been close to enough time to finish if it was clean.
With how good the flo telecast is, and how often this seems to happen here, they really are making it easier and easier to stay home and watch. And I hope they don’t start regretting that. i dont see how anyone buying a ticket is confident they’ll have every effort made to get the top show in.
Well… a little short of what I hoped for. But good racing for what they had. 2-2/3 out of 5, better than a complete rainout. Thanks to stafford for doing their best to get the racing done.
Stafford blew it again lmao ! Stop making money and upgrade your radar and you Owe fans big time ! Keep it up you will be Thompson! Drive there knowing weather is coming , again ! E mail me anytime! Was my favorite track but only see money !!! The 22 , win has *, never went distance….. joke
So Al why don’t you just stay home and watch it on Flo better yet why don’t you just watch the Olympics now there’s something you can complain about
“Well, at least we got to see a full hour of warmup laps before the racing!”, I heard someone sarcastically say as we all dejectedly walked to our cars after they pulled the plug.
What a complete failure of race program management! A complete failure!
Every single person with a cell phone weather radar knew at 6PM that the rain, heavy, guaranteed rain, was expected before 10 PM! So, how do they rush the show? We sit there for a full hour until 7, watching practice! Then they run four heats for 31 cars instead of 3. Then it’s over another full ten minutes of silence while we wait for the LLM to even GET to the track! Pitiful!
A couple weeks ago Stafford was raving about what a good program was run by the Cleetus crew, and how much they learned, blah, blah, blah, blah blah. Well, they learned nothing! Nothing at all!!! The “secret” to Cleetus is SIMPLE; everything is focused on the fans. Every action, every second! Tonight, Stafford directors acted like they had no idea we were in the stands. They showed no real sense of urgency the whole night, as usual. We were there for four hours! They can’t run a full show in that time???
My buddies and I have been to at least a dozen races at Stafford every year for the past 25 years. That’s a lot of time and money.
Tonight was supposed to be a regular full show, but with an extra 61 laps for the SKs, for an extra $10. Eh, acceptable. But, we get no heats for four divisions, and still an extra $10?! Well, screw that. No more. You can “work your magic” on someone else. “NO QUESTION ABOUT IT.”
Any chance that those Glen Reen cautions were intentional (to shorten the race for teammate/race leader Rocco)?
Well, a bunch more race fans are pissed off yet again at the greatest racetrack in the history of the world. I didn’t watch the race, but let’s not forget Rocco is well versed in spinning intentionally to win a big race. Butttttt I’m sure Reen being his teammate and all was just one big ol coincidence.
I’m Still Confused On Rule On Marcotte. I’ve Been Involved Or Around Racinf Fo 50 YEARS And Still Scratching My Head On That Ruling. I’ve Never Heard Of Such A Rule!!!!!!!!!! “NOT HOLDING YOUR LINE” “WHAT THE HELL DOES THAT EVEN MEAN” A Yellow falls and he gets black flagged!!
Chevelledude, I completely agree. Marcotte got boned on that one. Caution comes out for a car spinning that he’s no where near and they black flag him? Did he wash up a couple of times? Yup but it happens probably 20 times a night and if the race director felt that strongly about it he should have thrown the caution when the so called penalty occurred not using another cars spin to punish someone.
I’m with ya on that Chevelle. Not holding your line sounds like a dumb rule nascar would make. Sounds pretty whack to me. Can’t wait to see the replay but from what I’ve been hearing, the 5 got screwed.
OK, how do you have cars go out on a somewhat green track to race with no practice? And don’t say NASCAR does it, those teams have millions of dollars’ worth of personnel and equipment to enable them to do so! Oh, and there was a short rain delay in the middle of it as well. Yes, maybe they could have run three heats instead of four. The unforeseen incidents during heats unfortunately ate up some time; stuff happens. I’m guessing they took a shot at this as there was no touring division involved. I for one am glad they did! As said previously they have not had great luck with the weather overall this year; they’re doing the best they can dealing with the “Wicked Witch of Weather”.
Agreed, Chevelledude! When you find out, let all the rest of us veteran race fans know what that craziness was. I never heard of such a thing.
I’m sure they felt the need to run three heats because of the bonus
Monies up for grabs. I have seen some bone head calls the last two years . They even have penalized drivers for crashes behind them…
Fast Eddie, that’s what the heats are for, haha.
But seriously, they screwed the fans out of an hours worth of facing in the heats (granted, that’s hardly racing) but that’s what they advertised and we paid to see. They knew full well that it was going to be a short night. They tried, sure, but as SO OFTEN, they screwed up, with the fans being the last people considered.
Just watched the race on Flo- the 5 car got screwed- 💯 % worst call ever. Whoever made that call should be fired
Stafford always tries to put on top quality show no one can predict the weather even if everyone has cell phone everyone crying here needs to stop or just do something else
Thank you Stafford Motor Speedway and the entire team for what you do
They botched the Gambler Wheel Spin – it didn’t spin a revolution- it looked like Keith just put it on 6-10th
Congratulations to Keith Rocco and KRR and everyone behind him 10 years of trying and being right there almost every year They deserve this one I feel some more wins coming that team is amazing
Not amazing… far from it! Rocco was lucky to win that thing and they and nearly everyone else knows it.
Last night all but affirmed the choice of many fans to stay away after the Spring Sizzler fiasco. They now need to have a night with rain where they hustle a show along and execute perfectly to win any of the doubters back. They’ll keep watching on Flo so they will see it.
I’ll preface this by saying that although I do keep up with what is going on I have not attended a racing program since I stepped away from officiating in 2011. I do read Shawn’s articles and the comments. Some I chuckle at and others I just shake my head at. I worked for the Arutes for decades. One thing has always been consistent and that’s the fan and competitor experience. They take it seriously. From facility upgrades, food offering, safety and comfort, respect both ways between employees and clientele, efficient and fair running of the race program, and everything in between. It would appear to me that something is being done very right. The car counts are healthy and the program from everything I have heard and read is top notch. It always has been. Ownership and their staff pour heart and soul into this and frankly they don’t have to. As far as on track calls go I have no idea what has happened but I can tell you this. No dedicated official wants to blow a call or make a bad decision. One of the worst things is second guessing yourself after the fact. I speak from experience. It’s far worse than the beating you take from arm chair quarterbacks. There is a lot of pressure, again I know better than most. Give the on track people a break, they want you to walk away feeling like you’ve experienced one of the greatest things on earth because frankly, you have. Nobody runs a program with the intention of going through the motions while planning to cut it short. I know most of the players on both sides of the fence even still and you won’t find a better team. Just my two cents and I don’t have any skin in the game. Criticism runs far more rampant than compliments. And it’s a shame.
Surprise surprise. The highlight reel doesn’t show anything about the 5 except he was running up front. Was what he did so bad that nobody has ever heard of such a penalty?
Thank you Tony Leckey
From growing up watching you at the bowl flagging in the 90s to watching you on Sid’s view from the 80s I grew up in Plainville watch Ted and Mike behind Dibennidto‘s The Bear even came into eat at the restaurant
I wasn’t there to watch Ronnie Rocco race at tinies plainville stadium but watch him race at the bowl running the high line scrapping the wall down the straits putting on a show talking bad about the tracks in any way not going to help Stafford is a leading example to keep moving forward wish i was around to see plainville stadium it was right behind my house Dewey place Hamlins Pond
While I think they would have been fine with 0 practice, i understand not wanting to give them nothing.
I don’t think they needed 2 rounds, though. 1 round probably saves half an hour.
As for the marcotte penalty, that screams to me that they made it a point in a driver’s meeting, that day or recently before it, for the bottom guy to hold their lanes better.
In the 10 or so laps before the yellow where he got a penalty, i noticed a few times that he was drifting up more than others.
If they were making it a point to be watching that type of call closer, he kinda puts a target on himself being the worst of the cars up front doing it. I have 0 doubt he got at least one warning over the radio too.
If he didn’t get a warning at all, then I would be unhappy with the call.
Saying throw a yellow or something to give him the penalty is crazy.
Will be interesting to see how detailed they get on the penalty report this week and note which incidents gave him a warning and which was the straw the broke the camels back.
Good times back then DB. Most of the time lol. Ronnie at the Bowl in the late 80s and early 90s was pure gold. It was a promoter’s dream because it wasn’t rehearsed, it wasn’t planned, it was just plain organic and the fans ate it up and kept coming back for more. I’ll never forget the night he mud wrestled with Jim DeMarco in the infield after an on track skirmish. Racing was a different kind of cat back then for sure. I miss those days dearly. Thank you for the kind reply!
Worst call on the 5 – you make that call you have to make that call on 90% on inside passes- never touched anyone.
Steve,
Not for nothing, but, you basically made essentially the same comment on this same story at 2:43 pm. This is now the fourth comment you’ve made on this story, all negatively directed directly or indirectly at Stafford management. We get it, you don’t like the management at Stafford, but the piling on with repeated comments just to add comments is a little ridiculous.
Agree with all the comments regarding Marcotte … X10. I was there and staring right at that battle each lap. He washed up a little, just a little. How often do we see people run others up out of the groove completely and on purpose without any repercussions? I’m stunned and have never been this disappointed in Stafford’s officiating ever.
If any track needs a promoter there’s no shortage here ,everyone knows how to do it better when it’s not their money,