Digging Deep: Ryan Preece Wins Whelen Mod Tour Call Before You Dig 150 At Stafford Speedway

Ryan Preece celebrates victory in the Whelen Modified Tour Call Before You Dig 150 Friday at Stafford Speedway (Photo: Tim Bradbury/Getty Images for NASCAR)

Ryan Preece celebrates victory in the Whelen Modified Tour Call Before You Dig 150 Friday at Stafford Speedway (Photo: Tim Bradbury/Getty Images for NASCAR)

STAFFORD – When the NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour visited Stafford Motor Speedway on June 5, Ryan Preece put on a show with a dominating car, leading most of the event in his charge to victory.

Friday at Stafford Preece added a little drama to the recipe for success.

Preece, of Berlin, came from the 15th starting spot but dug from the deep and still ended up cruising to a dominating victory in Friday’s Whelen Modified Tour Call Before You Dig 150 at Stafford Motor Speedway.

It was the 14th career Whelen Modified Tour victory and third win of the season for Preece, who edged into the series points lead in a continued tight battle at the top of the standings.

Doug Coby of Milford was second and Woody Pitkat of Stafford third.

Preece went by Ted Christopher for the lead

“I like coming back from the back, it’s a lot of fun, but I like winning more,” Preece said. “So, we did a little bit of both today.”

Preece was up to sixth when the bulk of the leader pitted on lap 71. He was fourth out of the pits and restarted the race in sixth, setting forward with a quick dash to the front.

“We had a great racecar,” Preece said. “We started off a little free. [Crew chief Tommy Grasso] made some great adjustments on that stop to give me the car that I needed on that restart and the longevity and it was just a rocket ship.”

By lap 81 Preece was up to third. He went by Coby for second on lap 82 and then got under Ted Christopher for the lead for good on lap 83.

“We got our track position when we needed to and then we made all the right calls,” Preece said. “We drove forward when we needed to and got the lead and just kind of rode there with Teddy.”

By the time Coby got to second Preece had checked out from the field.

“Everybody just kept driving into my door,” Coby said. “It felt like it was Riverhead out there. From the drop of the green it seemed like everybody was trying to get every spot. I don’t know if they’re starting to drive desperate or whatever. I felt like I was ping-pong ball out there about six times. I dished a little bit of it out, but I took way more than I dished. Just really aggressive driving.

“I thought I had a winning car. We were just way too far back of Ryan.”

Pitkat, who came into the event leading the points, three ahead of Preece, spent much of the race near the back end of the top-10, but made a late race charge to third.

“I just got mad and just tried to drive the wheels off the thing,” Pitkat said. “We never give up. We just got bounced around the whole night. I couldn’t get in the right line, getting bounced off of people.”

Comments

  1. Sue Carnell says

    Great win Ryan.

  2. Art Becker says

    Preece is still Preece but the TS crew really got it together.Great win and great show by all.Makes the drive up to Ct worth it

  3. Shawn, what happened to todd szegedy last night? Seven cylinders?

  4. Tyler,
    I’m not sure what happened with the 4 car toward the end.

  5. Sect.D Row 25 says

    Preece gets a shot a Cup in Louden

  6. Sect.D Row 25 says

    Loudon

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