A LOOK BACK AT THE 2004
STAFFORD MOTOR SPEEDWAY SEASON

By: Scott Running

2004 was the 20th season of the Stafford Motor Speedway / CARQUEST Auto Parts relationship. CARQUEST Auto Parts continued their NASCAR Touring division support by sponsoring the Whelen Modified Tour Spring Sizzler and CARQUEST Fall Final Weekend. CARQUEST Auto Parts also brought the ISMA Supermodified cars to Stafford for the Inaugural CARQUEST Extreme Wednesday event. The race has since moved to Tuesday, but CARQUEST Auto Parts has brought the ISMA Supers to Stafford every year since along with the NEMA Midgets and Pro-4 Modifieds. CARQUEST also continued their support of Stafford's weekly divisions with a $150 bonus to each SK Modified® feature winner and a $125 bonus to each Late Model feature winner.

Track champions were Ted Christopher in the SK Modified® division, Ryan Posocco in the Late Model division, and Kevin Gambacorta was the inaugural DARE Stock track champion.

The Whelen Modified Tour made four stops to Stafford during the 2004 season with Jerry Marquis winning the CARQUEST Tech-Net Spring Sizzler to end Ted Christopher's bid to join Maynard Troyer as the only drivers to win 3 consecutive Spring Sizzlers. Tony Hirschman was the big winner of the Whelen Modified Tour events, taking both the May TSI Harley-Davidson 150 and the season ending CARQUEST Fall Final 150, and Todd Szegedy was the winner of the August Town Fair Tire 150.

The Busch North Series made a single visit to Stafford during the 2004 season with Kelly Moore winning the Aubuchon Hardware 150 event.

In the Inaugural CARQUEST Extreme Wednesday event, Chris Perley won the 80-lap ISMA Supermodified feature event, Nokie Fornoro won the 30-lap NEMA Midget feature, and Mike LaJoie won the 25-lap Pro-4 Modified feature event.

The SK Modifieds® entered their 23rd season of competition with Ted Christopher scorching his way to his 5th career SK Modified® track championship. Christopher won a total of 8 races to lead the division in victories, and he was so dominant that he enjoyed a winning streak of 5 races in a row, which was almost an 8 race winning streak as he won 7 of 8 races. As dominant as Christopher was, there was a total of 10 different winners during the season. Other multiple feature winners for the season included Jeff Malave, Jeff Baral, James Civali, and Steve Chowansky, who each won twice. Single event feature wins were taken down by Eric Berndt, Lloyd Agor, Chuck Docherty, Chris Jones, and Willie Hardie.

The 2004 season was the 18th season of Late Model competition at Stafford and it was Ryan Posocco taking down his second consecutive track championship. The battle for the championship was again a neck and neck affair all season long between Posocco and Mike Quintiliano, with Posocco trailing Quintiliano in the standings for much of the season. But Posocco came on strong when it counted the most, winning 4 of the final 5 races of the season to take the championship. Posocco led the division lead with 7 wins each, while Quintiliano won 4 times and Joe Rzeszutek and Tom Butler each won twice. Single event feature wins were scored by Craig Collins, Tom Fearn, Chris Matthews, and Jim Peterson.

The 2004 season was the 12th season of DARE Stock competition and it was the first season that the division raced for points and a track championship with Kevin Gambacorta becoming the first DARE Stock track champion. Gambacorta only won a single race, but he outlasted the competition to take the championship by an 84-point margin over Joey Ferrigno. Andrew Durand, Ferrigno, Scott Hitchcock, Dan King, and Fran Siana each won twice, with Glenn Bartkowski, Michael Bennett, Stacey Botticello, Peter Bourque, Kevin and Vince Gambacorta, Aaron Goff, Eric Grant, Fred Nees, and David Zienka each winning once.