NASCAR to Celebrate 500th
Modified Race at Martinsville
When the green flag
drops on the Made In America Whelen 300 on Saturday, Sept. 20 at
Martinsville (Va.) Speedway, it will be a historic marker on the
timeline of the NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour: the 500th race.
Formed with the
purpose of formalizing the procedure to crown a Modified
champion, the NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour’s first race took
place at Thompson (Conn.) International Speedway on March 31,
1985. Fittingly it was Richie Evans, who is widely considered to
be the greatest Modified driver of all-time, that took the
checkered flag in the first race.
The Modified
division is the oldest in NASCAR. The first NASCAR-sanctioned
event was a Modified race on the beach and road course in
Daytona in 1948. For the first 38 years of the division,
competitors chased a national title by racing three or four
nights a week at numerous tracks throughout the eastern seaboard
that held championship races. As 1985 rolled around, the
formation of today’s NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour brought the
historic division together as a regional touring series.
In the first 499
NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour races there have been 56 different
race winners, led by Mike Stefanik’s 68 victories. That 23-year
span has seen 12 different championship winners, led by
Stefanik’s seven, and the series has visited 35 tracks in 12
states.
Martinsville, the
site of the upcoming milestone event, is a marquee stop each
year for the NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour. The series has held at
total of 31 races at the historic track and the all-time
winner’s list includes such Modified legends as Tom Baldwin,
Brett Bodine, Jeff Fuller, Mike McLaughlin, Reggie Ruggiero and
Mike Stefanik.
Ed Flemke Jr., who
is the NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour record-holder for consecutive
starts with 307, looks forward to continuing his streak and
participating in the milestone event.
“To be part of the
500th race is going to be quite a feat,” Flemke said. “It’s
going to be really special to be a part of that – the 500th –
that’s a pretty big number.”
For the fourth year
in a row, the Made In America Whelen 300 will be a combination
race with the NASCAR Whelen Southern Modified Tour. Ted
Christopher, the most-recent race winner at New Hampshire Motor
Speedway on Sept. 13, will bring a 99-point lead in the NASCAR
Whelen Modified Tour season standings to Martinsville.
Christopher won the inaugural Made In America Whelen 300 in
2005.
To mark the
historic event, all fans attending the event will receive a
commemorative 500th race souvenir. For ticket information for
this historic race, please visit Martinsville’s official Web
site (martinsvillespeedway.com).
Source: Jason
Cunningham/NASCAR WMT PR
Posted:
September 16, 2008
