Column By: BOBBY CHALMERS / RPW – THOMPSON, CT – Ron Silk showed why he’s a NASCAR champion Sunday at Thompson Speedway Motorsports Park.
The veteran proved exactly how years of experience will help you get to victory lane on a consistent basis and that was on full display in the NASCAR Modified Tour Ice Breaker at the Connecticut oval.
Being calm, cool and collected was key to the defending Tour champion scoring the victory in the marquee event as he was able to save his equipment during the course of the 150-lap event, yet knew when to he needed to race if he wanted to find victory lane.
However, sometimes, according to Silk, the best car doesn’t always win. Sometimes, it’s all about how the cautions and the pit stops shake out. When did he know he had the winning car on Sunday?
“I knew before our pit stop,” Silk said. “I had driven to the lead and was able to drive away from everybody. We had just a fantastic car from the start of the race.”
Even though he was the one holding the wheel, Silk was quick to give credit for the win to his Haydt-Yannone Racing crew.
“We had just a great pit stop by all of my guys,” he said. “These are the guys that make this happen and we’re just pumped to be back in victory lane.”
Now, with two wins in the first three NASCAR Modified Tour events for 2024, you could say that Silk has confidence he can repeat as champion this year,
“Yea, it’s (his confidence) pretty high,” he said. “Richmond was a nail-biter. We could be looking at three in-a-row but should of, could of, would have so we’ll go to the next one and try and get another one.”
The next race on tour will be the Granite State Derby at Monadnock Speedway the first Saturday in May.
Silk captured the win at Thompson in the fall as well. Who finished second that day? That was young Jake Johnson and as fate would have it, Johnson followed the #16 home once again on Sunday at Thompson with a fine runner-up performance.
“We’re just trying to keep up with the 16 (Silk),” Johnson said. “Two straight races here at Thompson we’ve been runner-up so I can’t be upset.”
Johnson is another driver who realizes that good runs on the NASCAR Modified Tour are a total team effort.
“We had an awesome pit stop,” he said. “I have a great spotter and everyone’s doing their job. That’s showing in the results.”
Even though he came home second, the Rehoboth, MA driver doesn’t feel like he had anything for Silk.
“I had nothing other than hanging my tongue out,” he said. “There was nothing left in the chamber. Ron was just really good. We’re going to work on things and see if we can keep up with him.”
Third place on the day was Patrick Emerling, driving the Rob Fuller LFR house car. The team thought they had a shot at winning on Sunday, grabbing the lead after the pit stop. However, it was the final restart that Emerling wasn’t happy about.
It was then that he feels Silk fired early. Emerling was the leader and the control car, but he believes the eventual winner jumped the restart. That inevitably led to other cars passing the LFR machine off of turn two, dropping him back to fifth.
Emerling was able to drive back to third at the finish but he feels like Silk should have been penalized for the move.
“We showed up with an excellent car,” Emerling said. “We were the first out after the pit stop. Officiating didn’t catch it. I kind of feel like Martin Truex Jr. the other day at Richmond. Ron jumped the start, edged us at the line and then ran us way up the hill (in turns one and two).”
This will definitely be something Emerling keeps in the memory bank.
“I’m just going to run him, maybe, like that in the future,” he said. “However, I thought officiating would have caught that but that’s one of those things. It happened the other day in the (NASCAR) Cup race too.”
Though not a victory, Emerling was pleased with how well everything performed.
“We’re coming,” he said. “This is our third race in and we’ve had awesome race cars at each race so far. I’m just fortunate to be here and I love this entire team.”
Even with that, the driver from Orchard Park, NY believes his car should have been sitting in victory lane Sunday.
“We had the car to beat today,” he said. “We had the fastest car. It took us a little bit to get going but we were the fastest car at the end. I just have to give thanks to everyone involved. Everyone did an awesome job. We did everything right, I thought, but just got beat by a jump start. We’ll get them next time.”
