Notebook: Family Drives Rocco’s Title
Team shares in national championship celebration
Charlotte, NC — During the NASCAR Whelen All-American Series banquet at the Crown Ballroom at the NASCAR Hall of Fame, Jeff Rocco joked that he was born minutes before his twin brother Keith — in the “only race he ever let me win.”
While that may be true, the twins made a trip to Victory Lane together on Friday night, as Keith Rocco was crowned the NASCAR Whelen All-American Series national champion. Jeff Rocco serves as the crew chief for Keith at Stafford Motor Speedway.
“We love to race,” Jeff Rocco said. “That’s where our heart lies and our passion lies. If this never happens again, we’re still going to have fun every Thursday, every Friday, every Saturday night. We’re going to give it our all no matter what happens. We love to race. This is just a huge bonus.”
Keith Rocco won 21 races in 2010 at three Connecticut short tracks — Stafford, Waterford Speedbowl and Thompson International Speedway. Jeff is the crew chief at Stafford, while Shane Hopkins serves as the crew chief at Waterford; Rocco won both track championships.
Hopkins said that being crew chief for Keith Rocco, whose work ethic at the shop during the week is the only thing which rivals his ferocity on the track on race day, is different than it is for other drivers.
“Crew chief to me is like being the father of a big family. It’s making sure everything’s in place, dealing with the officials at the track, and when he’s on the track, making sure he knows everything that’s going on around him,” Hopkins said, likening it to being a manager. “That’s exactly what it is.”
Jeff Rocco sees an advantage in working with a sibling at the race track. Chemistry doesn’t need to be worked on because it already exists.
“I’d like to say there was a ‘moment,’ but there really wasn’t. The moment started when we were kids,” Jeff said. “We’ve been best friends our whole lives. If anything, that chemistry just built over time and got stronger and stronger over the years.
“Obviously, my brother’s my best friend. We talk five times a day. When you care about somebody, you want to see them succeed. You’re not on the payroll for somebody — it’s blood, it’s your brother. You want to do whatever you can.”
And wanting to do their very best for Keith Rocco made the way both Jeff Rocco and Hopkins approached the late summer all the more important. Three years running, it seemed Rocco was in the midst of the national championship picture, only to stall out as the dog days of August showed up on the calendar.
This year, they didn’t try and magical setups for new approach to the race day format. Instead, they let Keith Rocco re-stoke his competitive fire.
“This year, we had to find a way when that slump came to work our way through it — and we found it,” Hopkins said. “I think it was just as simple as (Keith) getting a little extra help and a little time off to re-charge his batteries. He picked up winning again, and we put it away.”
Jeff Rocco said his brother’s natural ability took over, too.
“He really is one of the most talented race car drivers I’ve ever seen. I’m not just saying that because he’s my brother,” Jeff Rocco said. “He’s fun to watch and you can ask anybody — he puts on a show.”
The show was all his on Friday night at the Crown Ballroom, too.
“To tell you the truth, I don’t know if it will ever sink in,” Jeff Rocco said of winning the national championship. “Just this whole deal, when you look at it — the amount of people in this ballroom tonight and the list of people that have won it, it’s all for my brother.
“He deserves it.”
PROUD FATHER: One other person who belives Keith Rocco deserves the limelight as the NASCAR Whelen All-American Series national champion is is father, Ronnie Rocco.
Ronnie Rocco beamed on Friday night.
“It’s unbelievable. It is,” Ronnie Rocco said, wondering if he’d ever thought he’d see this day. “I want to say yeah, but no, not really.
“I’ll tell you a story. When he was three years old, I bought him a jack. My in-laws said he was going to lose his fingers and his hands, and I said, ‘Let him go.’ And you see the rest. That’s it.”
Ronnie Rocco also told another story, a story asphalt Modified fans across the country will take notice of. Ronnie thinks of his son the way he thought of Richie Evans, owner of nine NASCAR Modified championships and title of “Greatest Modified Driver of All-Time.”
“When we used to race, we’d hurry up and go to the bar and wait for Richie Evans to come in just so we could get a glance of him,” Ronnie Rocco recalled. “We’d race the same track and be in the same race as him, but we still wanted to see him. My buddy called me up and said, ‘Hey remember when we used to go in the bar and we wanted to get to know Richie? Well, that’s your kid now.’
“I think that day it might have hit me what (Keith’s) done.”
NEXT STEP: In 2010, Craig Preble doubled his career win total in a season in which he thought he wouldn’t even be in a car full-time.
Preble, who competes at I-80 Speedway near his Nebraska home, was the national Whelen All-American Series runner-up to Rocco. And he watched Rocco’s coronation Friday and couldn’t help think about next year.
“I’m going to be a dad first,” Preble said of 2011, now that he’s the father of a baby boy that’s not yet a month old. “We’re going to race. The car owner wants to go after the (national) championship, obviously. We’re going to start out with this deal, and see where it goes. Like I said in my speech, ‘It’s a no-brainer.’ I’d like to be back here next year. I’d like to be in Keith’s shoes.”
But Preble is also rightfully proud of the year he just had. It included a 15-race stretch where he never finished out of the top two at the checkered flag. Running so well while competing at two tracks had its advantages.
“I’d say we were probably a little more confident that we could do it. But I wouldn’t say we were any better,” Preble said. “The rest of the teams were better at the end of the year. When it gets hot in the summer and the track slicked off and it wasn’t a hammer-down race track, that’s when we were good. A lot of guys struggle when the track is really slick, and that’s what we were waiting for.
“But the good thing was that when the season started and it was muddy it was slick, and that kind of suits my driving style. All the crew chief has to do is try and keep me from stepping on the gas pedal so hard.”
Not in 2011, as he tries to take the next step to national championship.
Sources: Travis Barrett, Special to NASCARHomeTracks.com