Zach Aszklar Riding Wave of Momentum Heading into Season Ending CARQUEST Fall Final Weekend at Stafford
Stafford Springs, CT — In the chase for a track championship, the pressure of having to finish in front of your rivals can sometimes be too much for a driver to overcome. But one driver who wasn’t fazed at all by the pressures of chasing a championship is Zach Aszklar in Stafford’s SK Light Modified division. After the August 31st event, Aszklar held a 12-point lead over both Tony Membrino, Jr. and Dylan Kopec. With only two races left before the season ending CARQUEST Fall Final feature event, Aszklar took down a win and a second place finish to accumulate 98 out of a possible 100 points in the final two races before the Fall Final to hold a 20 point lead over Membrino going into the last race of the season.
“We kind of planned on taking it easy, but I didn’t get stuck in as much traffic as we thought we would,” said Aszklar. “Last week, [Membrino] was racing me pretty clean, and I knew he was racing for the championship too, so I know he wasn’t going to do anything to wreck his car and we pushed the issue. We were satisfied with second but winning was a confidence builder for us and now we can go as far as 9 spots behind the 44 if we want to relax in the feature a little bit if we can’t quite make a move. It’s a bit more relieving where we are now.”
With a 20-point advantage heading into the final race, Aszklar knows exactly where he needs to be on track in order to clinch the championship. The 20-point cushion also gives Aszklar the option of either playing it conservatively or trying to go to the front and win in the final race.
“Next weekend will be a survival game, we need to finish,” said Aszklar. “If the 44 wins, we need to be at least 9th, which feels pretty good. I think we can pull off a top-10 as long as we get going. I’d like to say I’m going to be extra conservative, but it all depends on what happens in the race. If it’s clean and open, we’ll go for it. If there’s a lot of wrecks in front of me and if there’s been a lot of wrecks in the race, then we’ll try to take it easy.”
Aszklar was anything but conservative in the Lincoln Tech Final Friday Night Shoot-Out last week as raced side by side with Membrino for most of the race in a duel for the lead. Aszklar was able to make a pass for the lead on the last lap of the race, but with several restarts towards the end of the race, he says he was more concerned about getting into line rather than trying to go for the win.
“Last Friday night’s race was a lot of fun, but it was a bit tiring with having to start on the outside for 5 restarts,” said Aszklar. “I was more worried about getting down in line and protecting the bottom than going for the win. I wasn’t getting around [Membrino] on the outside, so the only way I was going by him was on the inside. I saw the white flag and I thought we’ll go for it. I gave him a little push going into 1, he went up and I got my wheel in there and it stuck, so I’d say we got lucky there.”
The race for the SK Light championship will conclude on Saturday, September 29th as part of the 40th Annual CARQUEST Fall Final festivities. Tickets for the Sept. 29th & Sept. 30th CARQUEST Fall Final Weekend are priced at $38.50 for adult general admission tickets, $5.00 for children ages 6-14, and children ages 5 and under are admitted free of charge when accompanied by an adult. Reserved seating will be priced at $42.00 for all ages. All CARQUEST Fall Final tickets are good for admission on both Saturday and Sunday. All ticket prices include 10% CT Admission Tax and Stafford Motor Speedway offers free parking with overnight parking available.
For more information on the 40th Annual CARQUEST Fall Final Weekend, or to order tickets, contact the Stafford Motor Speedway track office at 860-684-2783 or visit us on the web at www.staffordspeedway.com.
Sources: Scott Running/Stafford Motor Speedway PR