Moran Enjoying Second Title, Looking Forward to 2015
Phil Moran of Naugatuck, CT has spent his life in racing. For Moran, the second championship is “a little more special,” Moran said. “…This is our team as far as me concerned I’m the team manager, truck driver, the whole nine yards.”
11 years ago, Moran won his first championship with Todd Szegedy of Ridgefield, CT driving for Don Barker. The team had a lot of technical support from Chassis Dynamics.
Moran did not get to celebrate as much as he wanted at Thompson since he had to drive the transporter. Besides getting ready for the World Series, he has been busy building new cars for next season and NASCAR’s commitments as the championship team. He expects it to hit him during the celebration in Charlotte Saturday. The NASCAR Night of Champions honors the regional touring series. He especially wants to bring the championship trophy back to the shop.
It is first championship for Mike Smeriglio, III, owner of the Dunleavy’s Repair/HEX Performance No. 2 on the NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour. Driver Doug Coby of Milford, CT claimed his second title in the last three years.
“It was a well thought out move when we did it last year and it worked out for the good. It was a really good year.”
The MSR team parted ways with Szegedy in November 2013. 2012 champion and 2013 runner-up Doug Coby was available as his car owner Wayne Darling was unable to field his own No. 52 full-time. Some of the team members from the No. 52 joined Coby on the new team. Championship expectations were placed on Coby and his new team.
“It was good to live to everybody’s expectations, let’s just say. We worked hard at it. We had a great crew this year. The guys in the shop, the guys at the track, everybody was just awesome. … We were fortunate enough to get those guys (from the 52 team). Most of them were over the wall guys and really good mechanics and it helped out a ton. Our pit stops were good this year.”
The team completed every lap until the season finale at Thompson, when Coby suffered a flat tire. “That just shows a lot about the dedication and the well spent time that everybody works on the car.”
Moran said he “knew it was going to work” the day Coby visited the shop after confirming he would drive the car.
“I realized then that we were both on the same page and things were going to work out really well. And he’s a very smart kid. He runs a great business that he works in full-time as his livelihood and he takes his approach to racing the same way that he takes his approach to his work, so it made my life quite a bit easier because he is such a professional at it.”
The team in recent years has changed chassis from Chassis Dynamics to Troyer. The team tried new things on the car including brakes and shocks.
“Every change that we made was a good thing. Like I said, you’re always looking to go faster, so sometimes it takes change to go faster. If you’re doing the same thing, you’re not making yourself any better … This year everything came together.”
The combination gelled quickly with a victory at Daytona in February. The team visited New Smyrna (FL) Speedway as well, where Coby finished fifth after starting last in the 100 lap race. Coby opened the points season with a pair of podiums at Thompson and Stafford.
“It was just the consistency that we had week in and week out. ….And people knowing at that point ‘Hey these guys are here for real.'”
The third race at Stafford in June, saw the former track champion prevail. Coby led all but eight laps in the TSI Harley-Davidson 125.
“You’re not frustrated when you’re finishing in the top five every week. It wasn’t really frustrating (waiting for the first win) getting that win at Stafford.”
The team had to overcome adversity at both Loudon races. In the first race, the team discovered a leaking right front shock while they were gridding the car. Since the race was an impound race, changing the shock would penalize the team two laps. Coby persevered for the first 50 laps until the halfway break. Alex, one of the crew members that came over from the No. 52, switched a new shock and spring setup to fix the handling.
“It just showed that everybody kept their head cool, Doug in the seat, me on top of the box, the spotter, and we ran in the top 10 all day.” The team improved to finish second.
Coby spun out in the September race, and hit the wall after contact with Cole Powell. Ryan Newman ” body slammed us there one good ones and got us out sideways pretty good. … Everybody getting together and fixing the car and making sure its 100 percent right. To come back and finish third, it just shows what this team is all about.”
When asked what makes Coby so good, Moran emphasized his driver’s car control.
“He just knows car control really, really well. He’s very stubborn when it comes to getting the car the way that he wants it to feel for the race. During practice and stuff, usually if we go right out of the box and the car feels really good to him and the lap times are fast, we’ll still be working on the car because … he knows the feel that he wants and until he gets that feel he’s not happy. … But once we get him that feel, it’s 110 percent, and it showed this year.”
The team struggled throughout the Waterford race in June. Both the team and driver have run well at the shoreline 3/8 mile oval before.
“We kept working with each other and talking and we finally got into the race where the car was really, really good and we were coming up through the pack and got tangled up a little bit. Had to go back to the back and drove himself back up to sixth place, so he’s just a very smart driver. He doesn’t put the car into trouble. If the car’s a third place or a fourth place car, that’s where he’ll settle in and anything above that will be a bonus. But he gets 100 percent of the car every time he’s in it, so that’s always a big plus.”
Smeriglio has fielded cars on the circuit since 2006 and won double digit races. This week will be his opportunity to savor his first championship.
“Mike (Smeriglio) has for years put his heart and soul into this division. He’s won the sportsmanship award, so his dedication to the series is really good, and now to be able to next week take him down and put him up on the stage as the championship owner. That’s probably going to be more special than anything else in this whole deal for me.”
The team will be making another change for next season from Troyer to LFR Chassis.
“I’ve known Robbie Fuller from LFR chassis for quite a few years now. I’ve built him some cars, helped him out for quite a while and he’s a smart guy. He’s been down south a lot of his life. He moved back up to Massachusetts a couple of years ago and I helped him out quite a bit with his racing when I could and we’ve always talked about this LFR chassis, and he sucked it up last year and built some cars and I saw a lot of promise in the cars.
“If I was going to build a car myself, if I had the time and everything to build it myself, an LFR car is what I would built and that’s going to be a big plus for next year. Really looking forward to it, the support of LFR with Robbie. As everybody knows, Todd ran one this year at Loudon and Thompson and the car had great success. It was fast every week that it hit the racetrack, so I’m looking forward to putting our team together with the LFR and really shining with it.”
Coby will return to defend his title next season in Smeriglio’s car. Sponsors Dunleavy’s Truck and Trailer Repair, HEX Performance and FOX Shocks are also on board.
“They’re coming back with us, hopefully stepping it up a little bit more this year. We introduced ’em to the Modifieds this year and had some really great success with it, and they’re a small startup company and it was really great that they were able to see results from advertising with the Whelen Modified Tour … Hopefully we’ll roll right out of the box next year at Thompson and be a threat and people will be nervous when we unload it.”
Moran is excited about the possibly expanded schedule that may come when the 2015 schedule is announced. Rumors have the series going to upstate New York to Airborne Speedway in Plattsburgh or Shangri-La II in Tioga Center. Chemung Speedrome and Spencer Speedway last held series races in 2008 and 2009. For next season, Bristol will host one race. Riverhead has announced two races, Stafford four races, and Thompson four races.
“It’s nice to go to Loudon, it’s nice to go to Bristol, but it’s nice to go to Holland and it’s nice to go to Spencer and places like that, so I’m hoping that these tracks can get together with NASCAR and we can have a really good schedule.”
“14 races is for a lot of teams it’s just right as far as finances and stuff like that, but a lot of people cry ‘Oh they’re going to add more races. It’s going to cost more.’ But it’s also the opportunity to make more money, so hopefully with some of these new tracks coming in, if there are new tracks. We don’t know yet until the schedule is released, but it’s always a challenge to go to new track. Hopefully it’s a new, new track or something that we haven’t run in a lot of years like we did at Monadnock. Going back to Monadnock after (20) years of not going there, it was pretty cool to have us back there.
“There’s a lot of tracks up in upstate New York I hope that come back. Shangri La II, which is a beautiful racetrack, that new place up there. I know there’s rumors going around that we may have a show up there. So I’m looking forward to it. I’d love to see an 18 race schedule ’cause that keeps your blood flowing all summer instead of having three or four weeks off and then race a race and then have two weeks off. I’d rather keep on going weekly. (It) would be the coolest thing.”
Moran, 55, grew up around racing at the age of 10-12 next to hall of famer Art Barry of Preston, CT. He has been working full-time in racing since 1985. He began with Barry when the famed No. 21 was a part of the weekly NASCAR Modified competition at Stafford (CT) Motor Speedway.
“I learned a lot from Art Barry. He taught me everything I knew about racing, everything I know now. As everybody knows, Art is such a meticulous person, and learning how to do that from him was a big thing.”
He left the team in the “last part” of the 1990 season to work for Charlie Pasteryak. He joined Don Barker’s team in 2003. Moran worked for five years in the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series to “see what the big Cup world was all about,” before moving back north again. Moran joined Mike Smeriglio’s Modified operation and wants to end his career with Smeriglio.
“I plan on doing this until they have to wheel me around in a wheelchair, and if I can still turn a wrench, I’ll do it then too.”
The team’s shop is located in Newtown, where the Sandy Hook Elementary School tragedy took place two years ago next week. The team ran a ‘We are Newtown’ decal on their car last season and it still adorns the transporter.
” We try to do things for the community that helps out the kids. We have done several car shows. They had a couple up here in town at the park up in town where we’ve brought the cars out and the kids have been able to come up and sit in the cars and look at cars and ask the driver questions, and anything you can do to help out the kids. They’re the ones that sit in the stands a lot too, so to help ’em out is a big thing.”
Moran enjoys the questions from the young race fans as well.
“The adults always ask how much horsepower or how fast it will go. The kids are always like ‘Is this anything like my Xbox game or anything like that?’ They ask good questions. They’re a ball.”
Sources: Nicholas Teto/YankeeRacer.com