Lia Takes His First Checkered Flag of Speedweeks

Monday Lia was at the nearby New Smyrna Speedway and won his first feature of the 2006 season in dominating fashion with his #18 NASCAR Modified.

Lia led every lap on the fourth night of Speedweeks competition at New Smyrna to cap off a busy couple of days for the Long Islander.

“We’re really happy to have won tonight,” said Lia. “We struggled a little bit on Friday night and we still have to get the tires figured out. The car was really loose all night but it’s great to get a win this early in Speedweeks.”

Lia started off his winning race day by setting fast time in qualifying. From the drop of the green flag Monday night, Lia knew that he had a car that was capable of winning, but it wasn’t going to be easy.

“The car was good for maybe the first two laps, but then it just got so loose that I was just trying to hang on to it. The car was all over the place.”

Even though it was difficult to keep control of his #18 car, Lia was still fast enough to stay at the head of the field. He had to withstand the pressure of Chuck Hossfeld throughout the race, especially on the many restarts, but nobody was touching Lia Monday night.

“Chuck ran me clean. He and I are good friends and we have fun racing each other. We keep it clean. I’m sure he probably could’ve taken care of me there at the end but he raced me how I would’ve raced him so I have to thank him for that.”

Lia’s win Monday night made it two wins in his last three races at New Smyrna. The Jericho, NY native won the Richie Evans Memorial 100 there to close out last year’s Speedweeks. This win, however, comes with the assistance of an all-new pit crew turning the wrenches on the LMI #18.

“This is a great track and it is fun to run with these guys down here. Plus I’ve got a new group of crew guys here and it’s a really good bunch. We’ve got Doug Chouinard calling the shots and everyone’s done a great job. We’re learning together and they’ve been busting their tails for a few days now so I’m really proud of them.”

There are still five more opportunities for Lia to take down even more Speedweeks victories. The NASCAR Tour-Type Modifieds race at New Smyrna every night until Saturday February 18. Lia will then return working on the modified in preparation for his 2006 NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour campaign while also preparing for his first ARCA start on April 15 at the Nashville Superspeedway for Hagans Racing in the Eagle Creek Aviation #9.