Donny Turns Corner With #47 SK Mod, Finishes Second
Tour Race at Waterford up Next For #18 LMI Team
It hasn’t been an easy season for Donny Lia as he joined the SK Modified ranks at Stafford Motor Speedway with the #47 Wisk/Snuggle team. So far, 2005 has been a classic case of being in the wrong place at the wrong time.
But the team has been hard at work trying to make their own luck and their efforts were rewarded this weekend with a second-place finish to Lloyd Agor.
“We had a pretty good car tonight,” said Lia. We were just a tick too tight in the race. That final yellow came out and hurt us because I had Lloyd beat on the outside before that. He didn’t give an inch, but he gave enough to be fair. That was a good run.”
Most importantly, Lia and the #47 team might be on track for a turnaround to their season.
“This car is creeping up on us. We wrecked the other one and built this one. We had the other car
good, but this car needed something so different that it took us awhile to find out what it was. Now we’ve got it and I think that we’ll be getting better.”
“We’ve got the car working on the outside. We’ve been focusing on getting the car going up top. Usually I get up there and it’s too tight. We were just a little bit off to get into the lead on the outside.”
Lia takes almost no credit for the turnaround. He prefers to credit those around him at keeping everything progressing even when times were tough.
“I’ve got to hand it to these guys. These guys definitely don’t want to quit. Things aren’t easy when it’s something new. I’m new to these guys and the cars are new to me. It’s not as easy as it looks.”
Next up for Lia is another shot at victory lane in the Wisk/Snuggle car at Stafford on Friday night before heading to Waterford Speedbowl on Saturday for the NASCAR Whelen Modified Series event there. He’ll drive the #18 Lia Motorsports, Inc. car in that event and he’s looking forward to a tough race on a bullring track.
"It think that we are going to be good at Waterford. Our short track cars are real good right now. We ran well at Riverhead and if that had been 200 laps, I think we would have won that race."
So 2005 is turning around for Lia and he’s looking for some more great things.
“I got off to a slow start as a driver, but we’re getting there. This wasn’t easy coming. We should be good from here forward though.”
Later on in the evening, the #47 passes tech with flying colors after taking down second place.
