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NOTE:" Lime Rock will host an open test for all Whelen Modified teams on June 29. "

From the 5-14 Hartford Courant.com:

Auto Racing Notebook: Modifieds Prepare For Lime Rock
Whelen Series Makes Debut July 3
By SHAWN COURCHESNE,

" The roar of Whelen Modified Tour cars reverberated through the hills around Lime Rock Park on Tuesday when the track hosted four teams for a Hoosier Tire test in preparation for the division's debut on July 3 at the 1.53-mile road course.

The hope for many on hand for the test was that the sound of Modified motors isn't overtaken by that of crunching metal after the green flag falls on the division's first competition at the track.

"It's going to be chaos for the first couple laps," 2003 Whelen Modified Tour champion Todd Szegedy said, who competed at Lime Rock in sports cars in the mid-1990s. "I think it's going to be awesome. I've run here before, and the first few laps in any series is kind of cool because there's cars all over the place, there's cars going in the dirt, it just makes it a lot of fun."

Szegedy, from Ridgefield, Ted Christopher of Plainville, Rowan Pennink of Huntingdon Valley, Pa., and Bobby Santos III of Franklin, Mass., participated in the test.

Lime Rock will host an open test for all Whelen Modified teams on June 29.

"I think guys need to come here and do a little practicing if they can, so they can get used to downshifting and braking," Szegedy said. "That's going to be the big thing. I did it a bunch of times today, I overdrove the corner, braked too hard, locking wheels up, sliding off the track. So that's going to be a hard thing to get used to. But I think its going to be exciting. There will be cars all over the place. It should be pretty good racing."

The Lime Rock race will mark the first road course event on the Whelen Modified schedule since 2000. Since the division's inception in 1985, there have been six road course events, all at Watkins Glen, N.Y., from 1996-2000.

"I'll get goosebumps at the start," said Chad Little, the Whelen Modified Tour director and former Sprint Cup driver. "It's going to be really good. They all better use their heads going into the first corner. Road racing is a lot of give and take. They may need to do that on the first corner. I remember as a driver that one thing that's important is that a lot of times you've got to slow down to go faster, especially on a road course. The technical parts require that. You've got to slow down so you can carry your speed through the exit of the corner; that's where it's important."

In addition to researching the proper tire to use for the event, NASCAR officials also used the test to examine the best configuration for the cars at Lime Rock. In previous Modified tests at Lime Rock, the light-weight but horsepower-heavy cars struggled to keep from getting airborne at the crest of the track's uphill straight. In 2008, when the track was repaved, there were also optional corners added to the configuration. Using the new configuration allowed the cars to carry less speed into the crest of the hill and get over it cleanly.

Whelen Modified Tour team owner Bob Garbarino, who fields Santos' car, is not yet convinced that the division belongs at Lime Rock. Garbarino's team won events at Watkins Glen in 1997 and '98 with driver Tim Connolly.

"I really don't know how I feel about this right now," Garbarino said. "I guess I can say better after this race. The important thing is to have a good race. If we have a good race, then great, let's just hope we do.

"It's a different world for us here. We've run The Glen, and we were fortunate enough to win a couple shows at The Glen, but it's a different world. These cars were not made to do this. I think it's going to be a huge driver talent race. I think that's what's going to make the difference. I just don't know that we have the right racecars to be here."

Former Sprint Cup and Modified driver Brett Bodine, director of competition for NASCAR's research and development center, said if Lime Rock wants the Modified Tour, the division needs to be there.

"This is a regional touring series and there is road racing in their region," Bodine said. ". . . We've got racecars and we need to race them. I wish when I was racing Modifieds that I had the chance to do this. It would have made me better prepared further in my career. This is a developmental regional series and if you want to develop guys, this is where you need to be. They need to be running these kinds of places." "