Holyoke's Curran busy at Lime Rock

LAKEVILLE, Conn. (WWLP) - The Grand-Am racing series wrapped up its season on Friday & Saturday at Lime Rock Park in Lakeville, Connecticut. Holyoke's Eric Curran had a busy couple of days driving in 3 races on the tricky 1.53 mile road course. The road racing veteran teamed with Boris Said on Saturday in the Grand-Am Rolex Grand Touring race, behind the wheel of the #31 Whelen Corvette. They finished 7th in their class, 17th overall sharing the track with the Daytona Prototype cars. Saturday began with high hopes then after less than an hour of racing turned to heartbreak for Curran and Lawson Aschenbach in the Grand Sport event. The team came into the race contending for the championship, 3rd in the standings, 15 points behind. Aschenbach started the race but crashed their Camaro when he went off the track. He apparently came up the hill then hooked left into the guardrail doing extensive damage to the left side of the car. What started as a championship bid ended with a last place finish. Curran and teammate John Weisberg drove a Porsche Boxster to 8th place in Friday's 2 and a half hour Street Tuner race.

The #31 Grand-Am Rolex Grand Touring team is owned by 72 year old Ted Marsh from Old Lyme, Connecticut. Marsh is a veteran car owner familiar to NASCAR fans for his modifieds and Busch North cars that were wheeled by top drivers. NASCAR fans have also seen Boris Said race at Daytona and as a "road course ringer", but the Escondido, California driver carries a world class resume. Said has been the overall winner of the 24 Hours of Nurburgring in Germany, the 1st American to accomplish that feat. Marsh says Boris is "A great ambassador for the sport." Curran called Said "a superstar" and discussed his long time friend. He told 22News, "It's funny, Boris and I probably talk on the phone every day. I talk to Boris more than I talk to my girlfriend!" The 37 year old Curran grew up in South Deerfield and calls Lime Rock has home track. Said says LRP and Watkins Glen are his home tracks and he's a former instructor at the Skip Barber School at Lime Rock.

Pranks and practical jokes can be part of being teammates and friends. Curran told 22News he's one up on Boris at the moment: "The best thing was last week in California. I went to visit him at his dealership. I left a few minutes early and I waited for him on the highway. He didn't know what rental car I was driving. So he came up behind me and he went to pass me. I blocked him and blocked him and blocked him. He didn't know it was me and I thought he was going to run me off the road. Finally I pull up next to him and wave. So we do stuff like that all the time. It was his 50th birthday that day so I had to push on him a little bit. We do all sorts of stuff, some stuff we can't talk about. He's a good guy and we beat up on each other a lot. It's all in good fun."

For his part Said wouldn't elaborate about any specific prank he's pulled on Curran, but promised payback for the highway incident. He told 22News, "I've done plenty to him that I can't say on the air. He did get me pretty good on the highway last week so he's got one coming. Actually all the ones (pranks) with him had something to do with vulgarity and bad stuff, and he deserved it, let me just tell you that."

While Grand-Am will return to LRP for their season fianle on September 27th & 28th in 2013, there will be no NASCAR touring divisions at Lime Rock next year. Lime Rock President Skip Barber told 22News a NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour date is "A definite no for 2013." The last mod squad appearance at LRP was in 2011 and according to Barber, "The cars looked great here. I think the drivers liked it. We just didn't sell enough tickets. Unfortunately it's as simple as that. It was really tough. It wasn't close. It costs a lot of money, a lot more money to open the gates here than it does at an oval, just because the place is so big." NASCAR's Busch North Series used to conclude their season at LRP. But Barber isn't looking to bring what's now the NASCAR K&N Pro Series East back. Barber told 22News, "I think it really depends on the strength of the series." Barber cited what he sees as the erosion of Northeast fans' interest in K&N as it has changed to more of a driver development series. Barber had this final thought on the NASCAR Mods coming back to Lime Rock, "We get asked constantly about it. And if everyone who asked bought a ticket, we'd be fine."