Talk:Whelen Modified Tour

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Contents

[edit] Team owners in list of champions

  • In the Modifieds more than in any other division except Cup, there is a strong history of team owners being notable within their sport. So I added a "Team Owner" field to the list-of-champs table when I drafted the article. Barno 00:39, 10 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] modifications/suggestions

I have a WiFi internet connection which is greatly affected by weather, and the weather is predicted to be questionable for the rest of the week, so I might not be able to look at this much.

What about the earlier championships? I've written quite a few articles where I remember adding the driver as a modified champion. Maybe a separate box to keep them separate from the 1985 and newer champions. More comments likely to follow.

Greg Sacks was a regular before the 1985 changes. I don't know if it makes sense to add him to the article.

The Whelen title sponsor change happened sometime after 2003.

Definitely list the Top 10 drivers instead of a link. They have earned such an honor. It highlights the best drivers in the series' history, which I think is important.

Too bad there isn't some "sizzle" to this article, for a nice tag line could make this article worthy of Did You Know. I just wrote an article on Sara Christian, and the tag line was "first woman to start a NASCAR race", and "only woman to have a Top 5 finish". I wonder if there's anything that with sizzle about Richie Evans being the 9 time champ. Do you think this has enough general interest: Did you know...

...that Richie Evans holds the record for the most NASCAR championships with nine Modified Tour championships?

You sure put together an excellent article! There's no way I could have produced something this good! Royalbroil 03:41, 10 May 2006 (UTC)

Agreed, this is an excellent job. Could you put in ROTY as well? --D-Day(Wouldn't you like to be a pepper too?) 11:29, 10 May 2006 (UTC)
YEA, good idea. I'll see what I can find. I'm amazed at how much I could find so many championships in google. It's ok if we only can find some. I did only some for the ASA (American Speed Association), and others slowly helped fill in the gaps. Royalbroil 11:44, 10 May 2006 (UTC)


It's been hard to find many ROTY. This is all I found so far (in an hour): 2004 Ken Barry, 2003 Donny Lia, 2002 Todd Szegedy, 2000 Michael Boehler. Royalbroil 12:42, 10 May 2006 (UTC)
  • I found 1990 and 1999-2004 ROTYs and added them. We still need the rest. Thank you both! Barno 19:32, 10 May 2006 (UTC)
The article reads nicely, I think its close to publication. One problem is that the ROTY are arranged backwards. I'm poor with tables, so I'll let you handle that one. Please verify that the x6 for Stefanik in 1998 & 1999 was the correct car number (I wasn't 100% on the car number). I wonder if the make of car is relevant, especially since there are so few found.
I think there needs to be a section that talks about some of the more famous drivers that raced prior to 1985, such as Richie Evans, Jerry Cook, etc. Upon further reflection, this article should definitely get nominated for Did You Know. I would like to see a tagline similar to what I wrote, so a statement for the chosen tagline should be included in the new paragraph. Royalbroil 01:34, 11 May 2006 (UTC)
  • (1) I reversed the order of the ROTY chart to match the past-champions lists in the Cup and Busch articles (and this one). (2) For this article, I agree that a snappy tagline will help, but I'm undecided. For instance, "... is the oldest series in stock car racing" is valid only if you consider Modifieds still to be "stock cars" like in the Sixties; today only the roof panel is from the street car, and the built-for-racing engine block is the only other GM/Ford/MoPar component. "... is NASCAR's oldest series" is valid and short, but might not be exciting enough. (3) For the Richie Evans article, only one of his NASCAR Modified championships was "Modified Tour"; the rest weren't Tour/Series in format. (4) Yes, the Beal & Bacon car that won two titles was numbered x6. (5) Thanks for rounding up the photos and logo, and tagging them with appropriate license/credit information! Barno 04:28, 11 May 2006 (UTC)
  • (6) We should be able to get recent years' manufacturer info from contemporary press releases. Mod Series Scene has archives from 1999 forward, and we can Google for others. Banquet press releases should give champs' number of wins where that's missing. (7) Since sometime when bodies were Cavalier/J2000, media accounts list just the make but not the model. I'm retitling that header in the champions table. Barno 04:33, 11 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Wayne Anderson

  • I de-linked the link from Wayne Anderson to the Wayne Anderson article, because the Florida driver (who has run CASCAR, various late models, and occasional shots at NASCAR's higher series) is not the same as the Long Island driver who has run modifieds. Eventually we should write a second article and add a disambiguation page. Barno 19:40, 10 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Another source

I was erasing the thoughts to create link for this article off my userpage when I found a link that I had pasted there from http://www.petesracingsite.com/. The website must have just been pulled down. I went to archive.org to, and found the image of the website from March 2006. The website looks to be a very good resource for this article. You can go to the archive by clicking here.

I also remembering finding free use photos under some U.S. Military website (a military member was a modified racecar driver), so please don't upload this article until I find the photo. Royalbroil 02:46, 11 May 2006 (UTC)

  • Agreed. Thanks again. I think there should be a separate Modifieds article for the pre-Tour days, with the 1947-84 NASCAR champs, and deeper history than what I included here. Until we have a lot ready, we could put some of that content into this article, keeping it in separate sections that we can detach and move easily. Barno 03:45, 11 May 2006 (UTC)


I uploaded an image that appears to be a NASCAR modified to me, and there is no description on the website. I think I see Featherlite on the race trailer. Do you think it is a national NASCAR modified? A NASCAR modified looks quite a bit like an IMCA/UMP modified, and I don't know the distinguishing characteristics. I couldn't find any of the images that I was looking for, so I found this one with a google search on .mil websites.
Do you think there's enough information for a separate article for pre-1985? Is that information available via the web or some other source (say your book)? I strongly agree to keep the pre-1985 and 1985+ portions separate for potential future separation. What might the article names be?
Another thing, I think the article should be named "Whelen Modified Tour" instead of "NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour" so that authors can link up to both NASCAR and Whelen Modified Tour. Any comments? Royalbroil 04:40, 11 May 2006 (UTC)


  • (1) The orange car is definitely a NASCAR-type modified, not an IMCA/UMP one, but I don't recognize it. I suspect it's a southern car (NASCAR Whelen Southern Modified Tour or SMART). Did the .mil site have a driver name for it? (2) We will have to dig for documentation, but we can eventually find enough to make the pre-Tour article better than this one currently is. "NASCAR Modifieds" is probably a sufficient name for the 1948-84 article, as anything with the years or "pre-Tour" in the title won't be a likely search string. (3) The series' formal name includes NASCAR at the start. At least it's better than when they insisted on "Featherlite Modified Series, NASCAR Touring" in every press release. Let's keep thinking about whether to remove "NASCAR" from this article's title... maybe we should. I won't move it to article-space until at least tonight, after reviewing titles of other NASCAR series. Barno 15:03, 11 May 2006 (UTC)
The military base is in New York, so it most likely from the Northern. Who cares. It should represent the series in anyhow. The photo is from an image gallery that lists no details about any of the images. Royalbroil 02:08, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] NASCAR Media Guide

  • The only source I expect we'll be able to use for the Earnings column of the past-champs chart is the annual NASCAR Media Guide. Unfortunately, my newest copy is 1978. I'm going to try to post a request on a messageboard or two, hoping to get help from someone with a copy. Barno 14:52, 11 May 2006 (UTC)
  • For now I've removed the Earnings column. If we get this information we can re-add the column and information, but I'm guessing it won't happen soon. Barno 22:33, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] last changes before "publication": photos, article title

  • I removed the 1966 photo from Golden Gate because those appear more like "modified late models" than the prevailing type of Modifieds at any time. We should add a couple of historical photos, perhaps one from about 1950 (cut fenders, truck wheels); one from about 1970 (coupe/coach bodies on other chassis, 18-inch slicks); and one from about 1980 (Pinto/Vega bodies). Barno 22:41, 12 May 2006 (UTC)
  • I kept the Lakehurst photo (since it is representative of the current cars in appearance) until we get one that can be better identified. Barno 22:41, 12 May 2006 (UTC)
  • I'm going to move this into article space this evening, removing "NASCAR" from the title to be consistent with the current versions of NEXTEL Cup and Busch Series. I don't think it's ready for "Did You Know" yet, but once it's in article space, we'll get more people helping improve it. Barno 22:41, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Requested move

Speedy Move - this was our intention as we wrote it. We had discussed listing the article for DYK, so time is essential. Royalbroil 14:14, 13 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] postwar non-stock cars

I removed the USAC mention from the postwar Sprint and Midget classes, because they were under AAA sanction until that organization's exit from motorsports after the 1955 disaster at Le Mans. USAC took over those classes' national sanctioning in 1956. Barno 13:14, 15 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] DYK

Did You Know An entry from Whelen Modified Tour appeared on Wikipedia's Main Page in the Did you know? column on May 19, 2006.
Wikipedia

(technically this should not have qualified, it went live on the 12th and was mislisted as newer. The date is the date it goes live, not the day of nom. But no worries, it's a fascinating article...++Lar: t/c 02:34, 20 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Rookie of the Year history

I have a copy of the media guide, and its "Series Firsts" section lists "First Rookie of the Year: Dave Pecko (1999)". The table in this article had Renee Dupuis listed for 1996 and Charlie Rudolph listed for 1990. Both of those seem plausible but I'm not sure whether RotY's were given before the guide says. Can the editor(s) who added those listings show some documentation such as media mentions, or were these "unofficial titles" that eager fans added as if official? I removed the pre-'99 lines but we can add them back in if the earlier awards were considered "real", rather than just some columnist's opinion. Barno 23:23, 3 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] A seperate article for Modifieds.

I was just wondering if it would be a good idea to make an article on the Modified cars themselves. Both the Dirt and Asphault ones as well as the IMCA style modifieds as well as many other styles of these cars. It would be an article on all the styles of these cars, not just the two NASCAR tours that this and the southern tour article are about. I dont know how to create an article and stuff like that, but I can get all kinds of info and pix for these style of racecars. Fisha695 03:34, 9 July 2007 (UTC)

  • Yes, eventually we should create at least two more articles: One on dirt Modifieds (and their evolution into DirtCar full-modifieds and IMCA limited-modifieds), and one breaking out the current "history of the NASCAR Modified division" section into an article on asphalt Modifieds. To do this we will need more sources that feature the histories of those parts of the sport and describe some of the technical aspects. All I have at present are some individual articles from Stock Car Racing over the years. It would be good to have a couple of books. Some of the racing-history books from New England publishers might be helpful here. If you have photos that you took, it might be useful to post them to the Wikicommons tagged as released under the GFDL, and to list them here or on the talkpage for one of the racing WikiProjects. Barno 20:18, 9 July 2007 (UTC)