Nick Anglace thought he’d been an underdog long enough. So he reached out to the state’s top dogs.
“Everything I’ve done in my career to this point has been that underdog story,” he said, “where everything is home-built and going against these guys with big money and top-of-the-line stuff. So I really liked the idea of a Connecticut organization, like UConn, as big as they are and the name that they carry. They haven’t dabbled in motor sports, so I thought the story of a Connecticut kid, partnered with (UConn) going to take on these big people, would be a huge story.”
Anglace, 23, from Seymour, started racing go-karts in Berlin before he was 7, and has been driving at Connecticut tracks since 2018, following in the path of his father, Vinny, who competed in the 1990s and owns Anglace Racing Enterprises. Nick approached UConn with the relatively unique idea of a sponsorship arrangement between a local driver and a national brand.
Since the design was finalized in April, he has been driving a car sheathed in UConn colors, logos and other trappings throughout the season at Stafford Motor Speedway. Last Friday, after his crew spent a long day addressing a power steering issue, he sped to his third win of the season, which concludes Friday.
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From here, he hopes to move on to the NASCAR Xfinity Series or Craftsman Truck Series.
“We got three wins and eight podiums in 16 races,” Anglace said. “By far our best year. The overall fan engagement we’ve had is more than I ever could have dreamed. Since day one that we announced it, there has been a lot of positive feedback.”
It’s been a win-win for Anglace and UConn, which invested $25,000 from money set aside for marketing and advertising into the venture. Anglace, who has two UConn cars, has brought them out to football and soccer games, and hopes to get them to campus before some basketball games this season. There are also plans to involve the university’s engineering students and motor sports clubs with Anglace’s team.
“It’s no different from any other ad campaign,” said Kyle Muncy, director of brand partnerships and trademark management at UConn. “You buy a billboard, this one just happens to have four wheels and drive really fast. Nick is young, up and coming, ambitious. He was looking for, kind of a shot in the dark in terms of support. From our perspective, there’s a high, high visibility for UConn athletics, but it was as much an opportunity for us to get in at the foundational level with someone we think would have success, we think is going to be more successful in the future.
“It’s a really cool way for us to reach a different segment of folks who may have an affinity for UConn, but are not used to seeing us on Friday nights at Stafford.”
Once mutual interest was established, Anglace’s graphics team submitted designs for approval. Muncy, who watches over the trademark, assuring the right shade of blue is used, the logo is correct, and various other elements like web addresses are in place, signed off. The paint and vinyl was applied at Nick Anglace Racing’s shop in Wallingford, where his cars are built by his team of roughly 20 people.
What emerged is a white car, No. 10 on the roof and sides, uconnhuskies.com on the front fenders, all in blue, the Husky dog on the rear. There is a black version, with white trimmings. One is for SK Modified races, the other for Open Modified, with a little more horsepower. Anglace, who has played as UConn on video games since he was a kid, felt the pressure of being a Husky when he took to the track.
“It’s been really cool,” he said, “and I’d be lying if I said I didn’t feel immense pressure when we entered the year. You make this big announcement, and UConn is going to be on the car and knowing what the UConn name is in sports. I was like, ‘Dude, if we don’t win this year, I’m going to let down that whole name, so when we picked up our first win of the season, it was like an entire world was lifted off my shoulders.”
Anglace posted his first victory on July 25, his first at Stafford since 2021, and his second on Aug. 15. Last Friday, he passed Stephen Kalogiannis through the third and fourth turns on the final lap and won the 20-lap SK Light Modified feature race.
“We were having an issue with the power steering, occasionally it would be there, then it wouldn’t be there, it was a mess,” Anglace said. “At that point, you’re stuck with it and you have to just figure it out. If you turn your car off and try to turn the wheel? That’s how hard it was to turn the wheel in the race car. We just had to race with it and somehow ended up winning.”
After the season concludes Friday, Anglace will start to figure out what comes next, aiming to secure what’s needed to drive the UConn car at all the famous tracks in the country in 2026.
“For all of us, it’s not enough to simply think along conventional lines,” Muncy said. “‘Yeah, let’s put a billboard up, let’s put an ad in the paper.’ Nick has gotten a lot of attention with his successes, he’s humble and he’s grateful and I love that. I know how hard he’s worked at it and we’re excited to be along for the ride.”
Anglace says, maybe half joking, that being associated with UConn has really improved what used to be a “bad boy” image; he’s outspoken, had beaten some fan favorites, was given to ruffling feathers. Now? Young fans at UConn games are buying Anglace-related apparel, recognizing him and asking for pictures.
“When we go to games, and people come up, they don’t know what the car is,” Anglace said. “They come over and they’re like, ‘This thing is sick.’ Then you start to interact with fans and start to realize that what we do at Stafford is a lot bigger than I thought it was.”