Daily NASCAR

Even though the top three NASCAR series were off on Sunday, there was no shortage of racing going on.  At Iowa Speedway, the annual East/West showdown between the two K&N Pro Series took place, and the ARCA cars descended on Toledo Speedway for the first of two events this season.  At Iowa, Joe Gibbs Racing development driver Max Gresham won his second straight race, beating Richard Childress’ grandson Ty Dillon to the line by .039 seconds.  In Toledo, Roush Fenway Racing development driver Chris Buescher outlasted Joey Coulter, and veterans Frank Kimmel, Ken Schrader and Matt Crafton to win his first ever ARCA race.

By winning at Iowa, Gresham added his name to a pretty impressive list of past winners of the dual series event.  Kyle Busch, Brian Ickler, and Joey Logano are all past winners.  Gresham is a rookie running for the championship this season in the K&N Pro Series East and he is also scheduled to make select starts in the ARCA Series.

Gresham, a 17 year old from Griffin, GA, was running Legends cars at Atlanta Motor Speedway and Charlotte Motor Speedway only 4 years ago, and is already a decorated racer.  After graduating to latemodels in 2007 , he finished fifth in the Georgia Asphalt Series points in 2008, and won two races last year in the ASA Southeast Tour.  With two K&N wins already this season, the future looks very bright.

Buescher took no time this weekend showing his competition that he was at Toledo to win.  His #17 Ford was fastest in practice on Saturday, and he followed that up by sitting on the pole before he led 126 of 200 laps in route to his first ARCA win.  The 17 year old driver from Prosper, TX won in just his ninth ARCA start, and had help from Cup Series driver David Ragan.  After running the Sprint Showdown on Saturday night in Charlotte, Ragan boarded a plane and flew to Toledo to spot for Buescher.

Also a graduate of Legends cars, Buescher ran a part time ARCA schedule last season for the Roulo Bros. Racing team.  In seven starts, he had one pole, three top five, and six top ten finishes.  He is running another partial ARCA schedule this season.  And if his last name looks familiar, it should.  Buescher is the cousin of current Truck Series driver James Buescher.

From time to time here at TNI we like to point out a few young drivers to keep your eye on.  Driver development is certainly in inexact science, but Buescher and Gresham might be two names you will be hearing for many years to come.  They are both showing right now that they have the talent to compete with the best.

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(Do you like the consonance?) From auto dealerships to Super Bowl XL, Roger Penske finds success in just about everything he does.

His Penske Automotive Group, with 253 dealerships, is the second largest auto dealer group in the world.

His Penske Truck Leasing manages more than 200,000 trucks around the world.

And Penske is a self-made billionaire. Forbes ranks him as the 773rd richest man in the world and 296th richest man in America.

In open wheel racing Penske’s teams have won 13 championships and gone to victory lane a total of 141 times, including 15 Indianapolis 500 wins. He is one of the most prolific owners in open wheel racing.

Despite his success in business and on that side of racing, in 27 years of fielding a car in NASCAR Penske hasn’t been able to push his teams across the threshold and become a championship winning owner (though he came very close in 1993 and has 62 race wins). That may soon change.

It was only a matter of time before the man affectionately known as ‘The Captain’ once again positioned his NASCAR team to be as consistently competitive as any other organization in the sport.

With the announcement last week that Shell/Pennzoil would join the team in 2011, Penske (the organization) showed their strength not just as a racing organization, but as a business entity. The team and the larger Penske Corporation is able to provide sponsors with so much more than just an on-track presence. With big sponsors in short supply, this type of thing is vital.

On track, the team has Kurt Busch (a championship winning veteran), Brad Keselowski (an eager rookie), Sam Hornish (a developing, championship winning race car driver), and strong prospects in Justin Allgaier, Parker Kilgerman and Dakoda Armstrong.

Armstrong, running full time in the ARCA Series, won his first race this past weekend. And Allgaier scored his first win at Bristol earlier this season and has shown marked improvement. To his credit, Parker Kilgerman was running well this past weekend before getting caught up in a wreck.

While there is still work to be done at Penske, they are well positioned for the future. They have veteran talent, great sponsors and the willingness to nurture the Penske stars of tomorrow. Those are all factors that could one day soon combine to give Roger Penske that elusive NASCAR championship.

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by Holly Cain

Filed under: Daytona Int’l Speedway, Nationwide Series, Danica Patrick

DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. — After a top-10 taste of stock car racing over the weekend, Danica Patrick has decided to accelerate her learning curve and will enter Saturday’s NASCAR Nationwide Series season-opener at Daytona International Speedway.

Patrick announced her decision Monday, two days after finishing sixth at Daytona in an 80-lap race in the ARCA Series, which is an entry-level, training series for many drivers. The Nationwide Series is NASCAR’s version of Triple-A baseball and a significant step up.

“Racing in the Nationwide Series race was my goal during this entire two-month preparation process,” Patrick said, “but we wanted to make sure it was the right thing to do.

“The ARCA race was a blast and I’m not ready for my first Daytona Speedweeks to end just yet. I want more racing.”

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As the Danica Patrick bandwagon steams toward the Daytona Nationwide Series race next weekend, don’t worry about saving me a seat just yet.  Finishing sixth in her first ever stock car event is commendable, but I think it’s a bit early to crown her the next big thing.

In case you missed it, Patrick recovered from a late race spin through the tri-oval grass at Daytona to finish sixth in her debut race in the ARCA Lucas Oil Slick Mist 200.  She kept her nose clean, didn’t give up, and brought home a car with all the fenders still on it.  Which in itself is quite an achievement in the ARCA Series.  But lets try and remember what she was up against.

Stop by Jayski’s story links page for February 7th and you will find no less then 15 articles about Danica’s debut.  Most of which contain quite a bit of praise for the 27 year old driver, some of which she deserves, and some she doesn’t.

Danica took on the ARCA Series at Daytona in an ARCA car powered by Hendrick and put together by JR Motorsports.  She had a veteran crew chief on the box (Tony Eury Jr.) and had a combination of JR Motorsports Nationwide Series guys and Hendrick Motorsports Cup guys working on and pitting her race car.  Not a bad way to start off a stock car career.

And not to knock the ARCA Series, as it’s a great place to gain valuable experience on bigger tracks, but this is the same series that David Stremme once won a race at Michigan by lapping the entire field once, and up to ninth place twice.

So before we crown her and heap a ton of ridiculous expectations on her, let’s allow her to run a few races and gain some experience against some tougher competition.   I think it’s only fair.

And just as a side note, I know there is a certain motorsports writer (ahem Jeff Gluck) who, before the season started, posed an interesting question and bet to his readers and Twitter followers.  He wanted to know who would outperform the other this season, John Wes Townley or Danica Patrick.  Give round one to Townley, who followed up a fourth place run in last year’s ARCA opener with a third place run this year.

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by Holly Cain

Filed under: Daytona Int’l Speedway, Danica Patrick

DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. — When Danica Patrick climbed out of the cockpit after ripping off her first two “real” laps of stock car competition, she was the pole-sitter for Saturday’s ARCA Series season-opener.

However, as the day went on, 11 other cars ended up bettering Patrick’s speed of 179.788 mph, so she will make her stock car debut from 12th position — the outside of the sixth row — in Saturday’s 80-lap race at Daytona International Speedway.

Defending race winner James Buescher will be the pole sitter after a lap of 181.543 mph.

It was a brief tease for Patrick’s fans and a strong statement to those that may underestimate her much-hyped foray into stock cars.

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