Browse > Home / Archive by category 'Robert Yates Racing'

NASCAR History: Car Number 36 and Ernie Irvan

User Avatar

by JamesJ, Special To NASCAR commentary and driver pictures, 2011 NASCAR schedule, video, Bench Racing With Steve and Charlie

Sundays of my youth consisted of NASCAR racing and cold bottles of Mountain Dew. Thirty years later not much has changed for me. However, nearly everything has changed in NASCAR.

January 9, 2010 7:00 am CST 2 Comments

Over the next several weeks we’ll be featuring car numbers in NASCAR history. We started with #50 and are working our way down the line. With each car number we’ll take a brief look at a couple stats related to the featured car number, but we’ll primarily spotlight either a driver, sponsor, car owner, manufacturer or other significant subject closely tied to the car number of the day.

NASCAR Driver Ernie IrvanToday’s subject closed out his career in the #36 car. While the stats he put up in the #36 car [Photo credit: Jayski.com] were not impressive when compared to earlier in his 13 year career, the fact that he was able to choose to walk away from the sport is a miracle in itself. Today, he uses his celebrity and NASCAR association to actually walk the tracks that he once competed on.

Stats for all cars running the #36:

  • Number of Races: 541
  • Number of Wins: 0
  • Number of Top 5s: 32
  • Number of Top 10s: 122
  • Number of Poles: 5

Check out current NASCAR race statistics here at On Pit Row!

Spotlight Subject: Spotlight Subject: Driver Ernie Irvan

The year is 1994. Ernie Irvan would start the year off with champion caliber form. He already had one Daytona 500 win to his record from his 1991 season with Morgan-McClure Motorsports, but he was looking to take another in 1994 with car owner Robert Yates. He would win the first Gatorade Twin 125 Qualifier races and then go on to lead 84 laps in the Daytona 500 and finish in second place. The Car owner Robert Yates and NASCAR Driver Ernie Irvanmargin of victory over Irvan was 0.19 seconds and was handed to him by Sterling Marlin in car #4 which was owned by Morgan-McClure Motorsports (the team from which Irvan went through lawsuits the year before to free himself from). But don’t think for a minute he was second guessing his decision to join Robert Yates Racing [Photo of Irvan & Yates: credit Jayski.com]. Ernie would keep the hammer down on the start of the 1994 Cup season with phenomenal finishes. In the first 13 races he would finish outside the top 7 only once (a 33rd at Bristold due to engine failure). His strength during just these first 13 races was impressive! Check out the stats!

  • 3 Wins
  • 4 Second Place Finishes
  • 10 Top Fives
  • 4 Poles
  • 1,408 Laps Led
  • 1 33rd place DNF, thus an avearge finish of 5.3

Ernie was truly giving his competitors “the business” on the track. However, his championship run came to a halt later in the season after a tire failure sent his car slamming into the wall at over 170mph at MIS (Michigan International Speedway). He would need to be air lifted to the hospital and was given only the slightest change of survival. His lungs were damaged and he sustained severe brain damage. Amazingly, he would recover and take the stage during the season’s awards banquet to accept the 1994 Hard Charger Award. He was a “hard charger” too! Not only as evidenced by his performance at the beginning of the 1994 season, but also by the fact that after his recovery he made a concentrated focus to return to Cup level competition. And he would succeed in doing so too! Once he returned for Cup events it would take him only a dozen races to once again sit on the pole, and only 7 additional races to take the checkered flag at Loudon. He would go on to win two more races during his career with his final Cup victory coming at the track where he nearly lost his life 3 years earlier.

NASCAR Driver Ernie IrvanA move to MB2 Motorsports came in 1998 as Ernie would continue his Cup career in the #36 Skittles car. His career would end with the team and the #36 after competing in 51 races. During his ride in the #36 he would add 3 poles and 16 top ten finishes to his stats. In an eerie twist of fate, exactly 5 years after his near fatal wreck at MIS, Ernie would once again crash at Michigan requiring him to once again be flown to the hospital and once again be diagnosed with lung and brain damage. Yet the “hard charger” would recover from this accident as well. After making his recovery though he would also call it quits on racing.

Having been given the chance at life, twice, after such harrowing and similar accidents, Ernie put his “hard charger” drive to work on a new focus, helping others who suffer from Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI). He started his own organization named Race2Safety that focuses on educating parents and their children about head injuries and how to prevent it with safety equipment such as bicycle helmets. In addition to this organizations work, he also helped in LAPS Walk events held at NASCAR tracks during race weekends. Participants were given the unique opportunity to walk on the racetrack along with NASCAR drivers and other celebrities.

It’s unfortunate that Ernie’s career was cut short. But it’s nice to know that he was able to take those terrible events, survive them, and then come out on the other side to try and help others. Ernie Irvan is a leader on and off the track.

Filed under: James Jones, Michigan International Speedway, NASCAR, NASCAR History, Robert Yates Racing 

Tagged with: , , , , ,

Digg This | Save to del.icio.us

Dale Jarrett vs Geoffrey Bodine: NASCAR’s 64 Greatest Drivers Match Up

User Avatar

by Charlie Turner

Thanks for stopping by OnPitRow.com and the Bench Racing with Steve and Charlie blog. The best NASCAR and IndyCar news and opinion, exclusive pictures and video. I'm Charlie Turner. Follow me on Twitter @onpitrow

March 20, 2009 1:11 pm CDT 6 Comments

Two members of successful NASCAR racing families square-off in this first round match of the NASCAR 64 Greatest Drivers Tournament at Bench Racing with Steve and Charlie.

Dale Jarrett started kind of slow. But once he got to Robert Yates Racing in 1995, D J’s career took off. He is the only driver to win the Daytona 500 and Brickyard 400 in the same year (1996) and also won the ‘93 and 2000 Daytona 500’s and the Brickyard in ‘99. In all, he won 32 times in 668 starts and was the 1999 Series champion.

Geoffrey Bodine is another of NASCAR’s 50 Greatest Drivers who made his early reputation in modifieds. He was Winston Cup Rookie of the Year in ‘82. Bodine was the winner of the ‘86 Daytona 500, and finished with 18 wins and 37 poles. He purchased the late Alan Kulwicki’s team in 1993 and went on to win three wins the following season.

How do you value a driver’s total body of work? It’s up to you. Leave us a comment.

Filed under: Dale Jarrett, Daytona 500, Indianapolis Motor Speedway, NASCAR, NASCAR 64 Greatest Driver Tourney, Nascar Legends, Robert Yates Racing 

Tagged with: , , , ,

Digg This | Save to del.icio.us

Fireball Roberts vs Ricky Rudd: NASCAR’s 64 Greatest Drivers Match Up

User Avatar

by Charlie Turner

Thanks for stopping by OnPitRow.com and the Bench Racing with Steve and Charlie blog. The best NASCAR and IndyCar news and opinion, exclusive pictures and video. I'm Charlie Turner. Follow me on Twitter @onpitrow

March 19, 2009 3:17 pm CDT 19 Comments

NASCAR’s first super star and its last truly successful owner-driver face off in a first round match up of our March Madness - NASCAR’s 64 Greatest Drivers Tournament at Bench Racing with Steve and Charlie.

Glen “Fireball” Roberts won 33 times in 207 starts. Roberts won the 1962 Daytona 500, had 93 top fives, 122 top tens and 32 career poles. He was nicknamed “Fireball” because he was a hard-throwing high school pitcher. Roberts died after an accident in the 1964 Coca-Cola 600.

Ricky Rudd drove for many of NASCAR’s legendary owners: Richard Childress, Bud Moore, Rick Hendrick, Robert Yates and the Wood Brothers. He hold the record for most consecutive starts, 788. Rudd had 23 wins, including the 1997 Brickyard 400, 29 poles and was runner up for the 1991 Cup Series Championship.

Tell us who you like in this showdown. Leave a comment. Which one of these great drivers - both selected members of NASCAR’s 50 greatest -  will move on to the round of 32?

Filed under: Bench Racing Contests, Daytona 500, NASCAR, NASCAR 64 Greatest Driver Tourney, Nascar Legends, Richard Childress Racing, Robert Yates Racing 

Tagged with: , , , , , , ,

Digg This | Save to del.icio.us

How To Fix NASCAR: 3. Three-Car Limit by the End of 2010

User Avatar

by Chris Leone, Special To NASCAR commentary and driver pictures, 2011 NASCAR schedule, video, Bench Racing With Steve and Charlie

I do weekly Fantasy Pick'Em columns here at OPR, as well as the occasional opinion and analysis piece. I also provide the IZOD IndyCar Series coverage. For more on that, head to my site, OpenWheelAmerica.com. My Twitter handle is @christopherlion.

December 31, 2008 10:57 pm CST 2 Comments

Happy New Year folks, and it’s time for another installment of How To Fix NASCAR. Having already trimmed schedules and fixed NASCAR’s top tier development series, it’s time to ensure that the top levels of American motorsport move away from the elitism of Formula One, by ironically implementing something that that series has had in place for years: a hard cap of three cars per team (per series, seeing as NASCAR has multiple levels and F1 has… well… one).

The issue with a team cap lies in owners’ willingness to undo some of the expansion they have done over the past few years, expansion that many of them (like Jack Roush) can surely sustain. However, the sport is heading more and more in an elitist direction, where the top four or five teams are lightyears ahead of everybody else (like McLaren and Ferrari in F1). That only hurts the sport in the end, by stealing sponsors away from the have-nots: either they’ll sign for fewer races and less money with the haves, or put their money elsewhere.

Roush is already dealing with the elimination of his fifth car, probably Jamie McMurray’s No. 26, by the end of 2009. However, almost all of the other major players in the sport (Hendrick, Childress, Gillett after the merger with Petty, EGR) will still have four cars as well. Joe Gibbs has three, Roger Penske has three, and even Doug Yates is planning on three cars for next season. That’s a total of 30 cars among eight teams. That gives the newcomer a snowball’s chance in hell at signing a good driver, crew, or sponsor.

To limit teams to two cars would be a disaster, and probably turn out just like F1, with Hendrick like the Ferrari team and Roush akin to McLaren. The superteams would be able to shift five cars’ worth of resources and money to the remaining two teams, and we’d see races where only four cars had a reasonable shot at winning. But to limit teams to three cars would provide a fair balance: sure, the rich would shift their incredible resources to make their few teams stronger, but the drivers and crewmembers they released would go to smaller teams and, in turn, make them more competitive.

Let’s use Roush as an example, and assume that they would keep David Ragan, Greg Biffle, and Carl Edwards. McMurray has been rumored to go to Yates in 2010 for a while anyway, but assumedly they would also send over Matt Kenseth in this situation. A Yates team with Kenseth, McMurray, and the steadily improving Paul Menard would have a much better shot at reclaiming the team’s past glory than Menard, Travis Kvapil, and David Gilliland. And with three fully sponsored cars, Roush could concentrate on building up the other struggling Ford team, the Wood Brothers‘ No. 21.

How about the other superpower of the sport, Hendrick Motorsports? Sure, you could say they wouldn’t suffer much, if only Mark Martin ended up leaving the team after 2009. But some other team could certainly use his leadership and skill, and you know he wouldn’t be unemployed for long. Neither would crew chief Alan Gustafson. I’m thinking they’d end up at Stewart Haas, personally - it’s already going to become Hendrick 2.

At RCR, I suppose getting rid of Casey Mears wouldn’t provide too much help to a smaller team, but at least it’d potentially reunite Clint Bowyer with Jack Daniel’s. (I’m sorry, General Mills, but I don’t think anyone sees Clint as a cereal guy.) The only question is, would Mears be any more than damaged goods? Assuming this were to happen, it would be his sixth team in seven years (Ganassi’s No. 41 in ‘05, the No. 42 in ‘06, Hendrick’s No. 25 in ‘07, the No. 5 in ‘08, RCR’s No. 07 in ‘09 and ‘10…). I suppose that at least it proves he’s a commodity, but the guy already has more firesuits in his closet than some teams have won races.

While this wouldn’t have much of an effect on the Camping World Truck Series, it would limit Nationwide Series owners to only running one car for the owners’ championship (see the last installment). Because running a car for the owners’ title would require a minimum of one unshared car to go alongside it, and no less, the three-car teams would have to run two cars for the drivers’ championship, opening up even more spots for development drivers to hone their skills.

So on and so forth down the line, very good (but not spectacular) drivers would be cut from the sport’s most prominent teams, landing on their feet with second-tier teams with much less talent behind the wheel. Those guys would then get bumped down to the third-tier teams, and so on and so forth. Not only would the guys who really don’t deserve their rides disappear, the driving talent, skilled crewmen, and the sponsors would disperse to level out the playing field.

Before anyone says anything: We all know that the only reason the sponsors all flock to the superteams is because current NASCAR rules don’t really limit where they can go. Roush can just create another team in Nationwide or CWTS if a new sponsor wants to join his operation, or sign them for a handful of races with Edwards or Kenseth. Under this system, those spots would vanish pretty quickly. Since many of the companies who want to get involved in racing do so because they feel that NASCAR fans are an important target market, those sponsors will stay in the sport. They’ll just find other teams to work with.

Of course, some of you are still probably asking, “How does this change anything if the top drivers would just go to their old teams’ satellite operations?” By adding a truckload of extra talent and sponsorship dollars to these satellite teams, they find themselves in a situation where they may no longer be so far behind their providers. With a little luck and some decent results, these teams will have the resources to break off and race on their own again.

That’s all for this installment. I’m going to go watch the New Year’s Eve TV specials. See you in two weeks!

Filed under: Earnhardt Ganassi Racing, Gillett Evernham Motorsports, Hendrick Motorsports, Joe Gibbs Racing, NASCAR, Penske Racing, Richard Childress Racing, Robert Yates Racing, Roush Racing, Sprint Cup Series, Stewart Haas Racing 

Tagged with:

Digg This | Save to del.icio.us

Quick Hits: Homestead-Miami Speedway

User Avatar

by Chris Leone, Special To NASCAR commentary and driver pictures, 2011 NASCAR schedule, video, Bench Racing With Steve and Charlie

I do weekly Fantasy Pick'Em columns here at OPR, as well as the occasional opinion and analysis piece. I also provide the IZOD IndyCar Series coverage. For more on that, head to my site, OpenWheelAmerica.com. My Twitter handle is @christopherlion.

November 12, 2008 11:28 pm CST 4 Comments

I think this is the first time in quite a while that, heading into the final race of the Sprint Cup season at the Homestead-Miami Speedway, we have no idea who the 40-plus full-time drivers for the 2009 season will be. Granted, back in the days before Jayski, when “silly season” wasn’t as prevalent as it is now, a lot of contracts were signed in NASCAR’s offseason. Yep, we used to have an offseason. Who knew?

30-plus teams have already set their drivers and schedules for next season. Most of these teams, and a few others, have secured sponsorship. However, a lot of teams face uncertain futures, and as I detailed last week, a good amount of cars may not be around next year.

That being said, plenty of companies are still interested in sponsoring Sprint Cup teams. It’s just a matter of matching up the right driver, team, and sponsor with one another. There are plenty of quality drivers out there waiting for a call from teams, and there are plenty of teams fishing for enough sponsorship to be competitive next year.

Allow me to do all the work for you, drivers, teams, and prospective sponsors. This week’s Quick Hits are five teams that would certainly make sense to appear on track next year:

5. No. 41 A.J. Allmendinger - Target Chevrolet, Earnhardt Ganassi Racing

This one’s not too much of a stretch, which is why it ranks fifth. Allmendinger is the best driver available, and the No. 41 is the best car available. Chip Ganassi likes taking risks on open wheel drivers (because, obviously, that’s where he does his best), and Target would certainly appreciate a young driver who’s shown promise as of late.

Allmendinger’s done well in the No. 10 at Gillett Evernham Motorsports the past few weeks, with three top-20 finishes. He’s only failed to complete four laps out of a possible 1476, showing that he can keep the car on the track. EGR (sounds unnatural, doesn’t it?) may be in a take-whatever-we-can-get mindset, but adding Allmendinger to its stable could prove a savvy move by the end of the season if he breaks out.

4. No. 28 Travis Kvapil - US Air Force/Hitachi Power Tools/K&N Filters Ford, Yates Racing

There have been rumors as of late that the Air Force is going to head to Yates after a long association with the Wood Brothers. If so, there’s no doubt in my mind that the sponsorship would go to Kvapil. Not only has Kvapil outperformed David Gilliland this year, his sponsorship status is far less certain - Gilliland has relationships with FreeCreditReport.com and CitiFinancial that should carry him through at least part of next season, financial crisis notwithstanding.

Yates wants to expand to three cars next year, the other belonging to Paul Menard, who brings his Menards family sponsorship to the table. They basically have Menard’s and Gilliland’s rides covered. It wouldn’t be surprising if Hitachi stuck around for next year, or if some of the team’s other one-race sponsors made more of a commitment next year.

3. No. 00 David Reutimann - Aaron’s Rent/Champion Mortgage/Dow Chemical Toyota, Michael Waltrip Racing

Reutimann’s earned his keep these past few weeks. He had a chance at winning his first race in Texas two weeks ago and qualified fourth last week at Phoenix. Aaron’s has already announced that they will be on the car for half the season, but that still leaves an 18-race hole to fill.

This year, Champion Mortgage sponsored the No. 00 for 12 races with Michael McDowell, two with Mike Skinner, one with Mike Bliss, and one with Allmendinger. Even if they don’t return, rumors have been floating that Dow Chemical will upgrade their associate sponsorship with the team. It’s unlikely that Champion would want to commit to 16 races again in this economic climate, but anything that they don’t pick up, Dow would probably fill. Reutimann’s going to be a star in Sprint Cup one day, and whoever can snap up space on his car would be smart to act now.

2. No. 21 Kyle Petty/Bill Elliott/Jon Wood/Patrick Carpentier - Wells Fargo/Motorcraft Ford, Wood Brothers Racing

So the Air Force might go to Yates. Big deal. If the team brings on Kyle Petty and his 12-race Wells Fargo sponsorship, that more than fills the commitment the Air Force made this season. The Woods claim that their sponsorship contracts are set for next season, with Ford and Motorcraft, but given the automaker’s plight, a backup plan would certainly help.

The question is more about who will drive the car than who will finance it, as has been for the past couple of years. Bill Elliott is open to running a few early-season races, but nothing more. Jon Wood’s been waiting in the wings for a while. However, the Woods are also high on Patrick Carpentier, who was unceremoniously dumped by GEM after an incident at Talladega with team director Mike Shiplett. A few decent performances with the Woods could be the necessary jump-start to make Carpentier’s NASCAR career as successful as his career in CART.

1. No. 22 Scott Riggs - State Water Heaters/Hunt Brothers Pizza/Bad Boy Mowers Toyota, Bill Davis Racing

Despite the past couple years, people need to remember that Riggs is a capable driver. He finished 20th in points in 2006 despite missing the Daytona 500. His poor 2007 was the result of completely wrong data at GEM, and the Haas CNC cars currently aren’t high-quality competitors. (Just you wait ‘till next year, though.)

Counting both starts and DNQ’s, the three aforementioned sponsors have combined for roughly 36 races this season over four cars - the Nos. 22 and 27 at BDR, and the Nos. 66 and 70 at Haas CNC. State and Hunt Bros. have both affirmed their desires to stay in the sport in 2009, after combining for just over 30 races in total this year. Both sponsors appear pleased with what Riggs has done this season, qualifying for almost every race. Bad Boy Mowers has adorned Davis Toyotas four times this season and could certainly fill out the schedule.

Finally, congratulations to Phoenix’s winners: Jimmie Johnson in Sprint Cup, Carl Edwards in Nationwide, and Kevin Harvick in the Truck Series.

Photo Credit: Icon Sports Media

Filed under: A J Allmendinger, Chip Ganassi Racing, David Reutimann, Earnhardt Ganassi Racing, Haas CNC Racing, NASCAR, Robert Yates Racing, Sprint Cup Series, The Pettys, The Wood Brothers 

Digg This | Save to del.icio.us

Quick Hits: Phoenix International Raceway

User Avatar

by Chris Leone, Special To NASCAR commentary and driver pictures, 2011 NASCAR schedule, video, Bench Racing With Steve and Charlie

I do weekly Fantasy Pick'Em columns here at OPR, as well as the occasional opinion and analysis piece. I also provide the IZOD IndyCar Series coverage. For more on that, head to my site, OpenWheelAmerica.com. My Twitter handle is @christopherlion.

November 5, 2008 10:39 pm CST 1 Comment

NASCAR’s Sprint Cup Series enters the second-to-last race of the season at Phoenix with many teams still unsure about their 2009 plans. In recent years, most teams have already set their lineups for the following season by this point. However, plenty of drivers are still searching for employment, and plenty of teams are still attempting to put together the right packages to allow them to go racing next year.

A good amount of the field still lacks sponsorship for 2009 and beyond, and even top-tier teams are feeling the crunch. Longtime stalwarts such as Dale Earnhardt Inc. and Chip Ganassi Racing are having problems inking long-term deals in a crumbling economy. Four cars between them next season is a possibility, despite the teams running seven this year. Even Hendrick Motorsports recently had a modest round of layoffs that sent Stevie Reeves, Jimmie Johnson’s spotter, packing.

At last count, 35 full-time Sprint Cup seats have been filled by drivers for next season (not including Max Papis’ limited schedule with Germain Racing). Of those 35, cars for David Reutimann, Aric Almirola, Reed Sorenson, Ryan Newman, Juan Montoya, Bobby Labonte, and Chad McCumbee have either partial sponsorship or none altogether. Assuming that two open seats with full sponsorship (the No. 21 at Wood Brothers Racing and the No. 41 at Chip Ganassi Racing) are filled, and assuming the worst in regards to all other unsettled teams, we could only see 36 full-time cars attempting the race at Daytona.

This week’s Quick Hits is, in effect, a premature analysis of cause of death for some cars that may not be around come February. Be prepared to say farewell to any of the following next year:

5. No. 28 or 38 Yates Racing Fords: Yates has full-time sponsorship for Paul Menard from his family’s hardware store chain for one car next season. While team owners Doug Yates and Max Jones have suggested that they will add a third car for Menard, rather than replace either Travis Kvapil or David Gilliland, the team cannot afford to patch together limited sponsorships as they have this year.

The two current drivers have combined to run eight races with blank cars, and the majority of the rest with very limited sponsorship. Had Ford not filled in some holes earlier this year, the team would have run 15 of 72 races unsponsored. With many of those companies probably not returning in 2009, the team may only have enough sponsorship for one of its current drivers next year.

4. No. 22 Bill Davis Racing Toyota: With rumors of a buyout by Gillett Evernham Motorsports at a standstill, not much is known of the fate of this team. Bill Davis has entered this car in NASCAR competition since 1993, and whether Maxwell House, MBNA, or Caterpillar was on the car, it has never been unsponsored. Davis has had these issues with other cars before, but never with its mainstay Cup team.

Right now, the team’s best hope is that Toyota decides to move up its sponsorship from the Truck Series to this car, but that’s iffy at best. If the team puts Michael Annett in the car, they may attract sponsors based on his raw talent and potential, but the deals might be similar in nature to what Yates has been doing this year. Those life-support deals won’t be enough to sustain a team for too long.

3. No. 96 Hall of Fame Racing Toyota: This is a team in disarray under a relatively new owner partnership. The team has no alliance with Joe Gibbs Racing and Toyota past this season, no bona fide driver (with Brad Coleman getting the shaft in most of the team’s recent deals), and less than a full season’s sponsorship from DLP HDTV.

Recent reports have had the team switching to Ford and partnering up with the Wood Brothers for 2009, reuniting the Woods with Ken Schrader, who currently drives the No. 96. The Woods claim that their sponsorship for 2009 is all set, meaning the two could collaborate on finding deals for the No. 96. Regardless, rest assured that without some sort of alliance, this team will not be around in 2009.

2. No. 77 Penske Racing Dodge: Rumors keep swirling that Sam Hornish Jr. is going to return to the IndyCar Series with Penske for 2009, possibly to replace Helio Castroneves, who is currently facing tax issues. Regardless of Penske’s potential need for its IRL team, however, the results haven’t been there. The best American open-wheel driver of this decade hasn’t been able to translate his skills to the heavier stock cars.

If Hornish stays, look for Mobil 1 to stay with him. Mobil has been a longtime Penske sponsor and had been looking to expand to a full-time primary for a couple years before Hornish’s arrival. If Hornish departs, however, they may replace Kodak on David Stremme’s No. 12 Dodge.

1. No. 01 and 15 Dale Earnhardt Inc. Chevrolets: No one can say they didn’t see this coming. The No. 01 has had minor partners at best all year, and the No. 15 has neither driver nor sponsor for 2009 with Menard’s departure. Regan Smith’s win (cough) at Talladega has drawn some interest, but most agree that Aric Almirola has more promise than Smith, and any sponsorship attracted would probably go there.

The team may be merging with Chip Ganassi Racing, which would afford Smith a shot at the No. 41, Almirola’s needs permitting. J.J. Yeley has also stated that $12 million in sponsorship would land him in one of those cars for next season, but given his underwhelming performance this year, it might be a longshot.

On a more positive note, however, congratulations to last week’s winners at Texas: Ron Hornaday, Kyle Busch, and Carl Edwards in the Truck, Nationwide, and Sprint Cup races, respectively.

Filed under: Bobby Labonte, Brad Coleman, Chip Ganassi Racing, Dale Earnhardt, Inc., Dave Blaney, Germain Racing, Gillett Evernham Motorsports, Hendrick Motorsports, J J Yeley, Jimmy Johnson, Joe Gibbs Racing, Kenny Shrader, Max Papis, NASCAR, NASCAR Rumors, Penske Racing, Reed Sorenson, Regan Smith, Robert Yates Racing, Ryan Newman, Sam Hornish Jr, Sprint Cup Series, The Wood Brothers 

Digg This | Save to del.icio.us

« Previous Articles

March Madness

Play the Rattles from the Catch Can contest

Blogroll

Fantasy Sports Partners

Racing Websites

ON PIT ROW at RaceTalkRadio
Backstretch Boys: 30% Off New CD!
Jayski's: See what the buzz is about.

We've got your game.

Advertisement