Congrats to Christopher Bell and the entire #20 Rheem® Racing Team on an amazing Top 3 finish in the 2022 season championship. Here’s to a successful 2023. Whether it’s Christopher on the track, or our products delivering quick installations and rapid energy savings in homes and businesses everywhere, at Rheem, fast runs in the family.
Following a solid freshman campaign in the NAS CAR Cup Series, Justin Haley is settled in with the No. 31 Kaulig Racing team. Always smiling and hav ing a good time, the Indiana native is ready for the challenge that awaits during his sophomore season at NASCAR’s premier level.
The 23-year-old racer shined in the Xfinity Se ries and expectations are high for this young team. Haley won his first Cup Series race at just 20 years old, driving the No. 77 car for Spire Motorsports in a rain-shortened race at Daytona.
Now, it’s time to get to know Haley off the track.
BY JOSEPH WOLKINI HAVE JASON
Leffler’s first Xfinity Series win fire suit, which was also Toyota’s first NASCAR win. Definitely, a cool talking piece.
MY FAVORITE movie that I’ve seen recently is probably “Interstellar.” Great movie and a ton of great actors in it.
I’M AN EXTREMELY healthy person and believe firmly in putting only the most necessary foods into your body. Usually, anything organic and healthy is what you’ll find me eating.
CELSIUS, OF course! The flavor always changes, but my go-to has to be the peach vibe.
MY FAVORITE restaurant would have to be Pisces in Mooresville, North Carolina. I like to go there once a week and order my usual, which is actually not even on the menu. It’s called the flaming
WHO WOULD PLAY YOU IN A NASCAR MOVIE?
JUSTIN HARTLEY – because our names are similar, and I think it would be funny to see people try and figure that out.
Dirty Mo Media, the multimedia content platform of NASCAR Hall of Famer Dale Earnhardt Jr., has signed Denny Hamlin to a podcast deal that will give listeners an unfiltered, honest and bold perspective from one of NASCAR’s top athletes and businessmen.
“Actions Detrimental with Denny Hamlin” debuted Feb. 6 with new episodes dropping weekly during the NASCAR season.
Hamlin is joined by co-host, friend and
brand team member Jared Allen as the duo unpacks the previous race and pivots toward the next adventure on the schedule.
“I am approaching podcasting the way I approach everything else – I want to win,” said Hamlin. “Winning in this sense will be measured on whether I can become a dependable resource for NASCAR fans. That’s my goal. I want to connect with fans, even those who cheer for other drivers.”
NETSPEND, A LEADING provider of payments and financial solutions for consumers and businesses, will sponsor two-time NASCAR Cup Series champion Kyle Busch and the No. 8 Richard Childress Racing team this season.
“Both Richard Childress Racing and Kyle Busch are living out their dreams every day, having won multiple championships and some of the most prestigious races in motorsports,” said Kelley Knutson, president of Netspend. “We’re looking forward to seeing the No. 8 Netspend Chevy on race tracks across America and delivering our key marketing and business objectives through this unique platform with the RCR team partnership.”
RACING WILL RETURN TO Martinsville Speedway April 14-16 with three days of NASCAR action.
Until then, the “stripe” in Turns 3 and 4, put there last fall by Ross Chastain’s incredible move, will remain for fans who want to stop by the track and see where the milestone moment took place.
“It’s going to stay up until race week in April,” track president Clay Campbell told the Martinsville Bulletin.
“We’ve got so many people stopping by here, taking pictures. It’s an historical moment, and we’re going to do our best to preserve it all that we can.”
CABO WABO TEQUILA HAS been named the first Official Tequila Sponsor of NASCAR. As part of a wide-ranging, multi-year agreement, the brand will also serve as the Official Tequila of Daytona International Speedway, Kansas Speedway, Michigan International Speedway and Talladega Superspeedway.
Cabo Wabo is all about living, working and playing hard. That’s why it is giving fans 21 and older a new way to level up their racewatching experience. The Cabo Wabo Smokeshow combines the bold flavors of Cabo Wabo Blanco Tequila with smokiness of Montelobos Espadin Mezcal and is served over ice with a lime wheel garnish.
NASCAR AND REV RACING introduced the next generation of drivers participating in the NASCAR Drive for Diversity Driver Development Program. Eight drivers were selected to the newest class after participating in the Advance Auto Parts Drive for Diversity Combine.
The 2023 class features the following drivers:
■ Andrés Pérez de Lara (Mexico City, Mexico) / ARCA Menards Series
■ Lavar Scott (Carney’s Pointe, N.J.) / ARCA Menards Series East
■ Justin Campbell (Griffin, Ga.) / NASCAR Advance Auto Parts Weekly Series Late Model
■ Jaiden Reyna (Cornelius, N.C.) / NASCAR Advance Auto Parts Weekly Series Late Model
■ Paige Rogers (Fort Wayne, Ind.) / NASCAR Advance Auto Parts Weekly Series Late Model
■ Caleb Johnson (Denver, Co.) / INEX Legend Car Series
■ Nathan Lyons (Concord, N.C.) / INEX Legend Car Series
■ Eloy Sebastián López Falcón (Oaxaca, Mexico,) / INEX Legend Car Series
THE NASCAR HALL OF FAME WELCOMED A FORMIDABLE CHAMPION of the stock car racing’s premier division, one of the NASCAR Cup Series’ most successful modern-era crew chiefs and a driver who competed in NASCAR events during seven different decades as the Hall of Fame Class of 2023.
Matt Kenseth, the 2003 NASCAR Cup Series champion; Kirk Shelmerdine, who guided Dale Earnhardt to four Cup Series titles; and Hershel McGriff, who won four Cup Series races in 1954 and competed in NASCAR racing in 2018 at age 90 were inducted into the Hall of Fame on Jan. 20.
In addition, NASCAR Vice Chairman Mike Helton, a fixture in the sport for nearly five decades, was honored with the Landmark Award for Outstanding Contributions to NASCAR.
In 18 full-time seasons at NASCAR’s highest level, Kenseth won 39 races, tied with Hall of Famer Tim Flock for 21st all time. Driving for team owner and Hall of Famer Jack Roush, Kenseth was the last champion of the Winston Cup era.
Shelmerdine’s star shone brightly during a relatively short tenure as a toplevel crew chief. After a three-year stint with driver James Hylton, Shelmerdine moved to Richard Childress Racing. In 1983, at age 25, he got his first Cup Series victory – and the first-victory for Childress – with driver Ricky Rudd on the road course in Riverside, Calif.
The following year, Shelmerdine was paired with the driver who would help to define his career. With driver Dale Earnhardt at RCR, Shelmerdine won twice in 1984, four times in 1985 and five times in his first championship season of 1986. Three more championships with Earnhardt would follow – in 1987, 1990 and 1991.
McGriff’s storied NASCAR career began in 1950 when he raced his own car in the Southern 500 at newly built Darlington Raceway.
That was the first of 87 NASCAR Cup Series starts and the first chapter in a stock car racing tenure that wouldn’t end until 2018 (for the time being), when McGriff made the last of his 271 NASCAR ARCA Menards Series West starts at Tucson Speedway – at age 90, as the oldest driver to race in NASCAR-sanctioned competition.
Helton has earned universal respect as a larger-than-life figure in the NASCAR garage. In a racing career that started with a stint as public relations director at Atlanta Motor Speedway, Helton advanced to the role of NASCAR president in 2000 – as the first person outside the France family to hold that position.
As part of the ceremonies, the late T. Taylor Warren became the first photojournalist honored with the Squier-Hall Award for NASCAR Media Excellence. — NASCAR Newswire
BY JOSEPH WOLKIN
Brayton Laster may not be a name with which NASCAR fans are familiar, but that will change sooner rather than later.
Laster, better known as the “Pizza Man,” is set to start the season on opening day at Daytona International Speedway, wheeling the No. 03 ARCA Menards Series car for Mullins Racing.
As does any racer, Laster has his sights set on advancing through the NASCAR series over the next five years. His ultimate goal is to race on Sundays with his idols and mentors, but if that does not happen, Laster says he will always be grateful for the opportunities he has been given, the places those opportunities have taken him and the people he has met along the way who have become like family.
Laster said, “Last year, when we came to Daytona for testing, I was speechless. Driving through the tunnel for the first time gave me goosebumps and made the hair on my neck stand up, and it made both my mom and dad cry. Then, when we came back 30 days later and I was going to actually race at Daytona, the feeling was euphoric to say the least. I come from small-track racing and I wanted to soak up the entire experience. Only a fraction of race car drivers ever get to wheel a race car on a track as sacred as Daytona. I am now one of the chosen few who have had the honor.”
The Indiana native made his NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series debut a year ago, and he is determined to have a breakout 2023 season. At just 20 years old, he has plenty to learn but is ready for the challenge.
My dad has owned and worked on race cars since the early ’80s in the Indianapolis area. I have always been my dad’s biggest fan growing up. The second I was old enough to hold a steering wheel, I started racing go-karts. I was 7, and on my first night out I was wrecked twice and T-boned. I told my dad, “That was cool, but I won’t be racing again.” About three years later, I said, “I want to give racing another try.” Luckily, my second attempt was less traumatic than the first, and at that moment, I set my life goal to be a part of the racing community for life.
WHAT WAS IT LIKE TO MAKE YOUR NASCAR CRAFTSMAN TRUCK SERIES DEBUT LAST YEAR?
It was crazy! The race was at Knoxville Raceway in Iowa and was on dirt. I still can’t believe I have a NASCAR Truck Series license. Going into the Knoxville race, I had more experience on dirt than most of the other drivers racing that night. I knew I wasn’t able to compete for the win, but I wanted to gain more experience in this sport at all levels. Unsure how I would perform, and leaning on my years of racing dirt, within the first few laps I knew I had to throw everything I knew about dirt racing out the window. My dirt experience did not apply to the caliber of drivers or trucks I was familiar with. It was an incredible adventure, and my goal was to finish the race. We brought the truck home without a scratch, and finished P27. I was happy with the outcome, grateful for the experience as well as all of the new knowledge I gained.
WHAT ARE YOUR GOALS FOR THIS SEASON?
I want to find Victory Lane. We are running in the ARCA Menards Series with Mullins Racing at Daytona, Talladega and maybe a couple more races at intermediate tracks like Phoenix and Iowa. I want to return to the Truck Series, if possible, and who knows, maybe even an Xfinity Series race this year. For ARCA, Mullins Racing has hung a new Mustang body on my car. We are really excited about this new body and believe the changes will help me to become a better driver. Last year, Daytona was the first time I had ever been on an asphalt track bigger than three-eighthsmile. It was a big jump to go from 70 mph at a short track to 184 mph on the front stretch, a half inch off the bumper of the car in front of me. I have more experience now and I believe I have a shot at turning some heads this season.
YOU’RE ALSO A COLLEGE STUDENT. WHAT’S IT LIKE TO SPLIT YOUR TIME BETWEEN
I’m currently a sophomore at Liberty University online, working toward my business degree. With racing, it’s hard to go to school in person. We have an asphalt super late model that we will be running in 2023 in a NASCAR Roots series. I have always been a hands on, get dirty and do whatever it takes to get the job done kind of person. I’ve always wanted to know how something works, and would take things apart just to see the mechanics inside. My mind is constantly thinking of ways to be faster or what I can do to improve my skill level as a driver. It is a tough balance between working on race cars, school, family and life in general. Luckily, I am able to attend school online and have the flexibility to work school around my racing schedule and my family. I am also working hard to market myself online
It actually has two origins. One comes from when I was growing up. I was the fat and chubby kid that nobody understood. Everyone laughed at me because I was the nerdy guy at lunch. I was always seen with pizza in my hands and my Pokémon cards, which led to a lot of bullying and teasing during my elementary and middle school years.
The “Pizza Man” name really started to stick at the race track. My dad would give me $10.50 to buy food and I would always get pizza. The people at the track started calling me the “Pizza Kid,” because pizza was always in my hands. Then it grew into an entire identity of sorts when my clothing, socks, hats, hoodies, backpack, glasses, license plate on my personal vehicle and two of my helmets paid tribute to my love of pizza. People outside of our local area started recognizing me at other tracks due to my pepperoni pizza helmet. I feel like the pizza theme has given me a special identity because pizza is something everyone can relate to.
Beginning in the late 1950s, Eddie Wood sorted nuts and bolts and swept floors after school. By the time he was old enough to become a full-fledged crew member for his father’s famous Wood Brothers Racing NASCAR team in the early 1970s, Wood had already seen several legends drive the team’s No. 21 race cars. Wood, now co-owner of Wood Brothers Racing, recently sat down with NASCAR Pole Position and answered our questions about growing up in the sport and continuing his family’s racing tradition.
(Laughter) It was a wooden building built over a bank and it looked like it was about to fall down. It had stilts and was built up with a wooden floor. I guess it held two cars. I remember going in there and I had to have been younger than 5. They built the shop in Stuart, Virginia, they were in all those years in 1956, and it was before that. I was born in 1952.
You just kind of grew up with racing and it was just a gradual thing. I didn’t just wake up one day and say I want to drive race cars. I never wanted to drive and it wasn’t encouraged at all. At 16 or 18, I wanted to run Bowman Gray Stadium but didn’t care about anywhere else. (Laughter) I wanted to run a Ford Pinto with a Boss 429 engine, which would have been totally the wrong approach. ANY EARLY CHILDHOOD HEROES COME TO MIND?
I graduated from college in 1972 and started going to race tracks after that, and even skipped graduation to go racing at Michigan. I was racing full time and that was a big deal. That was the beginning of the David Pearson era and our time with him started in April of that year at Darlington. This would have been at the end of May. I was always close to David. My brother, Len, and I both were.
We were close to all the drivers – Cale (Yarborough), A.J. (Foyt) – they were like normal people to us. (Laughter) They picked on us a lot, but it was good fun. We had a good time, especially with Pearson. There was Donnie Allison, too. They were just cool guys. You looked up to them as heroes and I still do.
YOUR FATHER, GLEN WOOD, FOUNDED THE TEAM IN 1950. HOW WAS HE TO BE AROUND AS A FATHER AND ALSO AS A TEAM OWNER?
He was very laid back and very methodical. He didn’t do things quickly, as far as making decisions. Sometimes I guess he did because in racing you have to. But for the most part, he didn’t. He always seemed to make the right decision. He would think things through. Even when we were young, the things we wanted to get into, he always had a grown-up look at it. Sometimes you were right on the mark and sometimes you were way off. He was always right.
Leonard (Wood) was and is the same way. They had already been racing 22 years before I came into this full time. They had already been there and done that. Leonard is 87 now. He’s still a kid. That really works well with Len and me. Growing up, he liked things we liked and still does. We were his helpers and what he said is what we did. We wouldn’t ask questions. We just did it.
HAVE YOU EVER STOPPED TO THINK ABOUT EVERYTHING WOOD BROTHERS RACING HAS ACCOMPLISHED – SUCH AS 99 CUP SERIES WINS AND FIVE DAYTONA 500 VICTORIES – WITH SO MANY GREAT DRIVERS?
I guess you look back at it and you’re in the middle of it and you’re around it, it just felt like that’s what we should be doing. That was kind of normal. I remember all the way back to Marvin Panch in the early 1960s. I remember 1963 when Tiny Lund won the Daytona 500 when Marvin was injured. I met Curtis Turner and watched him race in the mid-1960s from the infield.
I remember hanging out with (driver) G.C. Spencer’s son, Dale Jarrett as a kid, Kyle Petty as a kid, Richie Panch, Marvin’s son who drove in the Cup Series for a time. We were all kids that weren’t old enough to go inside the garage so we hung out in the infield. Most people had station wagons. That’s where the food was. There are photos where the pit crew would come to eat before races. It was like an elaborate picnic. The Pettys did that, too.
WHAT WAS DAVID PEARSON LIKE? MAGICAL IS A WORD THAT COMES TO MIND.
Yes, we just clicked with David. And things clicked from the time he sat down in our car at Darlington at the 1972 Rebel 400 and turned that first lap. He sat on the pole and led most of the laps and won the race. I believe he won six races that year. A.J. drove the car that year and won the Daytona 500 and Ontario 500, but had to go back to Indy car racing. Pearson won 43 races in our Mercurys through April of 1979. YOUR FAMILY IS ONE OF THE MOST LOVED IN MOTORSPORTS, ESPECIALLY FOR YOUR DOWNHOME APPROACH. WHERE DID THAT GENUINE, HUMBLE DEMEANOR ORIGINATE?
I don’t know. It just worked out that way. Our mom and dad were very low key and that’s the way it’s always been. I guess all of us in the Wood family are also kind of low key as well. My dad grew up during the Great Depression, so he was very conservative and so was my mom. They grew up like that and were very humble people. That was just kind of the way they were and so are we. We’re nothing special. We’re just like everyone else.
The No. 22 car has won a total of 4 championships throughout NASCAR’s history, including NASCAR’s inaugural Cup Series champion, Red Byron, in 1949.
Car numbers have played a crucial role throughout the history of NASCAR, and some numbers have enjoyed considerably more success than others.
Richard Petty ran No. 43 with Petty Enterprises for all seven of his Cup Series titles while Dale Earnhardt carried No. 2 and then No. 3 during his seven championship seasons with team owners Rod Osterlund and Richard Childress.
For three other series champions, one number stands out.
During the NASCAR Cup Series’ inaugural season of 1949, Red Byron won the championship using No. 22 on the cars fielded by businessman Raymond Parks. The Alabama native won two races that season and had four top-5 finishes in six starts.
Thirty-four years passed before the number returned to championship status in 1983 when Bobby Allison earned his lone Cup Series title while driving for team owners Bill and Jim Gardner. Allison ran No.88 when the DiGard team campaigned the Gatorade sponsorship from 1976 through 1982, but when the sponsorship changed, so did the car number.
Allison’s championship year featured six wins and 25 top-10 results.
“Gatorade was a longtime sponsor with DiGard and they won a lot with them (32 races),” Allison said. “Darrell Waltrip also drove for them but when they went away in 1983, we changed the car number
to 22. Fireball Roberts had it in the 1960s and he won with it. It was available so DiGard Racing took it. Plus, I had used No. 22 years earlier in the Cup Series (1970) and had won some races with it.”
Then, another 35 years passed before the No. 22 became a champion again. Joey Logano, driving the No. 22 Team Penske Ford, earned his first Cup Series title over Martin Truex Jr. by winning the final race of the season at Homestead-Miami Speedway.
“I’ve worked my whole life to get here.,” Logano said in 2018. “I’ve spent 10 seasons fighting for this. Wasn’t sure we were going to get it, but man, Todd (Gordon, crew chief) made a great adjustment there at the end. He has a no-quit attitude and I was going to pass (Truex) no matter what.”
Then, after a very hard-fought season in 2022, Logano collected his second NASCAR Cup Series championship with No. 22. The title came when the Team Penske driver beat Ross Chastain in the Championship 4 finale at Phoenix Raceway.
Logano said there was never any doubt he would win Cup Series title No. 2.
“I knew all along that we were going to win the championship,” Logano noted. “I told the guys that we were the favorite from Daytona (the season opener) and we truly believed it. That’s the difference.”
All told, the No. 22 has won 87 races in 1,635 Cup Series starts. Roberts has 30, Logano has 29, Allison 17, Ward Burton five, Byron two, Kurt Busch two and Dick Brooks one.
The history of NASCAR is filled with colorful characters and remarkable stories. As the sanctioning body celebrates its 75th anniversary, it is a good opportunity to look back at the names, places and events that have shaped the sport.
It all started in the 1940s on the dusty dirt tracks scattered across the Southeast. It progressed through the development of superspeedways, purpose-built race cars, corporate involvement, a safety crisis and the social media explosion to the uber competitive sport that we have today.
It is a commonly held belief that the first auto race occurred when the second automobile was built. It might not have happened quite that quickly but the competitive nature of human beings has always shown through and, when you have people who modify machines to perform better than originally designed, they are going to want to find out who built the best version.
In the hills of Appalachia, moonshine was a way of life dating back to the founding of the country. The practice of distilling accelerated during prohibition. The basic premise that the whiskey was not taxed, immediately set up a competition among the people making the hooch and the people responsible for collecting the taxes or stopping the creation of the illegal liquor.
In order for the moonshiners to evade the revenue officers, they modified their cars to be faster and handle better than those driven by the authorities. It wasn’t long before the moonshiners decided to get together and see who had the fastest car.
As the races became bigger and more popular, individuals started promoting them and promising
prize money for the winners. This immediately presented opportunities for unscrupulous characters. There were few to no rules for the cars and, routinely, these promoters would put on the race, collect the gate and skip out before the checkered flag, leaving the winners begging for their winnings.
In the mid-’40s, “Big Bill” France, a racer and businessman who lived in Daytona Beach, Florida, mounted an effort to bring organization and structure to the sport of stock-car racing.
After a meeting at the Streamline Hotel in December 1947, the National Association for Stock Car Auto Racing was incorporated. It took a year to put the Strictly Stock division together but in 1949, some 12,000 fans attended the first race in Charlotte, North Carolina, and the rest is history.
That first year of the Cup Series saw eight races make up the entire schedule. The following year was a 19-race schedule that laid the groundwork for the
early years of the sport. The barnstorming years ran from 1949 through 1971.
After the first two years, the average season had 48 races per year. 1964 saw the most races in a single season with 62. Richard Petty was the champion that year for the first of his seven titles. Three years later, while securing his second championship, Petty set the record for the most wins in a single season. He visited Victory Lane 27 times out of the 48 races he contested that year.
1972 was the beginning of what is known as the Modern Era of NASCAR. R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Co. approached Junior Johnson, one of the early superstars of the sport, to discuss sponsorship for his team. Early in the discussions, Johnson realized the dollars being tossed around were far bigger than just a race team.
The end result was R.J. Reynolds becoming the title sponsor of NASCAR’s premier series and rebranding it to the Winston Cup Series. A couple of the changes, besides the huge increase in money behind the sport, altered the sport for decades to come.
Dirt-track racing was dropped from the schedule. The final dirt race was run in Raleigh, North Carolina, until the series returned to dirt in 2021. Races were also removed from small short tracks. Race tracks shorter than a half mile were dropped from the schedule and still have not returned, other than the exhibition race at the iconic L.A. Memorial Coliseum.
Early in the Modern Era, NASCAR racing slowly evolved into a business. Purpose-built race cars and sponsorships became commonplace but, for the most part, things were still very local and regional.
That changed as the end of the 1980s and beginning of the ’90s rolled around. Corporate sponsorship came to the forefront with national companies recognizing that NASCAR was at the doorstep of an explosion in popularity. Dale Earnhardt was the blue- collar champion of the sport who, by the mid’90s, became the second seven-time champion in NASCAR history.
Jeff Gordon was the newcomer and he became the de facto poster boy for corporate involvement in the sport. As the sport’s popularity skyrocketed, International Speedway Corp. and Speedway Motorsports Inc. grabbed the reins of facility ownership. Their leadership built race tracks across the country, elevating NASCAR racing to a national sport.
The increased popularity was a boon for the sport, the race teams and the competitors. The money being invested in speed was pushing the envelope faster and faster on the asphalt stadiums around the country. Unfortunately, while speed increased at a rapid rate, the safety aspects of the sport, while moving forward, were not moving at a pace consistent with the speeds of the cars.
The end result was multiple competitor fatalities at the turn of the century. The discussion of safety intensified but the event that changed the sport, and safety, forever was the death of Dale Earnhardt on the final lap of the 2001 Daytona 500.
That fateful day turned the entire focus of the sport to safety and, thankfully, there has not been a fatality in NASCAR, at the national level, since that race.
As the sport marks its 75th anniversary, the technology and methodology of putting cars on the race track has changed dramatically. The seventh generation car is now a predominantly single-source supplier vehicle. Every team gets its parts from the same manufacturers and customization is all but non-existent. The result is that driver skill and strategy are now at a premium and the parity from the top teams to the bottom teams has never been closer.
The sport dipped in popularity during the mid- to late-2010s, but the last couple of years have seen a rebound in television ratings and overall popularity.
For 90 years, Forney Industries has been disrupting the welding market with innovative products at competitive prices. 2023 is no exception, as the company releases several new machines for any level of metalworker.
THE FORNEY 180 ST + PULSE IS FORNEY’S FIRST MACHINE CAPABLE of pulse stick and pulse TIG welding. Powerful enough to weld up to 3/8”, but easy on thin materials; this ultra-light machine brings advanced welding to all levels of metalworkers in a variety of trades. Pulse welding alternates between the set output amperage and a reduced amperage, allowing the weld puddle to cool and solidify during each low amp cycle. With this capability, you can easily weld out of position and create more visually appealing results.
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FORNEY’S LINE OF AUTO-DARKENING WELDING HELMETS has expanded with the addition of four new custom designs. These unique designs include one-of-a-kind camo, vibrant Forney green lightning, a smoking green rose and, finally, a limited-edition tribute to Forney’s 90th year of business. Forney’s family of ADF hoods are divided into three lines, The Forney Easy Weld Series, Forney Series and the Forney PRO series, making it easy to find the perfect helmet for any level of metalworker.
2023 IS UNDERWAY, AND FORNEY Industries has embraced the new year with the release of several new and innovative products.
The Forney 190 MP Multi-Process machine is one of Forney’s most powerful welders, able to weld up to 3/8” single pass. It was designed with a patented “set and forget” despooler that helps to eliminate user error, ultimately resulting in better welds and reduced frustration. This machine also features TruSet™ MIG, an optimal welding mode that automatically adjusts machine settings based on specific applications.
Jason Mahugh, Forney’s Director of Engineering and Technical Services, knows TruSet MIG sets the Forney 190 MP apart from other welders on the market. “The 190 MP is our most user-friendly multi-process machine yet. It can be set by adjusting wire-feed speed and voltage like traditional machines or set by material thickness using TruSet. It’s also capable of welding aluminum with a spool gun.”
Forney also launched the SpoolPro Hornet™ SG250 spool gun. This ergonomic tool is revolutionary, designed with patented features that make out-of-position welding a breeze. The cutting-edge design relieves wrist fatigue, allowing you to weld for longer periods of time. This groundbreaking spool gun is assembled in America, and designed by our engineers right here in Fort Collins, Colorado. It’s also compatible with the Forney 190 MP.
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The 2022 NASCAR season was full of unforgettable moments and compelling storylines that made it one of the most enthralling campaigns in the history of the sport.
After all, no one could’ve predicted the season would produce a record-tying 19 different Cup Series race winners or five first-time winners. Likewise, no one could have forecasted that Ross Chastain – a driver who’d never won a race at the Cup Series level – would not only go to Victory Lane but would also race veteran Joey Logano right down to the wire for the championship.
Now, as NASCAR prepares for its landmark 75th anniversary season, there’s no telling what might happen that could even eclipse the excitement of the incredible season that ended in November.
Will Logano become the first driver in more than a decade to repeat as Cup Series champion? Will Ty Gibbs and Noah Gragson – now full-time Cup Series drivers – continue their intense rivalry that reached a fever pitch last season in the NASCAR Xfinity Series? Will this be the last year for Denny Hamlin and Alex Bowman with their respective teams?
We’ll take a look at all this and lots more in NASCAR Pole Position’s 23 things to watch during the 2023 NASCAR season.
BY JARED TURNEROnly one driver in the 28-year history of the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series has won backto-back championships. Will 2022 champ Zane
Competing for Front Row Motorsports, Smith captured last year’s title in convincing fashion by winning four races, including the season-ending Championship 4 race at Phoenix where he started from the pole and led 77 of 154 laps. It’s worth noting that Smith’s stellar 2022 campaign was hardly a fluke, considering the 23-year-old Huntington Beach, California, native had finished runnerup in the standings in each of the two previous seasons as part of the Championship 4.
Perhaps this season he’ll join three-time champion Matt Crafton as the only Truck Series driver to ascend the series’ highest mountain in consecutive
While the 2022 NASCAR Xfinity Series season ended with Joe Gibbs Racing’s Ty Gibbs being crowned champion, that outcome didn’t at all diminish what JR Motorsports accomplished – and what the organization is capable of accomplishing this year.
Not only did JRM score a series-high 15 wins as a company and place three of its four drivers in the Championship 4, but three-fourths of JRM’s driver lineup is back with the return of Josh Berry, Justin Allgaier and Sam Mayer. Notably missing is 2022 championship runner-up Noah Gragson, but his replacement is Brandon Jones – who has finished no worse than eighth in the standings and won four races over the last three seasons. With Gibbs moving to the Cup Series, JRM will be the overwhelming Xfinity Series championship favorite.
Ty Gibbs and Noah Gragson ruled the roost last season in the NASCAR Xfinity Series, amassing 15 victories between them and staging a hardfought championship battle. Along the way, Gibbs and Gragson also became bitter rivals after having more than one on-track altercation, and the feelings of animosity between them were so strong that Gragson bluntly declared heading into the final race that he simply didn’t like Gibbs.
Now, the two are moving to full-time Cup Series status after both making cameo Cup Series starts last season to fill in for injured drivers. Expect the uber-talented youngsters to continue their rivalry as newcomers to NASCAR’s top series, where they’ll undoubtedly be trying to one up each other all season for multiple reasons that include, perhaps most importantly, personal bragging rights.
Seven-time NASCAR Cup Series champion Jimmie Johnson will be wearing a new hat – the hat of Cup Series team owner. While Johnson, who’s been out of the sport since his final driving season of 2020, will be only a minority owner of Petty GMS, the future NASCAR Hall of Famer is bound to exert a tremendous influence on the organization and its two young drivers – Erik Jones and Noah Gragson.
Johnson’s mere presence around the shop should lift the organization, which went to Victory Lane once last year in its first season with Allegiant Air CEO Maury Gallagher and seven-time Cup Series champion Richard Petty as partners in team ownership. Add Johnson to the mix and you’re talking about a team whose co-owners have a combined 283 wins in NASCAR’s premier series.
The Next Generation Cup Series car that debuted last season certainly had its benefits, like improving the overall quality of the racing on many tracks – most notably the 1.5- and 2-mile venues. However, after Kurt Busch and Alex Bowman both suffered a concussion in the second half of the season from a high-speed, rear-end impact, NASCAR began working diligently to improve some of the safety features on the Next Gen vehicle.
Following a crash test of the car in early October, NASCAR informed teams of some structural changes it would make to the rear of the Next Gen car prior to the 2023 season. With those changes expected to be in place at Daytona, drivers should be far less likely this season to suffer any ill effects from an accident on the race track.
The 2022 NASCAR Cup Series season featured no dearth of rivalries. Whether it was William Byron versus Joey Logano at Darlington, Denny Hamlin versus Ross Chastain at World Wide Technology Raceway, Brad Keselowski versus Austin Dillon at New Hampshire, or Kyle Larson versus Bubba Wallace at Las Vegas, fireworks erupted early and often – creating authentic animosity between the participants involved in these incidents.
Will the drivers who didn’t quite see eye to eye a year ago turn the page and forget about their disagreements, or will they find themselves in situations that only heighten their disdain for one another? If the latter is true, look for retaliation to be a theme of 2023 – and NASCAR to intervene if things get too out of hand.
NASCAR is exploring new terrain both literally and figuratively this year with the running of the first Cup Series street course race, held in downtown Chicago. The event – scheduled for July 2 – is expected to attract a large and diverse audience while showcasing the United States’ premier stock-car racing series in one of the country’s most metropolitan areas. The track’s design originated in the realm of iRacing and was so popular with drivers who competed on the virtual Chicago street course that NASCAR decided to use it in real life. So, it’s safe to assume that the drivers who’ve raced virtually in the Windy City might have a leg up. But, nevertheless, this race should be a can’t-miss affair that will give NASCAR some fresh exposure in an important market.
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To receive a lot of fanfare or media coverage, a NASCAR Cup Series driver typically has to run the full schedule. That won’t be the case this year, however, when seven-time Cup Series champion Jimmie Johnson makes his return to the sport with a 10-race driving slate for the Petty GMS organization that he now co-owns.
Johnson, who drove his last Cup Series race in 2020, will compete in the Daytona 500 and nine other events that he had not revealed as of press time. Johnson isn’t the only prominent driver with plans to run a part-time schedule, however. Kurt Busch – who officially retired from full-time driving at the end of last season due to the lingering effects of a concussion – plans to make select starts for 23XI Racing if he gets medical clearance.
Two drivers accustomed to winning were uncharacteristically shut out of Victory Lane in 2022. Those drivers – Martin Truex Jr. and Ryan Blaney – had combined for seven wins the previous year, but for reasons both in and out of their control, never could seal the deal on a win last season.
Of course, this begs the question of whether one or both of them will return to the winner’s circle in 2023. Both certainly have the team to do it, but dry spells are often not easily ended. It’s therefore possible that Truex and Blaney might see their droughts last a while longer. In any case, everyone will be watching to see when or if the two are able to put their winless streaks to bed.
The 2022 NASCAR Cup Series season will be remembered for various outcomes and developments, but few will be more memorable and potentially consequential than Christopher Bell establishing himself as the sport’s new Mr. Clutch.
Not once but twice in playoff elimination races did the Joe Gibbs Racing driver prevail in a must-win scenario to punch his ticket to the next playoff round. And Bell did this on two completely different types of tracks – Martinsville Speedway (an oval short track) and the Charlotte Motor Speedway ROVAL (a road course). If Bell can continue to rise to the occasion when it matters most, he’ll further solidify his place as NASCAR’s newest No. 1 clutch performer, and he might even inherit Kevin Harvick’s old nickname of “The Closer.”
The 2022 NASCAR Cup Series season featured the emergence of several surprise contenders, most notably Ross Chastain, Tyler Reddick, Chase Briscoe, Daniel Suarez and Austin Cindric who all made the playoffs by virtue of earning the first win of their respective careers.
So, who’ll be the big surprises of 2023? One driver who could be poised for a breakout season is Chris Buescher, who went to Victory Lane in the Bristol night race last fall but missed the playoffs because his win came after the regular season. Buescher’s victory provided a bright spot in an otherwise disappointing season for the newly rebranded Roush Fenway Keselowski Racing organization. If RFK Racing as a whole can make some improvements, it might be enough for Buescher to enjoy his first multi-win season at the Cup Series level.
At age 73, Rick Hendrick is the youngest among the crop of NASCAR Cup Series team owners who’ve been in the sport for more than two decades. The others – Richard Childress, Joe Gibbs, Roger Penske and Jack Roush – are all over the age of 76, with Penske, the oldest of the bunch, checking in at 85.
While none of these NASCAR Hall of Fame owners are known to be in particularly poor health, time is certainly not on their side when it comes to how much longer
Second-chance opportunities tend to be rare in NASCAR, so when a driver gets one, they’d better take advantage of it. So it will be in 2023 for Ryan Preece and A.J. Allmendinger – drivers who once had a full-time Cup Series ride, lost it and now are back in the game.
Preece, who ran a part-time Craftsman Truck Series schedule last year, is taking over the No. 41 Stewart-Haas Racing Ford. Allmendinger, meanwhile, has been named a full-time Cup Series driver for Kaulig Racing where he spent the last two seasons in a full-time Xfinity Series role and made select Cup Series starts. Allmendinger last competed as a full-time Cup Series driver in 2018 as part of JTG Daugherty Racing where he was replaced in 2019, coinci dentally, by Preece.
After winning a career-high four Cup Series races in 2021, Alex Bowman understandably harbored aspirations of making frequent trips to Victory Lane in 2022. It didn’t happen, though, as Bowman prevailed at Las Vegas in Week 3 but never again.
To be fair, Bowman did miss five of the season’s final six races due to the lingering effects of a concussion he suffered in an accident at Texas in late September, but the Hendrick Motorsports driver’s season had not lived up to expectations even before his unfortunate injury and absence from competition. If Bowman doesn’t take it up a notch or two this season – a year when his contract with Hendrick Motorsports is up for renewal – it’s possible team owner Rick Hendrick will opt to move in another direction for 2024 and beyond.
Ross Chastain turned the NASCAR world on its proverbial head in the nextto-last race of the 2022 Cup Series season when he made the decision to never lift off the throttle in Turns 3 and 4 on the final lap at Martinsville. Chastain, who needed to pass two cars to advance to the Championship 4, actually gained five spots – more than enough to remain title-eligible heading into the next weekend’s season finale.
While Chastain’s video-game-style move damaged the right side of his car, it was well worth it to keep his championship hopes alive for another week. Now the question becomes whether Chastain’s maneuver – which looked like a video on fast-forward – will become commonplace as drivers seek to do whatever it takes to avoid elimination in the playoffs.
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One of the fiercest rivalries of the 2022 season was between two Hendrick Motorsports teammates – Chase Elliott and Kyle Larson, who found themselves entangled in not one but two late-race dustups that in both cases resulted in Larson going to Victory Lane and Elliott getting the proverbial short end of the stick.
Tensions between the two former Cup Series champions were so high after their second run-in, which occurred at Watkins Glen, that a visibly angry Elliott was seen on TV giving team owner Rick Hendrick and Hendrick Motorsports vice chairman Jeff Gordon an earful on pit road immediately after the race as Larson celebrated in the background. There’s since been no indication that Elliott and Larson have come to an understanding. If that’s the case, it could make for an extremely uncomfortable 2023 within the walls of Hendrick Motorsports.
Losing a loved one is always hard, but that tends to be especially true when they die unexpectedly, as Ty Gibbs’ father, Coy, did on Nov. 6 – just hours after Ty won the NASCAR Xfinity Series championship. No one knows exactly how Ty, who is just 19 years old, will deal with the loss of his father as he embarks on his first full season at the Cup Series level, but he’ll no doubt be racing to honor his father’s memory. This change in perspective could make for a more mature version of Ty Gibbs than the one that was often the object of ridicule in 2022 for overly aggressive driving. Plus, Ty unequivocally wants to make Joe Gibbs – his grandfather and team owner – proud in his first year as a Cup Series driver for Joe Gibbs Racing.
One year after Joe Gibbs Racing tried but ultimately failed to negotiate a contract extension for two-time Cup Series cham pion Kyle Busch, Denny Hamlin finds himself in a similar position but obviously hoping for a different outcome.
The three-time Daytona 500 winner has said he wants to finish out his Cup Series career at Joe Gibbs Racing, the place where it began in a full-time capacity in 2006, but Hamlin doing so is in all likelihood largely contingent on whether JGR will be able to re-sign FedEx –Hamlin’s primary sponsor for his entire Cup Series career. If FedEx doesn’t renew for 2024, Hamlin has said he could possibly compete on a part-time basis for 23XI Racing – the JGR-affiliated organization that he co-owns with NBA legend Mi chael Jordan.
Kyle Busch and Tyler Reddick all but swapped rides for 2023, with Busch moving into the No. 8 Richard Childress Racing Chevrolet that Reddick drove to three wins last year and Reddick taking over the No. 45 Toyota of 23XI Racing – an organization that has a close technical alliance with Joe Gibbs Racing, the organization Busch competed for and won 56 races and two Cup Series championships with over a 15-year run.
One of the more intriguing storylines of this year will be which of the two drivers fares best in their new digs, because this will provide a strong clue about who’s the better talent at this point in their respective careers. Ironically, Reddick’s new seat is the one that Kyle’s older brother, Kurt, filled for most of 2022.
Having turned 47 years old in December, Kevin Harvick, the 2014 Cup Series champion, announced one month later that he will retire from full-time NASCAR racing at the end of the season. Many believed a retirement announcement was just around the corner for the native of Bakersfield, California, and it came Jan. 12.
As of the final weekend of the 2022 season, Harvick was still undecided on how much longer he planned to race. The Stewart-Haas Racing driver did acknowledge, though, that 2023 could be it and now it’s confirmed. Of course, Harvick isn’t the only bigname driver who is thinking about hanging up his helmet. It’s very possible that veterans Martin Truex Jr. and Aric Almirola will do likewise, having both flirted with retirement at various points in 2022 before ultimately deciding to come back for at least one more year.
No Cup Series driver made more enemies in 2022 than Ross Chastain, who managed to upset the likes of Denny Hamlin, Martin Truex Jr., Chase Elliott and Kyle Busch – all victims of Chastain’s front bumper at one time or another.
In the case of Hamlin and Truex, they were recipients of an inflicting bump from Chastain on not one but two occasions, which left the veteran teammates steaming mad at the firstyear Trackhouse Racing driver and his continued aggression. Although Chastain seemed to keep his nose a bit cleaner late in the season, particularly during the playoffs, there will likely be no shortage of drivers still looking to settle a score with him – and they’re apt to do so when they feel like the time is right.
It’s been 13 years since a NASCAR Cup Series driver won back-to-back championships. Will defending champ Joey Logano break the cycle? It’s certainly possible, given that Logano is with the same crew chief and team that helped him win the title a season ago.
But if winning championships in succession was easy, a lot more people would do it – and the last driver to win consecutive championships at NASCAR’s highest level was Jimmie Johnson in 2009 and 2010 (The 2010 title was actually Johnson’s fifth in a row.). Dale Earnhardt won back-to-back championships twice in the ’90s and Jeff Gordon went back-to-back later in the decade, but Johnson has been the only once since to accomplish this feat. Maybe Logano will be next, but it’ll be a tall order.
No single event on the NASCAR Cup Series calendar will be greeted with more anticipation than the All-Star Race at North Wilkesboro Speedway, the venerable .625-mile North Carolina track that last hosted a race for NASCAR’s premier series in 1996 after being a part of the schedule for 48 years.
North Wilkesboro is undergoing major renovations – while being careful to preserve certain relics of its rich history – in preparation for the May 21 All-Star Race, which will be the main event in a week’s worth of activities at the track where so many legends of the sport competed over nearly five decades. However, unlike in North Wilkesboro races past, the All-Star Race will be held at night under the lights – adding to the excitement and electricity surrounding this blockbuster occasion.
BY JARED TURNER
Been thinking about attending your first NASCAR race but not sure what items to bring along? You’re not alone. For anyone who has never been to a NASCAR event, knowing the necessities to have in tow is likely pure guesswork – unless, of course, you have a trusted friend or family member who has spent time at the race track and can show you the ropes.
Up next, we’ll take a look at five items a newcomer to the NASCAR fan scene should have in their possession when they show up at the track for the first time.
Sunscreen or Sunblock: Unless you enjoy feeling like your skin is on fire or walking away from a NASCAR weekend with a not-so-fashionable sunburn, you won’t want to leave home without having sunblock or sunscreen at the ready. NASCAR Cup Series races typically last at least three hours, which means potentially being exposed to sunrays for an extended period of
time. And depending on the number of cautions, red flags, rain delays and how long you get to your seat before the green flag waves, you could be baking in the sun for up to five or six hours.
It’s especially important not to forget the sunblock or sunscreen if the race you’re attending is in the heat of summer. Beginning with the Coca-Cola 600 at Charlotte Motor Speedway on Memorial Day weekend and continuing through the Cook Out Southern 500 at Darlington Raceway on Labor Day weekend, making sun protection a priority is especially pivotal.
The Proper Apparel: Is Chase Elliott your guy? Do you have a picture of Kyle Busch or Kyle Larson beside your bed? Do you dream about spending a day with Kevin Harvick or dining with Denny Hamlin?
Regardless of your fan loyalties, it’s important that you spend your time at the track all decked out in your favorite driver’s apparel. That means shirts, hats and perhaps even socks or shoes. In fact, one could argue that there’s no more important item to bring to your first NASCAR race than a hat, shirt or another article of clothing that pledges your allegiance to your driver of choice.
Track Snacks: Like most professional sporting events, NASCAR races have concession stands where fans can typically purchase hamburgers, hot dogs, nachos, pizza, pretzels and various other popular food items. Appetizing as all these might sound and delicious as they might taste, you’re going to pay a hefty price for them. It’s just the way it is.
If you want to save some money – who doesn’t, right? – it’s best to bring your own track snacks and beverages, which you can throw into a clear bag or soft-sided cooler. Pre-packaged and sealed food and beverage items are welcome at NASCAR tracks, so there’s no reason to break the bank on concession food – regardless of how tasty it may be.
Seat Cushions without Metal Components: Is there anything worse than sitting on a hard seat for hours on end, with no relief for your backside? Unless you’re planning to stand for the entire race – which seems unlikely when considering its duration – you’ll need a comfy seat cushion to help get you through. In fact, you’ll want to bring a seat cushion for every member of the family, including children and the elderly who might have an especially hard time focusing if their posterior is in pain.
Just make sure the cushion doesn’t have any metal components, which tracks forbid for safety reasons.
Ear Plugs or Headsets: The race track is a loud place, especially when 40 NASCAR Cup Series cars are on the track at the same time. Therefore, ensuring you have adequate ear protection is absolutely critical. Who wants to suffer temporary or – even worse – permanent hearing loss in their first time at the race track? The answer, of course, is no one, and the only way to guarantee this doesn’t happen is to bring a reliable pair of ear plugs or, better yet, a headset that blocks out the noise. With the right headset, you’ll not only protect your hearing but you’ll be able to tune in to live radio coverage of the race and even listen in on the drivers as they communicate with their teams throughout the event. Best of all, if you forget and leave your ear plugs or headset at home, you can easily purchase ear plugs or rent a headset at the track – either once you get inside the concourse or through a vendor that’s set up outside.
While most NASCAR fans are proud to wear the colors of their favorite driver, those same fans oftentimes possess an even deeper loyalty to the “Red, White and Blue.” And they show it with patriotic T-shirts and bumper stickers and, of course, by displaying the American flag – a frequently seen symbol at most NASCAR events. Following are four reasons NASCAR is the true American sport.
2 Military Support: As great as waving an American flag or singing along to a patriotic song might be, some drivers take their support of their country – and, in particular, the U.S. military – to a whole other level. One of those drivers is Brad Keselowski, whose Checkered Flag Foundation has been known to raise upward of $450,000 in a single year to support veterans and first responders.
3
American-Made Cars: Nothing about NASCAR is more synonymous with the American way of life than the race cars themselves. Built to resemble the cars that motorists drive every day of the week, NASCAR stock cars look more like street cars than the vehicles used in any other genre of motorsports. Appropriately, all three of the vehicles involved in NASCAR Cup Series racing – Ford Mustang, Toyota Camry and Chevrolet Camaro – are manufactured in the United States.
1
Patriotic Paint Schemes: Whether for the annual race held during July 4 week or the Coca-Cola 600 at Charlotte Motor Speedway every Memorial Day weekend, patriotic paint schemes are a familiar sight when America’s two most patriotic holidays are nearby on the calendar. These special car designs have historically been a major hit with fans, who tend to buy the corresponding apparel and, especially, die-cast cars in vast quantities.
4
Robust Tailgates: It’s hard to find something much more American than a group of people standing around the bed of a pickup truck throwing back cold beverages, listening to country music and playing cornhole while they wait for a sporting event to officially get underway. This happens every weekend at NASCAR races, where fans congregate both inside and outside of the track for tailgating experiences typically of the more robust variety.
A weekend becomes a spectacle when NASCAR comes to town, and whether it’s through spectating, tailgating or camping, NASCAR and its fans enjoy the pleasures of being outdoors.
While the fans bask in the sunshine and light breezes during a beautiful afternoon, the drivers go to battle in an effort to cross the finish line and take home the checkered flag. When drivers have time away from the track, they too choose to spend it outdoors. Between hobbies that include fishing, cycling, skiing, running and golf, NASCAR’s biggest stars are no strangers to Mother Nature.
Martin Truex Jr.: A self-described hunter and fisherman in his Twitter bio, Martin Truex Jr.’s love for the outdoors began at an early age and came full circle with his Bass Pro Shops sponsorship.
Joey Logano: Joey Logano enjoys 4-wheeling and ATVs as a hobby and spent part of the offseason racing around a dirt path with his son Hudson.
Kurt Busch: Kurt Busch enjoys spending his free time outdoors, in and out of the water, and he rang in the new year by boating on vacation.
Daniel Suarez: Whether it’s through cycling, hiking on trails or enjoying
beautiful views, Daniel Suarez enjoys the outdoors and its relaxing nature.
Aric Almirola: Aric Almirola loves the outdoors and enjoys being in the mountains at any time of the year. He spent part of the offseason skiing with his family.
Austin Dillon: Through Bass Pro Shops’ Johnny Morris and grandfather Richard Childress, Austin Dillon developed a fondness for the outdoors and currently spends his free time hunting and fishing.
Chase Elliott: Chase Elliott has recently taken up fly-fishing as a hobby, and he also spends time experiencing the outdoors as a solo pilot.
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If you have an RV, dogs that love to travel and enjoy motorsports, you have nearly everything necessary to be a NASCAR fan. And you’d have a lot in common with Kevin and Amiee Taylor of Palmetto, Florida.
The couple, who married three years ago, are certainly not novices when it comes to RVing. For the past seven years, they have traveled extensively in their first RV, but upgrading to a Nemar Dutch Star, 43-footer, was the right decision at the right time.
And of course, their two dogs are always with them. Their companions are a 7-year-old English bulldog named “Harley”, who is carving out his own niche as a star, especially at NASCAR tracks, and 2-year-old “Jasmine,” a black Lab mix, with a very heart-warming story about how she was rescued and came to live with Kevin and Amiee.
Harley loves traveling. When the couple attends NASCAR races, friends they meet at the track have gotten to know and love the dog. They regularly stop by to give the bulldog treats and in some cases have even made breakfast for him. The story of the rescue of their second dog, Jasmine, could easily be an episode of any animal-oriented TV show.
Amiee had a black Lab that she was forced to have put down due to illness. It ended up being an emotionwrought two years spent looking for another black Lab, with no luck. That is until a chance meeting during a camping trip.
While staying in a cabin in Tennessee, Amiee could hear a dog howling. She became curious that it sounded like it was in crisis. Friends who were staying in a nearby cabin, explained that they presumed the dog had no owner and was alone in the woods. Further investigation brought the animal in question and Amiee together. To her delight, the dog was a black Lab.
The dog Amiee greeted was covered with fleas and ticks, was underfed and dehydrated. Further evaluation by a vet showed the dog had life-threatening heartworms, a double ear infection and a broken toe. Still, there was a bond beginning between Amiee and the dog she would later take home. Then, the owner showed up demanding the dog be returned to him. When asked how Jasmine had gotten into such a state of ill-health, he explained that he traveled regularly and was absent from his property for long periods of time.
Kevin intervened and tried everything to get the owner to release Jasmine to Amiee. Nothing worked, so Amiee told the owner she would keep his dog for a year, heal it and bring it back. However, she also gave him the list of medications that would need to be administered
■ Kevin and Amiee Taylor of Palmetto, Florida, will take their Nemar Dutch Star to multiple NASCAR races in 2023.
■ A look inside the Taylor’s Nemar Dutch Star 43-foot RV.
■ Harley and Jasmine live a dog’s life while on the road with Kevin and Amiee Taylor.
to Jasmine on a regular basis.
Upon hearing this, knowing his travel schedule and seeing the emotional decision Amiee was willing to make, and the bond growing between the two of them, the dog’s owner finally released Jasmine to Amiee and Kevin.
Jasmine is now a relaxed and happy member of the Taylor family.
The couple are also avid racing enthusiasts. Kevin started riding and racing motorcycles when he was 7 and now restores muscle cars. He likes the openness and friendly nature of the NASCAR drivers. Amiee became a fan partly on her husband’s passion for the sport but likes how loyal the NASCAR fans are. She is also enthused when she hears the national anthem performed at races.
The couple plans to attend keynote NASCAR races this year, at Daytona, Atlanta and Talladega. Amiee recently retired from the educational field and Kevin has had his own commercial painting business for many years, allowing them to regularly travel to NASCAR races.
Of course, their dogs go along and are greeted by their ever-increasing number of fans. It’s all part of being a NASCAR fan: the RV, dogs that like to travel and a love of racing.
Kevin, Aimee, Harley and Jasmine – soon to be on the road again.
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What good is an RV or camper without a quality power source? In short: not much. No need to fear, though. Dragonfly Energy’s Battle Born Batteries brand is a proven solution that’s noted for its extended lifespan, light weight, ecofriendliness and ability to charge quickly and stay charged for long periods.
Battle Born Batteries harnesses the power of lithium iron phosphate – one of the safest chemistries of lithium that’s available – unlike the more common lead-acid batteries that weigh an extra 40 to 50 pounds, have the potential to harm the environment, require more time to charge and last nowhere near as long in terms of overall usage in years and how they long they carry a charge.
Battle Born Batteries can last up to 15 years – roughly three to five times longer than most lead-acid batteries – and they come with a 10-year warranty. Battle Born lithium-ion batteries also charge about five times faster than the typical leadacid alternative.
“The biggest advantage of making the switch to lithium is upgrading your power system so that you can camp with freedom--so that you can camp anywhere you want to go,” said Dragonfly Energy Chief Marketing Officer Tyler Bourns, whose company is headquartered in Reno, Nevada, employs more than
180 people and has been in business around 10 years. “If you want to boondock or you want to explore remote areas, you have the ability to do just that, and you have the ability to do it in the comfort that you deserve. You can run a coffee pot in the morning without turning on a generator and annoying your neighbors to do it. If you need air conditioning when it’s really hot outside, you can do it. The upgrade to your power system is massive – and the freedom you get when not having to worry about it is priceless.
“RVers who still utilize traditional lead acid batteries have to replace them every couple of years, have to regularly maintain them, and are consumed with worry that they’re going to damage their power source when out camping. That’s no way to spend time traveling or off-grid.”
Enabling widespread deployment of cutting-edge technology and making green, renewable energy available to anyone is Battle Born Batteries’ overarching goal.
“When you look at lead acid, it’s dirty and it’s toxic. It’s one of those things that ends up in a landfill when it’s not supposed to, and can really hurt the environment in a mass way,” Bourns said. “Having a solution that is safe and non-toxic … and that poses no risk to the environment is important. The safety in Battle Born lithium-ion batteries is tremendous. People are sleeping on top of these batteries, putting them under their beds, inside of their rigs, and inside of their vans, so having something that you can trust to be by your family, that is vital.”
If there’s one group for which Battle Born Batteries seems especially tailor-made, it’s NASCAR fans – especially the hundreds, if not thousands, who pitch their campers and RVs at the race track every race weekend from mid-February through early November.
“I think we’re a perfect fit for the NASCAR audience,” Bourns said. “We are a USA-based company that cares about putting Americans to work, building quality products, and offering hands-on support to our customers. While it starts with all of that, we’re also put much of our efforts into supporting veterans and veterans’ organizations around the country.
“When you look at NASCAR events, it’s a huge place for RVing –a lot of fans traveling in their RVs or bringing their truck campers down. Not only do I think the NASCAR audience share our values, but I think they share a need where our product can really improve their experiences going to NASCAR events, races and then camping in their great rigs outside of that as well.”
One of the most notable new driver/team pairings for the 2023 NASCAR Cup Series season is “new” in name only. In fact, the driver and his boss even share a last name.
That driver, of course, is Ty Gibbs and the team is Joe Gibbs Racing – the organization owned by Ty’s grandfather, NASCAR Hall of Famer Joe Gibbs. It’s also the team that Ty, who turned 19 in October, has competed for the past two seasons in the NASCAR Xfinity Series – first on a part-time basis and then full time.
The 2022 season featured major peaks and valleys and just about everything in between for Gibbs, who remarkably won seven races on the way to a championship that he solidified with a convincing victory in the season finale at Phoenix Raceway. But sadly, triumph turned to tragedy just
a few hours later when Ty’s father, Coy – a Joe Gibbs Racing executive – died unexpectedly in his sleep at the age of 49. Despite being the target of major criticism at times last season for his aggressive style of driving that often led to bad outcomes for fellow competitors, Gibbs received a tremendous outpouring of support from the NASCAR community in the days and weeks after his father’s passing. What all this means for the season ahead and how he’ll perform in his first full season at the Cup Series level is anyone’s best guess. More certain is that Gibbs will be in top-notch equipment and be surrounded by veteran teammates in Martin Truex Jr. and Denny Hamlin who will be willing to help show him the way.
While Ty Gibbs’ promotion to the NASCAR Cup Series a season after winning the Xfinity Series championship is big, these four drivers made offseason moves that are arguably just as significant.
THE 2022 XFINITY SERIES CHAMPIONSHIP runner-up to Ty Gibbs, Noah Gragson put on a driving clinic in NASCAR’s No. 2 division last season when he won a series-high eight races for JR Motorsports. Gragson’s new home for his first full season in the Cup Series is Petty GMS, where he’ll get to learn from two seven-time Cup Series champion bosses –Richard Petty and Jimmie Johnson.
AFTER 15 MOSTLY REMARKABLE YEARS AT Joe Gibbs Racing, Kyle Busch joined forces with Richard Childress Racing for 2023 when JGR was unable to grant him a contract extension. Although Busch and new team owner Richard Childress haven’t always seen eye to eye, all that seems to be in the past as both parties believe they can accomplish a lot together.
THE DRIVER WHO KYLE BUSCH IS REPLACING in Richard Childress Racing’s No. 8 Chevrolet, Tyler Reddick caught a lot of people by surprise last summer when he announced he was leaving RCR for 23XI Racing. Although initial plans called for Reddick to join the Denny Hamlin- and Michael Jordan-owned team in 2024, the plan changed and he was able to make the switch a year
DEMOTED TO A PART-TIME CRAFTSMAN
Truck Series schedule in 2022 after three seasons in the Cup Series, Ryan Preece has something to prove as the new driver of the No. 41 StewartHaas Racing Ford. Along with his truck duties, Preece spent last year doing simulator work for SHR, so he’s plenty familiar with the Tony Stewart co-owned organization. Whether that will translate to success remains to be seen.
TYLER REDDICKWithout question, second-generation NASCAR driver John Hunter Nemechek – retired Cup Series wheelman Joe Nemechek’s son – has become quite the journeyman over the last several years.
After two full seasons in the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series followed by one part-time and one full-time campaign in the NASCAR Xfinity Series, Nemechek made the natural jump to the NASCAR Cup Series in 2020.
But after a mostly disappointing rookie effort in NASCAR’s premier division with Front Row Motorsports, Nemechek returned to trucks and has won a total of seven races over the past two seasons with Kyle Busch Motorsports.
But when KBM announced late last season that it was switching from Toyotas to Chevrolets, Toyota made a push to
THE SON OF 2002 DAYTONA 500 WINNER WARD Burton, Jeb Burton is competing for his third team in as many seasons as he assumes the wheel of Jordan Anderson Racing’s new No. 27 Chevrolet. Burton enjoyed a career season at Kaulig Racing in 2021 when he notched Xfinity Series win No. 1 and finished 10th in points, but he didn’t record a single top-10 finish last year at Our Motorsports.
A FOURTH-GENERATION DRIVER WHO’S THE grandson of the late Dale Earnhardt, Jeffrey Earnhardt will run the full Xfinity Series season for Alpha Prime Racing after starting 13 of 33 races last season with various other teams. One of those races – the spring event at Talladega – proved quite memorable as Jeffrey finished a career-best second in a black No. 3 car patterned after the one his grandfather made famous.
keep Nemechek and was ultimately successful in that endeavor when he landed back in the Xfinity Series – this time with Toyota’s flagship operation, Joe Gibbs Racing.
It’s been quite the whirlwind the past few years for Nemechek, but in 2023, he’s bound to have the best equipment in which he’s ever competed. Will strong results and a future move back to the Cup Series – perhaps with JGR – follow? That’ll play out in time, but Nemechek couldn’t be more pumped to be going full-time Xfinity Series racing with JGR, a company he made cameo Xfinity Series starts for in both 2021 and 2022 and even won with at Texas Motor Speedway.
“JGR is a group that I know I can win with after getting that win at Texas in 2021,” Nemechek said. “I’m excited to get to work on the 2023 season.”
FLYING HIGH AFTER AN EXTREMELY successful season in the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series, Chandler Smith is moving up to the Xfinity Series to take over the No. 16 Kaulig Racing Chevrolet that went to Victory Lane 10 times over the past two seasons with A.J. Allmendinger. Smith deserves the promotion, having won five Truck Series races since 2021 and finished third in the 2022 standings with Kyle Busch Motorsports.
KYLE BUSCH MOTORSPORTS HAS A NEW look this season – and not just because the team has switched from Toyota to Chevrolet. Also new is KBM’s driver lineup featuring youngsters Chase Purdy and Jack Wood, who collectively have nary a top-10 finish over their combined 87 starts in NASCAR’s No. 3 division. Obviously, the bar will be much higher for both at KBM – a perennial championship contender.
CHASE PURDY & JACK WOOD CRAFTSMAN TRUCK SERIES JEB BURTON XFINITY SERIES CHANDLER SMITH XFINITY SERIES JEFFREY EARNHARDT XFINITYJohn Hunter Nemechek is hardly the only Xfinity Series or Craftsman Truck Series driver sporting new digs this year. Get to know these other five drivers on the move.
With 2022 NASCAR Xfinity Series champion Ty Gibbs and runner-up Noah Gragson graduated to the next level, the way has been cleared for others to shine in 2023. Here are five contenders worth watching.
BY JARED TURNER1Josh Berry: A longtime JR Motorsports Late Model stock car standout whom team owner Dale Earnhardt Jr. promoted to the Xfinity Series full time in 2022, Josh Berry made the most of the opportunity by capturing a trio of victories and reaching the Championship 4. Although Berry fell short in his title quest, he’s a favorite to win it all in 2023.
Justin Allgaier: Xfinity Series veteran Justin Allgaier has come close to winning a championship on multiple occasions, only to come up a little short. It happened again in 2022 when the JR Motorsports driver made the Championship 4 but finished third among the title contenders. If Allgaier can take it up just a notch this season, he’ll be well-positioned to finally claim the big prize.
Sheldon Creed: After winning eight races and a championship in his final two seasons in the Craftsman Truck Series, Sheldon Creed appeared more than ready for a jump to the Xfinity Series in 2022. The transition proved difficult, however, as Creed went winless, missed the playoffs and finished 14th in points. He’s back for a second season with Richard Childress Racing in hopes of much better results.
Daniel Hemric: After winning the 2021 Xfinity Series title with Joe Gibbs Racing, Daniel Hemric took a step back a year ago after moving to Kaulig Racing. Hemric finished ninth in the standings, failing to win a race or even reach the Round of 8. He’ll once again pilot Kaulig’s No. 11 Chevrolet in 2023, with a goal of returning to Victory Lane and championship-contending
Brandon Jones: Brandon Jones missed the Championship 4 in heartbreaking fashion a year ago when he was punted on the final lap of the fall Martinsville playoff race by then-Joe Gibbs Racing teammate Ty Gibbs. Since then, Jones has transitioned to JR Motorsports – JGR’s main rival – where he’ll drive the No. 9 Chevrolet that Noah Gragson wheeled to a series-high eight wins and a runner-up finish last year.
1Zane Smith: After being the championship bridesmaid in back-to-back seasons, Zane Smith completed his climb to the top of the Craftsman Truck Series in 2022 by winning the title that had twice so narrowly eluded him. Smith returns to NASCAR’s No. 3 division and Front Row Motorsports with his eyes set on joining veteran Matt Crafton as the only driver to claim consecutive Truck Series championships.
Ben Rhodes: After just missing out on winning his second Craftsman Truck Series title in a row, 2022 runner-up Ben Rhodes will seek to reclaim possession of the series’ biggest prize. While Rhodes will be back in his familiar No. 99 truck at ThorSport Racing, he’ll be driving a Ford rather than a Toyota and have a new face atop his pit box in crew chief Jerrod Prince.
Grant Enfinger: One of the Craftsman Truck Series’ most consistent performers in recent years, Grant Enfinger will look to earn a place among the Championship 4 as he last did in 2020. This year will be Enfinger’s second run with GMS Racing, a perennial championship contender that he celebrated a lone victory with in 2022 on the way to a seventh-place points finish.
Matt Crafton: Will this be the year that threetime Craftsman Truck Series champion Matt Crafton finally calls it quits? Crafton, who turns 47 in June, made his series debut with a single start in 2000 and has run the full schedule in every season since – amassing a series record 521 starts. Despite going winless in four of the last five years, Crafton remains competitive, and that’ll likely continue this year.
Hailie Deegan: Fan-favorite Hailie Deegan begins her third full season in trucks at a new home – ThorSport Racing – after spending years one and two competing for team owner David Gilliland. Deegan, who has no top-five results and three top-10 finishes in 46 truck starts, will drive ThorSport’s No. 13 Ford with a goal of establishing herself as a contender with the five-time championship-winning organization.
The NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series has a new title sponsor for 2023, but look for some familiar faces to be near the top. Up next are a handful of drivers to keep a close eye on.
BY JARED TURNER
For years, Michael McDowell was eagerly awaiting NASCAR’s Next Gen race car. With his road course prowess and the Next Gen car driving similar to a sports car, McDowell believed it would be in his wheelhouse.
McDowell’s inkling proved to be correct in year one of the Next Gen era.
In his fifth full-time season driving the No. 34 Ford for Front Row Motorsports, the Arizona native had his best Cup Series season. While he never got to spray champagne in Victory Lane like he did at the 2021 Daytona 500, McDowell set ablaze his previous records.
He tied his single-season high of two top-five finishes, and his 12 top-10 efforts shattered his previous benchmark of five (2021). His 67 laps led were more than the previous three seasons combined.
But for the third time in as many seasons, McDowell enters the year with a new crew chief. Blake Harris departed the No. 34 team for Hendrick Motorsports, and Travis Peterson joined Front Row during the offseason to fill his position. Previously, Peterson was the engineer on Chris Buescher’s No. 17 car at RFK Racing.
Despite the turnover, the 38-year-old McDowell believes the team can still accomplish great feats this season, and can win on multiple layouts.
COMING OFF A YEAR IN WHICH YOU SCORED 12 TOP-10 FINISHES AND HAD A CAREER HIGH IN LAPS LED, HOW WOULD YOU SUM UP THE 2022 SEASON?
Overall, it was a great year. I don’t want to say that it wasn’t. But without getting a win and without getting into the playoffs, it doesn’t feel like you achieved the goal. That’s always the goal is to win a race, and winning will typically get you into the playoffs. I’m really proud of the effort and the results that we did get and how much speed we brought to the race track. We put together a lot of quality races and a lot of top 10s.
It was our best season to date, minus getting a win and getting into the playoffs.
HOW MUCH DO YOU PAY ATTENTION TO YOUR STATISTICS?
I think statistics are important, because if you’re going to have goals, you have to be able to measure those goals. Stats are a great way of helping that, but stats don’t always tell the full story. It doesn’t tell you completely where you’re at, but it’s a good indication.
One of the goals for us last year going into the season was more top 10s than the year before. We were able to accomplish that. To run top 10, you’re going to have to be in that top 15 a lot. And in order to run inside the top five, you’re going to have to run in the top 10 a lot. And to win races, you’re going to have to run in the top five a lot. I know it sounds elementary, but the more that you run in the top 10, the more opportunities you’re going to have at top-five finishes. Now, I feel like our goal is more top-five results because that’s what is going to be the opportunity to win a race and that’s what it’s going to take.
LEADING UP TO THE 2022 SEASON, YOU THOUGHT IT HAD THE POTENTIAL TO BE A BREAKOUT SEASON BECAUSE OF THE NEXT GEN CAR. WHY WERE YOU SO CONFIDENT?
My confidence came from knowing that everybody was starting with the same bits and pieces, and nobody had had a full year to figure it out. I knew we had quality people at Front Row Motorsports, and I knew if we had equal equipment that we would be better than we were the previous years.
The real test is coming this year, in regards to how much development has happened with this car and whether the big teams have found that next step that some of the small teams haven’t. Last year, starting off fresh, by the time we got to the end of the season, I didn’t feel that we were in a deficit to the big teams. If that stays the same, then I think we can have a great year and challenge for wins.
YOU LOST BLAKE HARRIS TO HENDRICK MOTORSPORTS. HOW VITAL WAS HE IN MAKING THE NO. 34 TEAM A FREQUENT FRONTRUNNER?
I think Blake did an incredible job and was an asset for sure, but it’s not just one person that moves the needle that much. My car chief last year, Ryan Bergenty, he’s a big part of the success and the other 68 people at Front Row that put the cars together are all a part of it. I don’t feel like it’s one person, but Blake, in particular, did a great job and it was a great season. I don’t feel at a loss right now with where we’re at.
TRAVIS PETERSON JOINS FRM AFTER SPENDING THE LAST FIVE YEARS WITH RFK RACING. HOW WELL HAVE YOU GOTTEN TO KNOW HIM DURING THE OFFSEASON?
Well, over the offseason, everybody has 50 different agendas and trying to get things done. The biggest thing is, spending that time and getting to know each other. He’s fired up and ready to go. You can tell he has that burning desire to win and that’s three-quarters of what you need to be successful at it.
HOW MUCH INVOLVEMENT DID YOU HAVE IN SELECTING YOUR CREW CHIEF?
For the last few years, I’ve had a pretty big involvement in that. I’ve had the freedom to get whoever I felt like was going to be the best fit. That’s a group decision, but I feel like a large part of that.
WHAT ARE SOME REALISTIC GOALS ENTERING THE NEW YEAR?
Realistic goals are to get to Victory Lane and build on some of the success from last year, especially on the road courses. A big goal for me is to win one of the road courses. I felt like we were close at 75 percent of them last year, so if we can put it all together and have good pit stops and do everything we need to do, I think we can challenge for wins there.
Just keep the momentum up by running consistently near the front. Hopefully more top-five finishes than we had last year. That’s the big goal: top-five finishes and wins. We’re going to be working hard to see where we end up. It’s going to be a battle and we won’t really know until we get through the west coast swing of what we need to work on.
THIS IS YOUR SIXTH SEASON WITH FRONT ROW. AT THIS POINT IN YOUR CAREER, WHAT MORE WOULD YOU HAVE TO ACCOMPLISH?
I feel like every year you’re pushing to be a little bit better, and I don’t feel like I have to accomplish anything to feel like I’ve done my job here. But I don’t feel like we’re finished yet. I want to be able to consistently challenge for wins, and not just at superspeedways where I felt like last year we did. I don’t think we’re done here and there’s still a lot of room for growth. I don’t feel like we’ve hit our plateau or our cap. There’s still a lot for us to do.
HOW DOES THE RECENT SUCCESS OF TEAMMATES ZANE SMITH AND TODD GILLILAND IMPACT YOU?
Them being successful is important for me to be successful with the morale in the shop. The truck program was huge for that last year. It was great with Zane running well last year. I don’t really worry about that. The best way to say it is, I haven’t had a teammate beat me yet and I don’t think it’s going to happen anytime soon. So I’m not too worried about my job status.
DO YOU ASPIRE TO EVENTUALLY DRIVE FOR A BIGGER TEAM?
Yes and no. I want to win races and win championships. If we can do that here, then that would be ideal. I feel like we’re building and growing, and I feel like I’m a part of that. I have a lot of freedom in going to find the guys I want to find and doing the things I want to do. I don’t feel limited here. At the same time, if the opportunity arose and I was able to get into a championship caliber program, it would be hard not to look at it. There’s so much that has to happen for all of those things to come together. I just try to stay in the moment and focus on my job and do it well and let everything else take care of itself.
In his first season as a full-time NASCAR Xfinity Series driver, Josh Berry dazzled his way to three wins, a Championship 4 appearance and a fourth-place finish in the final 2022 standings.
Based on those impressive results, one might assume the JR Motorsports driver was fairly satis fied, right? Fat chance.
While Berry is thankful to have enjoyed such a strong 2022 season and have an opportunity to compete full time in the Xfinity Series after spending a decade as a mostly Late Model driver, he’s far from content as it pertains to what he hopes to accomplish in his racing career.
Not only does the native of Hendersonville, Tennessee, want to win a championship in the Xfinity Series, he also harbors dreams of a suc cessful career in the NASCAR Cup Series – despite being 32 years old and well above the typical age of a Cup Series rookie.
In a wide-ranging exclusive interview with NAS CAR Pole Position Magazine in early January, Berry opened up about his aspirations for the future, rem inisced about how he came to know his famous boss and team owner – Dale Earnhardt Jr. – and reflected on his days as a Late Model racer and some of the trouble he got himself into.
YOU SPENT OVER A DECADE IN LATE MODELS BEFORE GETTING AN OPPORTUNITY TO MOVE UP. HOW DID YOU STAY PATIENT?
In the beginning part of my experience in a Late Model car, I think that I had some pretty high aspirations of hopefully being able to make it to the Xfinity Series. I got a couple of starts here or there, but nothing ever materialized. We weren’t able to put all the pieces together to in my eyes give me a legitimate shot. I was given opportunities – a race here, a race there – but it was hard to adapt and make something happen in that quick of time.
So I kind of slowly transitioned more into feeling like I was just going to be a career short-track racer. I was OK with that, and I kind of relished that opportunity. I tried to accomplish and get as much out of that as I could while I was racing. Then it kind of came full circle again, getting another opportunity back in the Xfinity Series. It requires a lot of patience, but I was having an amazing time racing what I was racing, and we were experiencing a lot of success and won a lot of huge short-track races. So when I think back on that, I don’t find it frustrating or anything like that at all. It just was what the timing was meant to be for me.
We both share a passion and a hobby for online racing. It really wasn’t even iRacing back then. iRacing was in the infant stages, I guess, but we all transitioned to iRacing, and Dale and I struck up a friendship and got to know each other a little bit, and we talked and he kind of asked what I did and what I raced and all that. It seems like a blur because it was so long ago, but ultimately that ended up turning into our conversations.
The (JR Motorsports) Late Model program at that time basically needed a driver and was kind of at an interesting point or crossroads there, and they were kind of looking for somebody else to stick in there and see how it was going to go. I got the opportunity to go test at Motor Mile Speedway in Virginia with those guys, and the test went well and they let me race a couple of times, and kind of the rest was history, I guess.
WERE YOU A BANK TELLER AT SOME POINT?
Yeah, I actually got an opportunity to work at a bank for a little while when I was still in high school, and when I graduated, I stayed working there for a little bit. I probably worked there like a year, but I did do it. That’s all true. Looking at my life, that was a pretty brief stint there. When I moved to North Carolina and began full-time racing, I guess you could say, and I went to work at JR Motorsports, I left that job to move here, which was a pretty easy decision.
BEING A BANK TELLER IS ABOUT AS FAR FROM BEING A RACE CAR DRIVER AS IT GETS, RIGHT?
It’s a lot different, but it was fun. I think back on that, and I learned a lot in that year or so about just life and banking and money, so it was a good experience.
WERE YOU SURPRISED AT ALL BY LAST YEAR’S SUCCESS?
I don’t think so. After my part-time (Xfinity Series) opportunity in 2021 and even kind of being in a substitute role a handful of times, I felt like I was positioned to have a good year. You just don’t know how good of a year that’ll be, right? It’s your first full-time season, and I think we checked a lot of boxes of things that we want to do. Winning three times and transferring into the Championship 4 checked a lot of boxes for us. Obviously, we wanted to win and we wanted to compete for a championship. Ultimately, we didn’t win the championship, but we feel like there’s a lot of room for improvement for me.
HOW LONG DID IT TAKE YOU TO GET OVER THE DISAPPOINTMENT OF NOT WINNING THE CHAMPIONSHIP?
I don’t know that I’ve really completely gotten over it. Really, all you can expect in that moment is your best effort, and we really didn’t have that. I think, really, going into that race, that’s all I was hoping for. I knew if we could put together our best race, we’d be in contention. But we just kind of struggled from the get-go. Just didn’t really have a good practice, didn’t have a good qualifying or start of the race. We made progress through the field and got up there, but we just weren’t where we needed to be. It’s tough, but you’ve got to move on from it pretty quick. It definitely was a learning experience for me, and going into this year, I think it’s going to be a source of a lot of motivation for all of us.
HOW MANY LATE MODEL RACES HAVE YOU ENTERED?
I don’t really even know. I think that would take some figuring up. I’ve won 95. I don’t know what my winning percentage is, but I’m sure it’s nothing too crazy. It’s probably 400 or 500 races pretty easily, I would think.
ONE OF YOUR LATE MODEL COMPETITORS ONCE CALLED YOU THE BIGGEST JOKE EVER IN RACING. HOW DID THAT COME ABOUT AND WHAT WAS YOUR REACTION?
There was some excitement in that race. Gosh, that was years ago, but, yeah, me and Lee Pulliam – he’s a really well-respected and accomplished short-track racer – me and him had a little bit of an altercation, I guess you could say, and he went on a little bit of a Twitter rant there, but it’s all part of the past, I guess.
DID THIS SERVE AS MOTIVATION FOR YOU MOVING FORWARD?
I think I learned a lot from that experience. I was a lot younger and that was a pretty prestigious and important race to win, so I think in the moment toward the end of that race, I was just trying to do a little too much with what I had and ended up getting into Lee and we ended up all tangled up.
Looking back on it, you’ve gotta learn from those experiences. It’s one that I wish I had over, but you’ve just got to take those as they are and learn from them and be better the next time.
DO YOU DO ANYTHING BESIDES RACE?
Not really. I’ve never found a hobby that really sticks like that. When I was a kid, I’d come home from school and work on our go-kart or Legend Car or whatever it was at the time, in the evenings, and that’s just how I grew up. I never really found a real hobby. I know people golf and play basketball or whatever, but when I was young, any extra time I had we either spent racing or spent preparing to race, and that’s kind of what I’ve always done. Now I’m older and married and have a 3-year-old and extra time is spent with her, but that’s really about it, I guess.
DO YOU STILL HARBOR CUP SERIES ASPIRATIONS?
Yeah, I think so. I still think about it and hope that that could happen. The age thing, I guess in a way it works against me, but I don’t really necessarily let that eat at me too much. I just feel like if I go out and do a good job and win races and stay up front, I feel like some sort of opportunity will come my way. So my focus is to do everything I can to be prepared and win these Xfinity Series races and do a good job for my team and my partners and just see what happens.
Zane Smith enters the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series season with high expectations. Not only is he confident he can become a back-to-back champion, he’s also getting his feet wet in the NASCAR Cup Series.
Smith was a highly touted prospect as a teenager, and he’s now enjoying the success that NASCAR industry insiders believed he would have. When he first entered NASCAR’s top-three divisions, he went straight to the Xfinity Series with JR Motorsports and stood out in just 10 starts. The success at JRM led him to GMS Racing, where he finished runner-up in the Truck Series two years in a row.
Then, Smith left the Chevrolet camp to compete with Ford and Front Row Motorsports, a move that gave him a clear path to the Cup Se ries. Now, a year later, Smith is a NASCAR Crafts man Truck Series champion, and the team is also running him in a part-time Cup Series entry.
WHAT’S IT LIKE TO FINALLY BE A TRUCK SERIES CHAMPION? It means so much that I can’t even describe it. People don’t understand how hard it is to get to the Championship 4. It’s really hard to capitalize on that day. People are like, “You just have to be better than the other three.” But typically, those other three are second, third and fourth. It comes down to winning a race. You have to go into the race with a mindset of this is a must-win. That’s what we did and we fully executed. That’s what makes me most proud.
YOU WERE CONFIDENT BEFORE YOU EVEN DROVE A FRONT ROW MOTORSPORTS TRUCK. WHAT MADE YOU SO CONFIDENT RIGHT AWAY?
I knew we would have the opportunity to win races. It’s so hard to go into a new team and say, “We’re going to win a championship.” You can’t say that if you haven’t won them in the past. I was waiting to see what the year brought and we fired our year off with a win at Daytona.
That brought so much momentum, locking us in the playoffs right away. We followed up with a few more wins right after that. We won the regular-season championship and each and every weekend, we contended. It says so much about our race team in general. I’m just extremely happy we finished our year off as strong as we could.
YOUR CUP SERIES DEBUT CAME AT WORLD WIDE TECHNOLOGY RACEWAY IN 2022, TOO. WHAT WAS IT LIKE TO GET THE CALL FROM RFK?
That was wild, for sure. Opportunities happen when you least expect them. I was packing my bag and just told my fiancée that she should probably stay home to watch the dog this weekend since we were in the middle of our eight-week stretch. I just got a random phone call. It happened to be from Brad Keselowski, and he just came right out with it.
It was such a cool experience, and it’s something I’ve dreamed about since I was a little kid. I’m so happy I was able to get there. I wish I had my family and friends there – I had some, but it was so last minute and hard to get there. I did exactly what I wanted to do, and I felt like I learned so much. I was pretty excited about a 17th-place finish. I came down pit road, seeing how excited everyone else was, and I realized how big of a deal that was.
The Cup Series deal is tough, as it should be. To come home 17th with a brand-new team in a seat I barely fit in, I was happy about that.
THAT WAS ESSENTIALLY A WARM UP FOR 2023’S PART-TIME CUP SERIES SCHEDULE. HOW EXCITED ARE YOU FOR THAT?
I’m pretty stoked. It’s going to be a lot of fun, especially because I’m doing it with my truck team – my crew chief, my engineer, my car chief – everybody who’s on my truck will be on my Cup Series car as well. We’re going to be learning together. AFTER YOUR CUP SERIES DEBUT, WAS THERE A SENSE OF ADDED CONFIDENCE, KNOWING YOU CAN RUN WITH THE TOP TEAMS?
Not initially. Brad Keselowski is probably one of the smartest people I’ve ever met. The advice he gave me went a long way. He said, “Hey, you have nothing to prove. You already proved it with me calling you.” Those 400 miles, I learned so much in bettering myself.
If you think you’re good on pit road, you’re not. If you think
you’re good on restarts, no you’re not. When you feed yourself to the wolves like that, which I’ve done throughout my career since I was a little kid, you learn right away. I was thrown into the deep end. I’m super fortunate to have been raised that way, and I’m getting to experience that at an older age.
WHAT ARE YOUR GOALS FOR THIS YEAR’S CRAFTSMAN TRUCK SERIES SEASON?
I don’t know, but we have a lot of momentum right now. It should be a really good year, but it’s going to be hard to match the year we had. We can’t rest on what we’ve done. We have to keep grinding. We have to be ready to execute. It’s going to be a busy year and it’s going to be tough. I really want to win back-to-back championships. I want to win the final Camping World Truck Series championship – like I did – and then win the return of the Craftsman Truck Series.
I’ve won on every type of race track our series brings besides a dirt track, and I have one attempt to do that this year. I want to win another regular-season championship and contend in the Championship 4.
YOU
Back in the day, yes, the layout was Truck, Xfinity and Cup. People don’t realize now that the Cup Series car is so far apart from anything – team owners will tell you this – it doesn’t make a whole lot of sense to go to Xfinity Series unless you’re already in it.
You’re almost racing time. I don’t think it’s any tougher and if anything, I think over the last couple of years, the Truck Series has been tougher. The Xfinity Series – at times – is tougher than the Truck Series. There are times when Xfinity has an absolutely stacked field with most of Hendrick in the field. The trucks have that, as well, with Kyle (Busch) and Ross (Chastain). My experience in that one race was that it raced more like a truck than anything with the dirty air side of things.
Now that I have that Truck Series championship, one day, I’m going to want to chase a Xfinity Series championship. I know there are a few guys wanting to do that – Kyle and Martin Truex possibly – who will go back and try to win all three championships. That’s a main goal of mine, but I’m not in a huge hurry to get to Cup. I’m having so much fun and I’m taking advantage of my age. I’m simply enjoying life and collecting trophies.
I’ve been with some great race teams and Front Row certainly fits in that category. It’s been cool to see our partnerships grow throughout the year. Front Row is obviously one of the smaller teams, and I guess you’d consider it one of the underdog teams. That’s what makes it cool when we accomplish what we did last year, or with what Michael McDowell has done.
It’s just been really cool to see how excited the sponsors are to be part of it. Everyone wants to be part of an underdog story. I guess we’re an underdog to the naked eye, but the effort of the people who grind here are just as good as anyone else. I’ll put them up against anyone else, especially with the team that I have on my truck.
Twelve years ago, Russell Byrnes, a longtime race fan, had a captivating idea. The world of motorsports artwork was slim, and he wanted to address the issue. Byrnes created Linear Edge, a company that prides itself on designing innovative and unique wall sculptures for motorsports enthusiasts.
Byrnes, president and owner of Linear Edge, has a background in high-end, residential architecture. He knows how to operate a CNC machine and began creating two-dimensional wooden race tracks, with the first being the Mugello Circuit, a 15-turn road course in Italy.
“It’s probably the hardest one to make because of the way it turns back on itself so many times and with how tight it is,” Byrnes said. “That was a good one to start, because if you can make that, you can make any of them.”
Byrnes saw a hole in the marketplace. He believed the only motorsports artwork out there were posters and die-cast cars, but nothing that was “refined.” He believes his company’s artwork fills that void. Following the inception of the 2D products, Linear Edge created 3D tracks along with car and track engravings. The latest products to hit the market are the wrapped canvases and phone cases in 4 different camo patterns of race tracks.
Linear Edge is based out of Dallas, Texas, but doesn’t have a storefront. Instead, Byrnes has licensing agreements with the majority of race tracks in North America. Linear Edge is currently working with those tracks to make them available on site at each track.
BY DUSTIN ALBINO“A lot of the major tracks have (merchandise trailers) where they sell their stuff,” Byrnes said “They don’t really sell anything like this at any of the tracks. We found that the track sculptures are really popular, especially with guys that do track days. Road courses, specifically, have a unique shape. It’s a way that people like to remember either going to the race or doing a track day.”
The 2D track sculptures are the most popular, Byrnes noted. Depending on how popular the track is, Linear Edge might have a stock of the sculptures ready to be sold. Otherwise, they hit the CNC machine and get their product made.
Within the last 18 to 24 months, Byrnes has inked a licensing agreement with NASCAR to create tracks that the sanctioning body owns.
“This is the first time that I’ve reached out to them to see what would be mutually beneficial,” Byrnes said of becoming a NASCAR licensee.
“If we sell their stuff, of course there are royalties. But if they decide to put our products at their (tracks), then that’s mutually beneficial because it gives them a unique product to offer their customers and generates more revenue than royalties. I started reaching out to see if it made sense for individual tracks to sell the track sculpture online, in person or both. NASCAR does it better than anybody, as far as merchandise.”
Linear Edge has created sculptures of hundreds of race tracks around the world. Daytona International Speedway and Charlotte Motor Speedway are the most popular NASCAR tracks requested.
While other people are deathly afraid of hurricanes, Mike Boylan is literally drawn right into them.
The operative word in that sentence is “into,” as the 49-year-old Boylan, a native of the Tampa, Florida, area, takes storm chasing to a whole new level. While others may chase tornadoes, Boylan is one of the most astute and respected hurricane reporters in the world.
Typically behind the wheel of his tricked out pickup truck, full of radios and equipment, Boylan chases hurricanes from Florida to Texas. But that’s not all. Since 2004, he has produced one of the most accurate and well-read online blogs about hurricanes, simply named “Mike’s Weather Page.”
Boylan has become such a respected expert in hurricane prediction and reporting that folks from Fox, CNN, the Weather Channel, Weather.com and other major weather entities follow Boylan’s page religiously because he oftentimes gets information that they don’t. Even federal, state and local first responders follow the site, particularly when they’re in harm’s way as a hurricane approaches. One of Mike’s most prestigious awards was winning the 2021 Governor’s Hurricane Conference Tropical Meteorology Award. This top honor is usually reserved for top officials in Government agencies.
Boylan’s accuracy on the direction hurricanes will go and where they may potentially make landfall is almost legendary. He oftentimes makes somewhat controversial predictions,
but more often than not, he winds up being right.
Now, you may wonder what reporting about hurricanes has to do with NASCAR racing. Countless NASCAR officials, team executives, drivers, crew chiefs, PR persons and media regularly follow Boylan for weather information that may impact NASCAR tracks in Daytona, Homestead-Miami, Atlanta, Talladega (where Boylan and his family camp in the infield for the October playoff race every year), Darlington, Charlotte, Richmond and Dover.
“To find out that the big dogs are fans and followers, it’s very humbling,” Boylan said.
Now, comes the next level: Boylan will see his website name and logo emblazoned on the hood of the No. 4 JD Motorsports Chevrolet Camaro, driven by Bayley Currey, in the Feb. 18 Beef, It’s What’s For Dinner 300 Xfinity Series race at Daytona International Speedway.
It’s the first time he has sponsored a race car, but Boylan hopes additional opportunities will further spread the name and hurricanic gospel of Mike’s Weather Page.
The design for the car will emphasize hurricane preparedness and awareness, which is right in Boylan’s sweet spot.
“We’re going to have a meet-and-greet with fans, also talk storm awareness,” Boylan said. “Volusia County is going to give me a bunch of stuff to give away about storms and use this type of sponsorship as a good tool to prepare people. Yeah, a lot of them appreciate what I do. There is gonna be a lot of people happy to see the car.”
He’s become so proficient at knowing where to go and what to do to stay safe, especially when he’s in the eye of a hurricane, that his wife and two daughters don’t worry that much about him.
“My wife’s pretty level headed about it,” Boylan said. “She’s realized I’ll make smart decisions. Friends that are sitting there eating popcorn and watching (him chase a hurricane), they say, ‘I can’t believe you went down that road and it was in the water and we were so scared for you.’ And then I call Julie (his wife), and she’s like, ‘No, I went to bed early.’”
But there’s one other aspect of Boylan’s longtime love affair with racing: Since he was 12 years old, he’s been heavily involved in radio-controlled cars, miniature race cars that have their own culture, race events, eager fan base and give car owners a NASCAR-like feel of a need for speed.
Boylan is one of the top individuals in RC racing, including owning and promoting what is considered the sport’s version of the Daytona 500, the annual Snowbird Nationals, which by design is held two weeks before the real Daytona 500. This year’s Snowbird Nationals were run Jan. 31-Feb. 5.
But instead of needing a 2.5-mile high-banked superspeedway, the Snowbird Nationals were held inside a massive hotel ballroom at the Wyndham Orlando (Florida) Resort, just 50 miles from Daytona.
Boylan has even raced RC cars with a number of big names in NASCAR, most notably Hall of Famer Tony Stewart and Carl Edwards.
“Tony grew up racing RC cars,” Boylan said. “In the offseason, he would come to the Snowbirds to race a couple times. He loves this stuff. He always told everybody that RC was just as hard, if not harder, because you become part of the car.”
SHOP ALL BACKUP POWER AND EMERGENCY SUPPLIES
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Mike Boylan lives for speed and power, be it tracking the natural fury of some of the world’s most powerful hurricanes as the owner and publisher of Mike’s Weather Page, following NASCAR or racing radio-controlled cars. Pole Position spoke with Boylan about the intriguing science of hurricanes. Here are some excerpts of that interview:
It’s technically June through November, but it’s more like eight months. The peak months are August, September, October and a little bit of November.
WHAT WAS THE LURE ABOUT HURRICANES THAT SPARKED YOUR INTEREST?
I went to school at the University of South Florida for marketing, and was taking some HTML classes for websites. In 2004, we had four storms out here. It was very active. When (Hurricane) Charlie was coming right toward Tampa Bay at the time, it was crazy trying to find anything on the internet.
We were trying to find spaghetti models and radar and I just got frustrated. So I put together a website to throw these links and images together for myself, I called it Mike’s Weather Page, shared it with friends and fam ily for like a year or two before I even bought the domain (MikesWeatherPage.com, also known as Spaghettimodels.com as well as the same name on Facebook).
(The Weather Channel’s) Jim Cantore calls my website a “one-stop shop.” And once social media got into it, it really grew. We’ve now got more than 2 million followers and people rely upon you, even a guy like Cantore, all the major networks, all the major weather predicting ser vices and so much more.
THIS WAS SUPPOSED TO BE A FUN LITTLE HOBBY, BUT YOU WERE ABLE TO TURN IT INTO A CAREER THAT YOU’VE BEEN DOING NOW FOR NEARLY 20 YEARS. HOW DID THAT HAPPEN?
I never dreamed it. To be quite honest, my ad diction level to hurricanes is the same today as it was when I started it. I’m self-taught, I always tell everybody. I really make a claim that the people that follow me never stress that I’m not an official meteorologist, or that I’m just a weather hobbyist.
WHAT’S YOUR NORMAL DAY IN HURRICANE SEASON, WHEN YOU’RE NOT ACTIVELY CHASING THEM ON THE ROAD? You have to be obsessed. I wake up at five o’clock in the morning and first
thing I do is roll over (to his laptop), look at the weather models and start posting and do a video and will do these updates in Instagram and other social media, usually all the way to all levels of storms.
YOU’RE NOT A CERTIFIED METEOROLOGIST, BUT AT THE SAME TIME, YOU’VE BECOME MORE SUCCESSFUL THAN TRAINED METEOROLOGISTS. DID YOU EVER THINK ABOUT BECOMING A FULL METEOROLOGIST?
I’ve gotten this far doing stuff most meteorologists sometimes can’t, like using a lot of pictures, sharing my life, which can be crazy. The last few years, we’ve met so many fans. It doesn’t matter where we went, there were so many good people, good family people. (If he became a certified meteorologist) I think the personal aspect would probably lose a little bit. What it has done more than anything is it’s made me be able to communicate to people a bazillion times better. I mean, now, when I’m talking about storm surge, I’ve seen storm surge. When we’re talking about Category 4 or 5 winds, I’ve seen those. It’s helped me just be able to communicate more about (a storm’s) potential effects.
DO YOU HAVE ANY TIPS FOR PEOPLE THAT MAY FIND THEMSELVES IN HURRICANES?
The common thing with hurricanes is you hide from the wind, and you run from the water. Roughly ninety percent of all hurricane deaths are water-related. That’s a huge number. So with wind, I position myself to not be around water, and I feel safe with my choices now.
HOW DID YOU REACT DURING THE DEVASTATING CATEGORY 4 HURRICANE IAN IN LATE SEPTEMBER?
It was very rough. There were a couple chasers that went to Fort Myers where the surge came and they lost everything. Like they were clinging on to the second floor of buildings because the water came in 10-, 15feet high. Vehicles flooded and washed away and you’re stranded. And the islands down that way, the roads got washed out.
Mike’s Weather Page is bringing hurricane awareness to this year’s Daytona 500 weekend. The No. 4 Mike’s Weather Page powered by
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Mitch Stapleton, better known to NASCAR fans as Stapleton42, is one of the biggest fan creators on YouTube with more than 240,000 subscribers. Nearly every week, his audience is treated to fascinating content such as an intimate storytelling session with Rusty Wallace, a tour of the International Motorsports Hall of Fame and even a personal tour of Richard Petty’s childhood home. But before all that, he was just a broke college student souping up his dad’s Escalade and hanging with his friends at the drag strip. Mitch sat down with NASCAR Pole Position to give us the origin tale of his NASCAR history series. This is a story of voided warranties, DMing with racing legends and getting hung up on by the Petty Museum.
It started with this LS Escalade. As far as I know, it’s the fastest one in the world. I built that from 2016 to 2019. I started drag racing, just because my Monte Carlo was broken all the time, and my friends were going to the drag strip.
It was supposed to be my dad’s work vehicle if he needed to carry something around, but he never really used it. So he said, “This is what you’re going to drive to college. And if I need to use it, then you’ll take my car to class.” I didn’t have a say in what I drove. He wouldn’t even let me buy my own car, because I wanted to buy something that was a V-8, and he thought I was going to kill myself. So he said, “No, you’re driving this or tough shit.”
I tuned it up without my dad knowing about it because it was under warranty, and he would have kicked my ass if he knew that it was voided. That was just me being young and dumb. He didn’t find out that the warranty was voided until it had a blower on it for about two months. But he wasn’t mad. He figured that if I took the engine out and changed the head gaskets, the camshaft, all this stuff, and drove it around for two months without any problems, then I had proven my worth as my own warranty.
But I knew he never would have let me if I asked him, because everything else I had worked on up until that point didn’t really work that well. I screwed up everything I touched.
Well, that evolved to taking it to the drag strip, which I also was not allowed to do. I was never allowed to do anything remotely dangerous with anything that had wheels. I wasn’t allowed to have a go-kart when I was growing up. I went to NASCAR races with my dad, at least twice a year from 2001 to 2011. So NASCAR was my first passion, my first interest in life, as long as I can remember. I just love everything about it, but I wasn’t allowed to do it. So I just had to put that on the backburner and do something else.
Things just started getting a bunch of attention – getting posted on The Hot Rod Instagram page, 1320 Video and all that stuff. I realized, “Dang, I think I can do something with this thing. My goal at the time was to have it be marketable enough that it could build itself. When I was in college, I had no money. I had to scrounge together what little money I made from detailing cars and stuff in the summer. So I go to the trade shows. I went there with my business cards, and I made a little
packet and all this stuff, and was able to prove my concept enough to gain sponsors to do this big turbo build. The big turbo build is what led to the creation of the YouTube channel.
WHAT WAS THE FIRST BIG BREAKTHROUGH FOR THE CHANNEL?
I started posting on the channel in spring of 2020, and one of the first videos I ever posted that got a large number of views was finding Dale Earnhardt’s old Newell Coach on sale in Nevada. I knew a guy who was selling it for a ridiculous deal, so I was able to get a loan and buy this thing. Because I’m like, “This is going to enable me to get out of Pennsylvania and go where racing is.”
I thought, “Oh man, this is it!” How cool would that be? He only had three of these things and I just found one of them for sale, and it was in a price range that I could handle.
After doing that Earnhardt video, I got to talk to the people at the Newell factory. So I went to the factory to learn more about the stuff, and that’s really where the racing history aspect of it started.
The guy I got it from said he thought that Robert Gordon used to have it, but he didn’t know for sure. But somebody told me, “Well, why don’t you just call Robby Gordon Motorsports and ask him?”
So I did. I told them I had a weird question. I bought this motorhome and somebody told me it used to be Robby’s. Could you be able to confirm or deny that? I told her what it looked like and stuff. She put me on hold for about five minutes, and then someone picks up the phone, and it’s Robby.
He’s like, “Hey, man, I can’t believe you found my old motorhome. I haven’t seen that thing in forever!” Meanwhile, I’m driving this thing, barely staying between the lines, thinking, “Holy shit! I’m talking to Robby Gordon right now! Man, this is cool.”
HOW DID THE CHANNEL EVOLVE INTO NASCAR HISTORY?
Mark Martin bought a Yukon Denali, he posts about it on Instagram and I made a comment on that post. He went to my page, and I guess saw the Escalade and thought it was cool, and he followed me. I’m always posting things with really long captions, and real insight. I always tried to do that to provide some kind of lesson or introspection, not just posting a picture. I think he picked up on that. Then, he started paying attention to what I was doing really closely.
I woke up the first night of sleeping in the Newell to a message from Mark. “Hey, text me,” and then he called me right after that. I talked to Robby Gordon yesterday, now Mark Martin calls me today. This is his motorhome.
His endorsement opened the door for everything for us in this world. I actually called Petty’s museum about a year before and asked about doing a video there. The lady answered the phone and was like, “Aha, yeah, we don’t need YouTube,” and hung up on me. So I said, “OK, we’ll see about that.”
We were going through St. Louis one day and I thought Kenny Wallace was in St. Louis. Maybe he would want to do a history tour video with us, because he’s doing YouTube now. And that was a few months after we had done the museum and hometown history video with Mark Martin.
So I called Kenny and he’s like, “Yeah, let’s do it. Just give me three days’ heads up.” So we went there, and Mark had explained to him who we are and what we did and all that stuff. As soon as we got there, it was like he had known me forever, and the whole hometown history tour video concept was created by accident.
When we were there at Mark Martin’s museum, we started talking about his dad’s trucking company in Batesville, and he said, “Oh, I could just show you. Why don’t you ride with me?” I ended up driving around to a few different places with him telling stories.
After that, I was like, this is a great structure for this. It is awesome to hear these guys tell these stories until they’re blue in the face, and then when you see where those things happened – it’s completely different.
And so we did the same thing with Kenny, and that did well. I guess he was behind what we were doing and saw that we really cared about the history. So we’ve gotten to know Kenny pretty well, and he’s become the other godfather of this stuff. If Kenny knows somebody in the business, he’ll just give me their number and say, “Tell them I told you to talk to him.” Or if he doesn’t know them that well, he’ll ask them first, and they usually say yes.
Everybody wins, because these guys love talking about what they did. It’s not like people are asking him about it every day any more. Right? And I love hearing about it. I love seeing it. I’d want to do this stuff even if the camera wasn’t going. When you grow up as a little kid and NASCAR is your thing, and you see Jeff Gordon or Bobby Labonte in the back of that truck going around the track in their fire suits, that might as well be your Superman or Batman. Except your Batman is real. He doesn’t go away when you turn the TV off or close a comic book. You can go talk to him.
The Mark Martin hometown history tour is probably my favorite. That was profound. The things that he talked about, to see where they happened, and the way he talked about his dad. It was just intense. I left that parking lot with a little bit of a different perspective on everything.
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BY BOBBY ALLISON, AS TOLD TO BEN WHITE
From 1961 through 1977, I was always in contention to win the Daytona 500 at Daytona International Speedway, but every year I would come up short of getting to Victory Lane.
In 1977, I decided to run my own AMC Matador program. I worked very hard to make it a winner, but the effort almost physically killed me and I ended up with nothing. I had incredible faith in the car but getting to 500 miles was often difficult.
While with Roger Penske for a limited schedule in 1974 and the full season in 1975, I won four times in the Matador at Riverside, California; Ontario, California; and twice at Darlington, South Carolina, in the Cup Series. Mark Donohue also had a win in the Matador in 1973 at Riverside.
Going into 1978, I was having rather bad stomach issues and had lost a great deal of weight. I parked the Matador when Bud Moore called and I gladly accepted his offer to drive his Ford. I told him I wasn’t well and we would have to take it a race at a time at first. He agreed.
In our 125-mile qualifying race on Thursday prior to the 500, we ended up getting wrecked by Buddy Baker, and it hurt the frame and left-side sheet metal pretty badly. When I saw the damage to the car, I told Bud I was going back to the hotel to lay down. I didn’t think I could go on and thought seriously about heading back to Alabama.
When I got back to the track the next morning, I was shocked and also happy to see the car was completely repaired and painted back to its blue and white colors. The crew had stayed up all night and worked until early morning getting the car finished and ready to race.
Because of the crash, I started in the 33rd position. I led a total of 28 laps even though the race was dominated by Darrell Waltrip, Cale Yarborough and Buddy Baker as far as lap leaders go. But Waltrip crashed out with Richard Petty and David Pearson (on lap 60) and that left Cale, me and Baker to sort it out.
Late in the race (with 11 laps remaining), Baker’s engine blew. I was home free because I knew I had Cale covered. I hadn’t won a Cup Series race since the Southern 500 at Darlington in September of 1975, so it felt so good to win again.
It took several months for me to recover from the health issues, but I finally got there. We won five races that year and a total of 14 while with Bud’s team through 1980.
The key to that Daytona 500 win and all of our success through 1980 was Bud Moore. No question. He was a very smart team owner and had an incredible crew of people around him. Everybody supported me and they were so easy to work with. I enjoyed my relationship with them when it came to getting the car the way I wanted it and also the closeness of the team. Doug Williams was our crew chief and he was a complete joy to work with.
I also won the 1982 Daytona 500 with DiGard Racing and the 1988 Daytona 500 with Stavola Brothers Racing, and both wins are also very special. The 1978 Daytona 500 was my first and helped me realize I had many more wins and a Cup Series championship in 1983 in store. Without Bud Moore’s surprise phone call in late November of 1977, none of that remarkable time in my life would have happened. It was an incredible turnaround for sure.
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