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Ryan In No. 99 & Martin Jr. In No. 00 At Kansas, First Race Together

CORNELIUS, N.C. – Diamond-Waltrip Racing announced today that two-time K&N Pro Series East champion Ryan Truex and two-time NASCAR Nationwide Series champion Martin Truex Jr. will share the No. 99 Toyota for the remainder of the 2010 NASCAR Nationwide Series season.

The brothers will replace Trevor Bayne.

DWR will field two cars this weekend at Kansas Speedway, marking the first time the Truex brothers will race against each other. Ryan Truex, who capped his second K&N East Series championship season last weekend in Dover, will drive the No. 99 OUT! Pet Care Toyota at Kansas while older brother will pilot the No. 00 OUT! Pet Care entry. Ryan Truex will then race at Charlotte, St. Louis, Phoenix and Homestead-Miami, while Martin Jr. will race at California and Texas.

“I am very proud of the Diamond-Waltrip race team and the progress our team has made this year,” said majority owner Gary Bechtel. “On the track, this has been a sensational season and I feel as if we can win a race before the end of the season. The root of the issue regarding Trevor and his future with DWR is simply economics. DWR held an option on Trevor’s contract, but without appropriate funding, we could not match the provisions of that contract extension by guaranteeing him a full-time ride in the No. 99 car next year. We could not commit to the demands of the agreement.

“We all wanted to work towards a positive solution, but time was not on our side. We had to make a business decision and Trevor had to make a business decision. We owe it to our race team, sponsors and everyone personally invested in this organization to move forward with those who will be with us in 2011 and beyond.”

Bechtel said his Nationwide Series team is strong and finalizing a program he expects to announce soon.

“We have a very good plan in place, but we just haven’t reached a point where we can publicly discuss it at this time.”

Bechtel and his son Blake along with Michael Waltrip Racing own Diamond-Waltrip Racing that fields Toyota Camrys out of the MWR shop in Cornelius, N.C. The Bechtels have owned cars in the Sprint Cup and Nationwide Series since 1990. The Morgan Hill, California residents’ teams have visited victory lane 10 times in the Nationwide Series.

Ryan Truex said he didn’t think twice when offered a chance to drive for the Jerry Baxter-led DWR team that owns three poles and five top-five finishes in 2010.

“These are tough circumstances, but I love driving in the Nationwide Series and I’m pumped up about racing this weekend,” said the Mayetta, N.J. native. “My main goal this weekend is to keep this team’s momentum up and continue to deliver a great racing program to OUT! Pet Care. They came on board this year and have been a big boost for the entire organization and I want to get them a win.”

Martin Jr. will drive the No. 00 sporting a reversed-colored OUT! Pet Care paint scheme in Saturday’s race at Kansas. He expects Saturday will be a big day for the Truex family.

“This is pretty cool. I always hoped this day would come but I didn’t have any idea it would come this year,” said the 2004 and 2005 Nationwide champion. “We raced a lot on the computer and he’ll claim he beat me, but we’ll see what happens Saturday. I’m real proud of him. He’s had a good season winning the East championship for a second time and he’s done real good in his first few races in the Nationwide Series. He’s got a good deal driving for the Diamond-Waltrip guys. I’ve told him to just stay patient, learn as much as he can and everything will fine.”

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FYI WIRZ: NASCAR’s Top Dover Drivers Talk Before and After Race
By: Dwight Drum
http://Racetake.com

All top five NASCAR Sprint Cup finishers expressed their thoughts before the green flag and after the checkers for the AAA 400 at Dover International Speedway, race 28 of 36 in the long, NASCAR season–also the second of 10 races in the Chase for the Sprint Cup.

The story at Dover seemed to be all about Denny Hamlin (No.11) and his rift with Richard Childress Racing drivers over his adverse comments about Clint Bowyer’s No. 33 car. But the tale that counted was the Chase for the Cup as Jimmie Johnson (No. 48) surged back into contention after a poor finish last week at Loudon.

Kurt Busch (No.2), Jeff Burton (No. 31) and Carl Edwards (No.99) moved up while Clint Bowyer (No. 33), Matt Kenseth (No. 17), and Tony Stewart (No. 14) slipped into 160 plus point deficits that will be tough to overcome.

FYI WIRZ is the swift presentation of pertinent motorsports topics compiled, condensed, and often written by Dwight Drum @ Racetake.com. Quotes provided by NASCAR and Sprint Cup team media.

Select driver comments before and after track action presented here–just for fans:

Jimmie Johnson (No. 48 Chevy) Finished first

Before:
“Dover is one of my favorite race tracks so I’m excited to get back after last weekend’s finish,” Johnson said. “We definitely need to get some points and get some things going. We couldn’t pick a better track for the Lowe’s team to go to in order to get some points.”

After:
“Today we got maximum points,” Johnson said. “I am very proud of that internally. But it’s not time to celebrate. If we take this week off and take it lightly, not prepare like we need to for Kansas, we’ll get beat. We can’t get beat. We’ve got to win races and keep this momentum going.”

Jeff Burton (No.31 Chevy) Finished second

Before:
“When things are going well, it’s easy to be mentally tough,” Burton said. “The question is when the chips are down, who is going to be mentally tough? The chips are going to be down for everybody at some point in this Chase and those will be the defining moments in this Chase and who can come through those…that’s going to determine who the winner is.”

After:
“I thought the track changed a lot,” Burton said. “My guys did a great job of adjusting to the track, getting the car better at the right time. Proud of us being right at the right time.

“Every team is here to win races. Every team is here to try to win a championship. As the thing goes on, it will get harder for some teams to win than others.”

Joey Logano (No. 20 Toyota) Finished third

Before (Qualifying comment):
“We freed it up too much,” Logano said. “We got loose and as soon as I landed the back end just broke out and I just over-slowed the car and forced me to get to the gas too soon and I missed my corner. It seems like once the first thing goes wrong it all kind of goes wrong together after that.”

After:
“We had to start in the back, but felt like we did a good job working our way up there today and made good adjustments on this race car,” Logano said. “It’s definitely a good run for us. We still have to work on our consistency. We have to somehow figure out how we can do this week in and week out.”

Kurt Busch (No. 2 Dodge) Finished fourth

Before:
“Dover will always be such an extraordinary track for me that holds such significance as far as my career goes,” Busch said. “We’ve had some strong Cup runs at Dover; it just seems like we haven’t been able to put together a whole race.”

After:
“My guys did an outstanding job, here at the track, back at the shop to have this effort come forth today,” Busch said. “Dover was definitely one of the tracks we were worried about. We had a fast enough car to win. Driver was speeding on pit road. So I cost us five or 10 point s today.”

Carl Edwards (No.99 Ford) Finished fifth

Before:
“We have nine races left in the Chase and we are going to Dover to win this race,” Edwards said. “It’s a great track for me. We’ve had some really good runs there including a win. For me this is one of the races in the Chase where I can make a difference as a driver.”

After:
“It was a solid day for us,” Edwards said. “It’s nice to be disappointed with fifth. I thought we had a better car than that. We’ve got eight races left and closed some points on the leader. That’s all we can do every week.”

ABOUT DWIGHT
Dwight Drum, a member of the National Motorsports Press Association, began in motorsports as a photojournalist and writer with Stripbike.com in 1998 and as editor created Zoomster.com (1999) and Racetake.com (2007). He has interviewed almost every big name in NASCAR, NHRA and IndyCar. He also has experience covering the Tampa Bay Buccaneers and has two stories in the 2010 book “Chicken Soup for the Soul: NASCAR.”

The opinions expressed in this articles are solely those of the author and not this website.

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By Reid Spencer
Sporting News NASCAR Wire Service
PHOTO CREDIT: CIA STOCK PHOTO

DOVER, Del.(Sept. 26, 2010) —The leading rebounder in NASCAR’s Sprint Cup Series solidified his status in Sunday’s AAA 400 at Dover International Speedway.

Lest any of his competitors happened to forget that Jimmie Johnson will be a factor in the Chase for the NASCAR Sprint Cup, Johnson gave them a smoky reminder Sunday afternoon as he rallied from last week’s rocky start to the Chase at New Hampshire.

Moments after beating Jeff Burton to the checkered flag by a convincing 2.637 seconds on the 1-mile concrete oval, Johnson stirred up a cloud of smoke with a burnout on the Monster Mile’s asphalt apron near the entrance to the garage.

As the drivers he beat rolled through the gate to the garage area, they had to pass through Johnson’s smoky celebration. It wasn’t exactly a case of “eat my dust,” but it was close.

“Man, you are rubbing it into all these guys’ faces here,” crew chief Chad Knaus radioed to the driver, after Johnson completed the best-case rally from last week’s 25th-place run.

Indeed. Johnson won the pole, led the most laps (191) and scored maximum points (195) as he vaulted four positions to second in the Chase standings, 35 points behind ninth-place finisher Denny Hamlin, who posted a respectable result at a track that has plagued him in past Chases.

“It’s a huge weight off my shoulders that we were able to come here and win a race in the Chase, rebound from last week,” said Johnson, who won for the sixth time this season, the sixth time at Dover and the third time in the past four races at the Monster Mile.

With 53 Cup victories, Johnson is 10th all time, one behind Lee Petty and two behind Rusty Wallace.

Johnson regained the lead from Carl Edwards on Lap 366 of 400, when Edwards brought his No. 99 Ford to pit road during a cycle of green-flag stops. Johnson pulled away from Burton over the final 35 laps.

“Today is a great day for us, because it shows us what we are capable of and the fact that we can win races and be competitive in this Chase,” Johnson said. “This summer was hard on us—there’s no way around that. We had bad races and finished bad. We had good races and finished bad. So it’s nice today to do things start-to-finish all weekend long on the right foot.”

Joey Logano—the only non-Chase driver in the top six—finished third. Kurt Busch ran fourth, Edwards fifth and Kyle Busch sixth. Kyle Busch remained third in the standings and trails Hamlin by 45 points.

Burton hadn’t written off Johnson’s No. 48 team after New Hampshire—far from it.

“Well, they’re good,” he said before correcting himself. “They’re not good—they’re great. That word is not being overused when I say that. They’ve won four (championships) in a row. You’re not good doing that. You have to be great to do that.

“They’ve been in the hunt. They’ve been in the mix. I think they’re as seasoned as you can possibly be together. They fought the fights together. They haven’t won every championship together. They’ve lost some, too. Through losing some, you gain wisdom. Through winning some, you gain wisdom. They perform. That’s what they did.

“I expected them to come here and perform. This is one of their best race tracks. It didn’t surprise me to see them run as well as they did.”

Notes: A problem on the final green-flag pit stop dropped Jeff Gordon to 11th at the finish. He lost four spots in the standings to eighth, 83 points behind Hamlin. … Hamlin’s 35-point lead is the largest in Chase history after two races, but no driver who has led the standings after two races has gone on to win the title. … Clint Bowyer finished 25th, three laps down, and trails Hamlin by 235 points pending the result of Wednesday’s appeal of a 150-point penalty NASCAR levied against Bowyer when his race-winning car at New Hampshire failed inspection. … Tony Stewart went a lap down early and ultimately came home 21st, two laps down. After running out of fuel and finishing 24th at Loudon, Stewart is 10th in the standings, 162 points behind Hamlin.