2007 NASCAR Thread

[spleen1015]

Originally Posted by Atocep

Dale Jr. and Truex are supposedly both leaving DEI to race under Jr.'s own team which as of now has only run Busch series races.

At his press conference today he said he hasn't signed a deal with anyone yet. Truex is still with DEI and he is in no part involved with what Jr is doing.

[miami_fan]

http://sports.espn.go.com/rpm/news/s...d=2&id=2871375

Dale Earnhardt Inc. was notified Tuesday what the penalties are for infractions found on Dale Earnhardt Jr.'s car at Darlington. They are heavy.

Earnhardt was docked 100 points while crew chief Tony Eury Jr. was fined $100,000 and suspended for six races beginning with the Coca-Cola 600 on May 27. Team owner Teresa Earnhardt also has been docked 100 owner points.

Eury Jr. expected the penalty from NASCAR this week to be serious.

"I was definitely not trying to get away with nothing, so you can take it for what it is," he said Saturday. "There's nothing I can do about it. Whatever they hand down, it certainly wasn't on purpose."

NASCAR confiscated the rear wing mounts from Earnhardt's car on Saturday before the Nextel Cup race at Darlington Raceway was postponed until Sunday due to rain.

Eury called it an "interpretation."

"It was a bad deal," he said. "It was a part that got put on there that shouldn't have. We've done a lot of offseason testing for NASCAR. There's been three different styles of brackets on there and it just happened to be one of those old-style brackets."

Eury said the brackets were the same ones that weren't discovered during pre- or post-qualifying inspections.

"It fit all of their templates," he said. "It just had a problem when you put [the angle] to where you should have."

Eury said he tried to explain how to fix the problem to series director John Darby.

The cynical sports fan in me says this is another dig at DEI by Jr. Am I wrong?

[DanGarion]

Originally Posted by miami_fan

http://sports.espn.go.com/rpm/news/s...d=2&id=2871375



The cynical sports fan in me says this is another dig at DEI by Jr. Am I wrong?

How so, he had no control in this.

[JonInMiddleGA]

http://sports.myway.com/news/09082007/v9989.html

JOLIET, Ill. (AP) -Dario Franchitti will become the latest open-wheel star to make the jump to NASCAR.

A source close to the negotiations said Franchitti will sign with Chip Ganassi Racing to drive the No. 40 Dodge beginning in 2008. David Stremme, the current driver of the No. 40, has already been told he will not have the ride next year.

The source, who asked to not be identified because details of the agreement have not yet been finalized, said Ganassi and Franchitti decided to make the announcement after the end of the IndyCar Series schedule, which ends with Sunday's PEAK Antifreeze 300 at Chicagoland Speedway.

He will join Juan Pablo Montoya, another former open-wheel star, a heralded rookie with Ganassi's NASCAR Nextel Cup team this season. Franchitti and Montoya tied for the CART - now champ Car - series points lead in 1999, with the Colombian driver winning the title on a tiebreaker - four more wins.

Franchitti, who currently drives for Andretti Green Racing, goes into Sunday's race with a three-point lead over Ganassi driver Scott Dixon in the battle for the series title.

"Right now, all I want to concentrate on is winning this championship and then winning the (American Le Mans Series) championship next week in Utah," Ganassi said Saturday. "All this other stuff can wait until after that."

Franchitti also declined to talk about the future, saying, "I'm trying to win a championship here, and that's all I want to talk about."

Speculation on the 34-year-old Franchitti's racing future began in May after he won the Indianapolis 500 for the first time. The Scotsman works on one-year contracts, so he would become a free agent on Dec. 1.

Although he has gotten along well with his teammates, there has been some recent friction with team co-owner Michael Andretti after Franchitti and Andretti's son, Marco, crashed late in the race last month in Sonoma, costing Franchitti a shot at a win and, at the point, the series lead.

Franchitti said he and the elder Andretti "talked things out" at a dinner last week in Detroit.

It is expected that Franchitti, who has yet to drive a stock car of any kind, will get a quick course in the sport from Ganassi, who plans, according to the source, to enter him in a series of ARCA and NASCAR Busch Series races to get him up to speed.