DIRECTV Channel 795:
Jamie McMurray and the No. 1 McDonald’s Chevrolet team of Earnhardt Ganassi Racing with Felix Sabates will make his 277th career NASCAR Sprint Cup Series start and his eighth at Chicagoland Speedway … Has one top-10 finish in seven career Sprint Cup starts at the 1.5-mile oval … The 34-year old Joplin, Mo., native has four wins and 85 top-10 finishes in 276 Sprint Cup starts … 2010 marks McMurray’s eighth full year in Sprint Cup with a career-best point finish of 11th in 2004 … Started 17th and finished 39th last week at Daytona (Fla.) International Speedway … Ranks 19th in Sprint Cup points with one win and five top-10 finishes.

DIRECTV Channel 796:
Tony Stewart and the No. 14 Office Depot / Old Spice Chevrolet team of Stewart-Haas Racing will make his 411th career NASCAR Sprint Cup Series start and his 10th at Chicagoland Speedway … Has two wins (2004 and 2007), one pole (2003) and seven top-10 finishes in nine career Sprint Cup starts at the 1.5-mile oval … The 39-year-old Columbus, Ind., native has won 37 races and has 238 top-10 finishes in 410 Sprint Cup starts … 2010 marks Stewart’s 12th full year in Sprint Cup and he won the points championship in 2002 and 2005 … Started ninth and finished 25th last week at Daytona (Fla.) International Speedway … Ranks ninth in Sprint Cup points with eight top-10 finishes.

DIRECTV Channel 797:
Ryan Newman and the No. 39 Haas Automation Chevrolet team of Stewart-Haas Racing will make his 315th career NASCAR Sprint Cup Series start and his ninth at Chicagoland Speedway … Has one win (2003), one pole (2002) and five top-10 finishes in eight career Sprint Cup starts at the 1.5-mile oval … The 32-year-old from South Bend, Ind., has 14 wins and has 127 top-10 finishes in 314 Sprint Cup starts … 2010 marks Newman’s ninth full year in Sprint Cup with a career-best point finish of sixth in 2002, 2003 and 2005 … Started 14th and finished 26th last week at Daytona (Fla.) International Speedway … Ranks 15th in Sprint Cup points with one win and six top-10 finishes.

DIRECTV Channel 798:
Dale Earnhardt Jr., and the No. 88 AMP Energy/National Guard Chevrolet team of Hendrick Motorsports will make his 382nd career NASCAR Sprint Cup Series start and his 10th at Chicagoland Speedway … Has one win (2005) and three top-10 finishes in nine career Sprint Cup starts at the 1.5-mile oval … The 35-year-old Kannapolis, N.C., native has won 18 races and has 148 top-10 finishes in 381 Sprint Cup starts … 2010 marks Earnhardt’s 11th full year in Sprint Cup with a career-best point finish of third in 2003 … Won 1998 and 1999 NASCAR Nationwide Series championships … Started 13th and finished fourth last week at Daytona (Fla.) International Speedway … Ranks 11th in Sprint Cup points with six top-10 finishes.

The NASCAR HOTPASS lineup for the Coca-Cola 600 at Charlotte (N.C.) Motor Speedway is as follows:

DIRECTV Channel 795: Tony Stewart and the No. 14 Office Depot / Old Spice Chevrolet team of Stewart-Haas Racing will make his 405th career NASCAR Sprint Cup Series start and his 23rd at Charlotte (N.C.) Motor Speedway … Has one win (October 2003) and 11 top-10 finishes in 22 career Sprint Cup starts at the 1.5-mile oval … The 39-year-old Columbus, Ind., native has won 37 races and has 234 top-10 finishes in 404 Sprint Cup starts … 2010 marks Stewart’s 12th full year in Sprint Cup and he won the points championship in 2002 and 2005 … Started 16th and finished ninth two weeks ago at Dover (Del.) International Speedway … Ranks 14th in Sprint Cup points with four top-10 finishes.

DIRECTV Channel 796: Jimmie Johnson will make his 304th career NASCAR Sprint Cup Series start and his 18th at Charlotte (N.C.) Motor Speedway … Has six wins, three poles and 13 top-10 finishes in 17 starts at the 1.5-mile oval … The 34-year-old from El Cajon, Calif., has 50 wins and 187 top-10 finishes in 303 Sprint Cup starts … 2010 marks Johnson’s ninth full year in Sprint Cup and he won the points championship in 2006, 2007, 2008 and 2009 … Started fifth and finished 16th two weeks ago at Dover (Del.) International Speedway … Ranks fourth in Sprint Cup Series points with three victories.

DIRECTV Channel 797: Dale Earnhardt Jr., will make his 376th career NASCAR Sprint Cup Series start and his 22nd at Charlotte (N.C.) Motor Speedway … Has one pole (May 2000) and nine top-10 finishes in 22 starts at the 1.5-mile oval … The 35-year-old Kannapolis, N.C., native has won 18 races and has 145 top-10 finishes in 375 Sprint Cup starts … 2010 marks Earnhardt’s 11th full year in Sprint Cup with a career-best point finish of third in 2003 … Won 1998 and 1999 NASCAR Nationwide Series championships … Started 27th and finished 30th two weeks ago at Dover (Del.) International Speedway … Ranks 16th in Sprint Cup points with three top-10 finishes.

DIRECTV Channel 798: Carl Edwards will make his 206th career NASCAR Sprint Cup Series start and his 11th at Charlotte (N.C.) Motor Speedway … Has seven top-10 finishes in 10 starts at the 1.5-mile oval … The 30-year-old Columbia, Mo., native has won 16 races and has 105 top-10 finishes in 205 Sprint Cup starts … Captured 2007 NASCAR Nationwide Series title … 2010 marks Edwards’ sixth full year in Sprint Cup with a career-best point finish of second in 2008 … Started ninth and finished eighth two weeks ago at Dover (Del.) International Speedway … Ranks 10th in Sprint Cup points with six top-10 finishes.

NASCAR HOTPASS is available free to all DIRECTV customers. More information is available at www.directv.com/hotpass.

Race fans can get their sneak peek of Speedweeks 2010 with numerous activities with their favorite drivers from the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series, Nationwide Series and Camping World Truck Series in the Sprint FANZONE located in the heart of the “World Center of Racing.”

Among the activities planned for both days include:

* Interactive fan forums
* Autograph sessions
* Show cars, displays, music
* Online auction
* Blood drive
* Richard Petty Driving Experience

Drivers currently scheduled to make appearances on Friday, Jan. 15 beginning at 6 p.m. are 2009 Daytona 500 champion Matt Kenseth, Dale Earnhardt Jr., Jeff Gordon, Ryan Newman, Mark Martin, Jeff Burton, Joey Logano, Paul Menard, Travis Kvapil and AJ Allmendinger,

Scheduled to appear on Saturday, Jan. 16 during the noon – 4 p.m. session are Kevin Harvick, Clint Bowyer, Martin Truex Jr., David Reutimann, Morgan Shepherd, Michael Annett, Ricky Stenhouse Jr. and Colin Braun. In the 4 p.m. – 8 p.m. session on Saturday, Jan. 16, drivers scheduled to appear are Kurt Busch, Brad Keselowski, Todd Bodine and Sam Hornish Jr.

Tickets, which are available for $15, are on sale now at 1-800-PITSHOP or online at www.daytonainternationalspeedway.com with autograph session availability limited to 250 people per driver in advance. To request access to the special autograph sessions, race fans can call 1-800-PITSHOP or visit the Daytona International Speedway ticket office beginning on Monday, Jan. 4 at 9 a.m.

The only drivers with advance reservations for the driver autograph sessions will be Earnhardt Jr., Newman, Kenseth, Busch, Gordon, Harvick and Martin. The remainder of the driver autograph sessions will be done by a first-come basis.

Additional drivers and more details about the NASCAR Preseason Thunder Fan Fests will be released in the coming weeks.

“The NASCAR Preseason Thunder Fan Fests are going to provide a great opportunity for the fans to interact with the drivers and get pumped up about the upcoming Speedweeks events and the 52nd annual Daytona 500,” Daytona International Speedway President Robin Braig said.

Speedweeks 2010 is highlighted by the season-opening 52nd annual Daytona 500 on Sunday, Feb. 14. Other events include the Camping World 300 Nationwide Series race on Saturday, Feb. 13, the NextEra Energy Resources 250 Camping World Truck Series race on Friday, Feb. 12, the Gatorade Duel At Daytona qualifying races on Thursday, Feb. 11 and a racing tripleheader on Saturday Feb. 6 with Daytona 500 Qualifying Presented by Kroger, the Lucas Oil Slick Mist 200 and the Budweiser Shootout.

TONY, GIVE US YOUR THOUGHTS ON YOUR FIRST YEAR AS A DRIVER AND OWNER OF STEWART-HAAS RACING:
“I am like a proud father. It has been neat to see over the last 13 months how this has all come together and progressed through the season. From that standpoint, I don’t think I could be any happier. Obviously, we wanted to win the championship this year and after leading the point standings, we felt like we had a good shot. We just couldn’t get that run these last 10 weeks that we wanted. We will do what we can next year to try and pick up on that and improve on it.”

COULD YOU SPEAK THE COMMENTS YOU MADE ON THE RADIO REGARDING DALE EARNHARDT, JR. AFTER THE WRECK LAST WEEKEND AT PHOENIX? HAVE YOU SPOKEN TO HIM?
“I haven’t actually. Everybody knows when we are in the heat of the moment, it doesn’t matter who it was, I would have said the same thing. It was being upset because we are running for all the points we can get right now and we took a hit in the points last week because of that incident. It didn’t matter who it was. That is heat of the moment.”

WHAT GRADE WOULD YOU GIVE YOUR ORGANIZATION FIRST YEAR OUT OF THE BOX AND IN YOUR OPINION, WHAT MAKES CHAD (KNAUS) AND JIMMIE (JOHNSON) SO SUCCESSFUL?
“If we knew that, we would be doing it ourselves. As far as our team is concerned, I feel like for a first-year team I have to give us an A. If we could have won the championship, you would give yourself and A+, but for a first-year team an A or an A- is appropriate for what had to come together in such a short amount of time. The changes and trying to get people organized and equipment ready and just so many new people working together for the first time. I think we’ve done fairly well.”

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WHAT IS IT LIKE WHEN THERE IS A RACE WINNER’S CELEBRATION HERE AT THE END OF THE RACE BUT YOU AREN’T THE CHAMPION AND THERE IS ALL OF THAT GOING ON?
“We obviously can’t win the championship tomorrow night so our goal is to win the race. So if we can accomplish that, even though Jimmie or Mark are going to have their celebration tomorrow night, if you are that team that can win the race, that is a lot of momentum you carry in to the next season. This is the last chance to build momentum for next year. If you can leave this event tomorrow night winning the race, you carry that win all winter long. You are crowning a season-ending champion but at the same time, there is still an individual race that is being competed for and that is our goal.

DO YOU FEEL LIKE THE RACE WINNER GETS SLIGHTED AT THIS RACE?
“No, not at all. I watched the truck race last night. The interview with Kevin (Harvick) in victory lane was awesome and I thought it was appropriate and thought they did a good job with the champion’s celebration also.”

WHAT DID YOU LEARN MOST ABOUT DARIAN GRUBB THIS YEAR AND WHAT HAS IMPRESSED YOU THE MOST ABOUT HIM?
“He is just a very smart, calculated crew chief. His demeanor is the one thing that I didn’t know much about going in to it but, his demeanor through the whole season has been very calm and collected. He just doesn’t get wound up. He doesn’t get super emotional on the radio and he has a great sense of humor too and that is something that does come out and I think that is where we complement each other. Our personalities are similar from the relaxing standpoint and humor standpoint. I think he has helped me with the calm demeanor on the radio.”

WHAT DO YOU PLAN TO DO THANKSGIVING WEEK, THE FIRST WEEK OFF BEFORE YOU FACE GETTING READY FOR NEXT SEASON?
“I’m going home. We will have our competition meeting on Monday like we always do every week. Depending on how Monday goes, if I need to be there Tuesday and Wednesday, I will stay. Most likely when we get done with our meeting, I am hoping to be able to go home as soon as possible. But, being a car owner, if I need to be there until Thursday morning, which is what I will do. A lot of it will be dictated on how our meeting goes on Monday.”

PURELY ON DRIVING ABILITY OUT ON THE TRACK, WHERE DO YOU RATE JIMMIE (JOHNSON) AND WHAT ARE HIS STRENGTHS VERSUS THE OTHER GUYS?
“It doesn’t matter, like you said, you have to have the package, it doesn’t matter how good of a car, crew chief and crew you have, if you aren’t a good driver, you aren’t going to make that package work. Jimmie does a great job behind the wheel. He proves it in the Cup Series. When he goes back and runs a Nationwide car, he runs well there. You don’t get to this level by not having talent. He has an extremely high amount of talent. He knows what he wants out of his race cars. He knows that feel that he wants. There are guys that are good qualifiers and fall off a little in the race and there are guys that are vice versa. Jimmie is one of those guys who excels at qualifying and the race. I think he is one of the more rounded drivers we have.”

AS A CAR OWNER AND DRIVER WHO RENOVATED A TEAM AND TOOK IT TO THE CHASE, YOU HAVE VERY GOOD PERSPECTIVE ON THE RED BULL TEAM AND BRIAN VICKERS. HOW DO YOU VIEW THEIR ACCOMPLISHMENTS THIS YEAR?
“They’ve done a great job. They’ve also brought a rookie driver in that’s starting on the front row tomorrow. That’s proof that their organization is doing a good job. Some of their resources have helped them with that and that’s important in our series. I mean that’s how you get to that level that they’ve gotten to is by having good resources and good people and there’s not an organization out there that makes the Chase that isn’t doing a good job. So they’ve obviously in a short amount of time done a great job of making adjustments. Their constantly changing personnel and upgrading their people and that’s what you have to do.”

FANS CAN’T FEEL THE EMOTIONS YOU’VE HAD IN MAKING THE CHASE. CAN YOU SHARE WITH THEM WHAT’S MOST IMPORTANT ABOUT BEING IN THE CHASE AND THE EMOTIONS THAT YOU HAD?
“It’s no different than any other pro sports when you’re going through the playoffs. You know that everything you’ve worked for during the first 26 weeks of the season all comes down to these last 10 weeks. So you know if you have one bad race, that’s one-tenth of your opportunity to win a championship. As we’ve seen over the last two or three years, you can’t make that mistake and still have an opportunity to win the championship. So you place your whole season in those 10 weeks when you make the Chase, and if you have a bad week it’s hard on you.”

WITH THE SUCCESS OF THE NO. 14 AND THE NO. 39 TEAMS THIS YEAR, DO YOU ANTICIPATE ANY PERSONNEL CHANGES WITHIN THE GROUPS ON EITHER TEAM GOING INTO NEXT YEAR? HOW IMPORTANT IS IT TO KEEP THOSE SAME PEOPLE TOGETHER TO ENSURE SUCCESS?
“I think it’s important, but at the same time if you feel like you have to make changes, you have to do that. You hope that you have the right core group of people in place where you’re not making those changes, but you can’t sacrifice that for not making the changes that are necessary. So you evaluate where you’re at and that’s where the next couple of weeks will be pretty important as far as analyzing. I already know that there are one or two guys that want to come off the road that have just been doing this a long time and they’re ready to be home a little more. So you have to make changes because of that; you have to make changes because you’re trying to improve your program. But you try to keep that core group as intact as you can.”

JIMMIE JOHNSON MENTIONED THAT IT WAS COOL THAT YOU WON A PRE-CHASE CHAMPIONSHIP AND A CHASE CHAMPIONSHIP AND HE KIND OF WISHES THAT HE HAD A PRE-CHASE CHAMPIONSHIP. DOES HE NEED A NON-CHASE CHAMPIONSHIP TO BE CONSIDERED AMONG THE GREATS?
“Oh, gosh no; are you kidding me? What did I get for leading the point standings after 26 weeks? I didn’t get anything.”

NO, ONE CHAMPIONSHIP UNDER THE OLD FORMAT AND ONE UNDER THE CHASE FORMAT
“Oh, okay, I understand what you’re saying. Does he need that? Well, he doesn’t have that and with the format we have now he doesn’t have the opportunity. But no, you don’t need that. I feel like this is a tougher format than the old format was. Obviously, just the sheer math of it; you have one bad day out of 10, that’s one-tenth of your schedule. Whereas before it would be 1/36th of it. So one bad day didn’t affect the outcome as bad as it does now. I feel just the opposite. I feel like the way he’s done it in this format is more impressive than winning it in the old format.”

DO YOU TAKE SPECIAL PRIDE IN THE FACT THAT YOU DID IT BOTH BEFORE AND AFTER?
“I’d rather be in his situation and be running for my fourth in a row (laughs), so, not necessarily. Any time you win a championship it doesn’t matter what format it is whether it’s a single event championship or a season championship, you cherish them. So I can’t say that I value one over the other. They were both special in their own way.”

WITH THE RELEASE OF KRAIG KINSER, WHAT ARE YOU LOOKING FOR IN A REPLACEMENT FOR DONNY SCHATZ IN THE WORLD OF OUTLAWS? AND WHAT’S THE STATUS OF YOUR USAC TEAMS FOR 2010?
“We’re going to scale our USAC program back to two Silver Crown cars and one dirt Sprint Car. We’re not going to compete in the pavement Sprint Car races, but we’ll only have one team there and we won’t have any Midget teams next year. On the Outlaw side, Donny is obviously coming back next year and on Kraig’s side, the hard part was we waited to a part of the season that’s kind of hard for him, helping him get a ride for next year, which we’re doing everything we can to help with that. It was kind of hard for both of us. We saw some improvement early fall that we thought was going to continue and it fell back off at the end of the year. So we’re just trying to find someone that we feel like is a better fit. Kraig and Donny ran two different packages, chassis-wise and engine-wise and we’re trying to figure out how to bring that together where both guys are running the same chassis and same engine package. So we’re trying to find a driver that likes the J&J car like Donny does and somebody that we feel will be an asset to Donny as a teammate and be able to work together with him. So that’s what we’re working toward.”

LOOKING BACK AT YOUR CHASE, AFTER KANSAS IT LOOKED LIKE YOU WERE WELL-POSITIONED TO CHALLENGE JIMMIE JOHNSON FOR THE TITLE. IS THERE ONE RACE OVER THE LAST SIX THAT YOU REALLY FEEL COST YOU, MOMENTUM-WISE? OR WAS IT SIMPLY A CASE OF THE NO. 48 TEAM STEPPING UP THEIR GAME?
“Well they’ve definitely stepped up. You can’t take that away from them at all. Obviously the Talladega wreck didn’t help us any and last week’s wreck didn’t help us any. So that’s two weeks where we finished 20th or worse and that was a huge hit to us.”

It was triggered when Dale Earnhardt Jr., spun coming off turn four of the 1-mile oval, and Stewart’s No. 14 Old Spice/Office Depot Chevrolet Impala SS was among a gaggle of cars that were trapped in the ensuing melee. Nine cars in all were involved, with Stewart suffering significant damage to each corner of his racecar, including a busted front splitter that took three pit stops to repair.

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Despite the bleak outlook and the subsequent time spent on pit road, crew chief Darian Grubb and his team were able to work on the No. 14 machine quickly enough to keep Stewart on the lead lap.

However, eventual race winner Jimmie Johnson was setting a blistering pace, and he soon lapped Stewart, not once, but twice. The battered Old Spice/Office Depot Chevy was no match for the clean lines of Johnson’s No. 48 ride, but that was the case with just about every entry in the 43-car field, as Johnson dominated the event by leading four times for a race-high 238 laps.

As Johnson sprayed champagne in victory lane and celebrated his 47th career Sprint Cup victory, his seventh of the season and his fourth at Phoenix, Stewart’s crew loaded his crumpled racecar onto the team’s transporter for the long haul back to Kannapolis, N.C., headquarters for Stewart-Haas Racing (SHR).

Stewart’s SHR teammate, Ryan Newman in the No. 39 U.S. Army/Haas Automation Chevrolet Impala SS, fared only a little better. He was also caught up in the lap-171 accident, but didn’t suffer as much damage as Stewart. Still, it dropped him off the lead lap and delivered a 20th-place finish.

Johnson, the three-time and reigning Sprint Cup champion, has all but assured himself of making NASCAR history by becoming the only driver to win four straight championships. His 108-point lead over second-place Mark Martin is nearly insurmountable, for Johnson needs only to finish 25th or better in the season finale Nov. 22 at Homestead-Miami Speedway.

Even with the frustrating outcome in the season’s penultimate race, Stewart remained fifth in the standings and is now 285 points behind Johnson. Newman maintained his ninth-place standing and is 411 markers out of first.

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Enjoying a much better time in the Checker O’Reilly Auto Parts 500k was Jeff Burton, who finished 1.033 seconds behind Johnson in the runner-up spot to score his best finish of the season. Denny Hamlin finished third, while Martin and Martin Truex Jr., rounded out the top-five. Kurt Busch, Clint Bowyer, Juan Pablo Montoya, Jeff Gordon and David Reutimann comprised the remainder of the top-10.

There were four caution periods for 23 laps, with six drivers failing to finish.

Only one race remains on the 2009 schedule, and the top-12 drivers who made up this year’s Chase for the Championship currently rank as follows:

1. Jimmie Johnson (6,492 points) +/-0
2. Mark Martin (6,384 points, -108) +/-0
3. Jeff Gordon (6,323 points, -169) +/-0
4. Kurt Busch (6,281 points, -211) +/-0
5. Tony Stewart (6,207 points, -285) +/-0
6. Juan Pablo Montoya (6,203 points, -289) +/-0
7. Greg Biffle (6,171 points, -321) +/-0
8. Denny Hamlin (6,140 points, -352) +/-0
9. Ryan Newman (6,031 points, -411) +/-0
10. Kasey Kahne (6,016 points, -476) +/-0
11. Carl Edwards (5,972 points, -520) +/-0
12. Brian Vickers (5,826 points, -666) +/-0

The season-ending Ford 400 at Homestead-Miami Speedway starts at 3:15 p.m. EST with live coverage provided by ABC beginning with its pre-race show at 2:30 p.m.

Thanks to RyanNewmanInfo for posting it to YouTube.

Wimmer will compete in six events in the No. 5 Chevrolet and Newman in four, with America’s largest fastener distributor, Fastenal, as the primary sponsor. Stewart’s one race for JR Motorsports will be in a Delphi-sponsored Chevrolet at Lowe’s Motor Speedway on Oct. 16. He is already a race-winner in 2009, driving a Hendrick Motorsports entry to victory in the season-opening Camping World 300 at Daytona International Speedway. He has eight overall victories in 87 starts.

“This No. 5 team carries a strong tradition and a lot of expectations, and we are fortunate to attract such quality talent to help carry on that tradition,” Earnhardt Jr. said. “We had a similar set-up with this team last year, and we were able to go to Victory Lane twice. Obviously with this driver line-up, there’s no reason we can’t exceed last year’s win total.”

The driver additions leave only two races on the No. 5 team’s 21-race schedule unfulfilled – the road-course events at Watkins Glen on Aug. 8 and Circuit Gilles Villeneuve on Aug. 30. Driver plans for those races will be announced at a later date.

Newman is a seven-time winner in the Nationwide Series. Six of his victories came during a stellar 2005 season, in which he scored eight top-fives in nine starts and led nearly half of his completed laps (800 of 1,658 laps). He will join the JR Motorsports campaign for the following races in the No. 5 Fastenal Chevrolet: Dover International Speedway on May 30, Chicagoland Speedway on July 10, Michigan International Speedway on Aug. 15, and Kansas Speedway on Oct. 3.

Wimmer is slated for six races in the Fastenal Chevy: Darlington Raceway on May 8, The Milwaukee Mile on June 20, O’Reilly Raceway Park on July 25, Iowa Speedway on Aug. 1, Bristol Motor Speedway on Aug. 21, and Richmond International Raceway on Sept. 11. He is a six-time winner with 29 top-fives and 68 top-10s in 171 starts. He captured four wins in 2002 en route to a career-best third-place finish in the championship point standings. His most recent victory came last season at Nashville Superspeedway for Richard Childress Racing.

“I am really excited to be associated with JR Motorsports and a great sponsor like Fastenal,” Wimmer said. “I will be running at tracks that have been good for me in the past and look forward to my first event with JR Motorsports at Darlington in May. Hopefully, we can get the Fastenal car in the Winners Circle.”

Earnhardt Jr., has already driven the No. 5 Chevy in two events this year, finishing seventh at Daytona and fifth at Las Vegas. He is scheduled for five more, starting with the April 4 race at Texas Motor Speedway. His is a 22-time race winner and a two-time series champion.

Martin, whose 48 victories make up the all-time career benchmark in the Nationwide Series, will drive the No. 5 Lipton Chevy on May 1 at Richmond International Raceway. He earned JR Motorsports its first-ever Nationwide Series victory at Las Vegas last March.

Fastenal is the latest of new sponsorship partners to join the JR Motorsports fold in 2009. Its 14-race deal with the No. 5 team was announced in January. Earlier in the year GoDaddy.com extended its partnership with Hendrick Motorsports and JR Motorsports and included a 20-race sponsorship package with JRM’s Nationwide Series teams. Unilever was introduced as a new partner last October, with its brands Hellmann’s, Lipton, Klondike, and Degree splitting races throughout the 2009 season. Delphi returns for seven races, six of which will be for the No. 88 Chevrolet driven by Brad Keselowski.

You don’t think as an owner out there on the track? You’re just a driver, right?

TS: Honestly, the only way it really works is to be a car owner four days a week and to be a driver the three days we are there at the race track. It’s hard enough just doing the driver role, but that’s part of having people in the right places and having someone like [team director of competition] Bobby Hutchins. He kind of plays that car owner role during the weekend and the short amount of time that I’ve been with him I can tell you I have 110 percent confidence that if I wasn’t at the race track at all during the weekend that everything is fine with him at the helm.

How do you think the economy is affecting NASCAR fans planning on attending this season’s races?

TS: The thing about race fans is that people that come to one race a year literally save up the whole year to go to that one event. The things you normally hear the fans talk about the most is gas getting there and the hotel prices. We can go across the street to a hotel and it’s probably $80 a night right now. When you come back in 40 days, it’s going to be a $380 room and you have to buy a minimum of three or four days whether you stay there or not. It’s just things like that that drain the race fans of going to the races. The facility here, not charging for parking, is a great idea. Why should anyone charge for parking? That’s showing how the promoters and tracks are trying to help. I always lean on [TMS President] Eddie [Gossage] for my information as a promoter and we try to do the same things at our race track and try to figure out how we can help the same way. But that’s the things you hear them talk about, when you’re talking about just getting to the track is the hardest part for these people.

Is NASCAR more susceptible to the economic hardship as opposed to basketball or football?

TS: I don’t know. I’ve not been a part of basketball or football so I really don’t know. A basketball game is a one night game where our events are two- to three-day weekends. That’s where those lodging costs and the fuel cost getting there come in. You don’t normally see too many people drive eight hours to go to a basketball game, but they do it to go to a NASCAR race.

Have you encountered any surprises on the owner side thus far?

TS: Everything has been pretty sane from the ownership side. There hasn’t been a huge curveball come our way yet that we didn’t expect. Honestly, I just don’t think it’s happened yet. I’ve been so proud of [team director of competition] Bobby Hutchins, [crew chiefs] Darian Grubb, Tony Gibson and Ryan [Newman]. To come in here and to get these groups of people that we’ve got there at the shop have come from all different teams. To be able to go to Daytona and for us to be both competitive like we were was something that I was really, really proud of.

How has the owner’s role changed you as a driver?

TS: It hasn’t because I take that owner’s hat off on Thursday night when I get to the race track and put it back on Monday. I’m still dealing with three pedals and a shifter when I get in the car. It’s the same thing as it was last year whether I was a driver or an owner. That’s the reality of it. My job when I get in the car is to drive the car. It’s not until Monday that I focus on that [being an owner]. It’s a full-time job being a driver, but Monday to Thursday when I’m not being a driver we still have to shuffle things around like appearances and media days and try to figure out how we need to get done and do all these obligations. It’s been something that I think we’ve all been pretty efficient about so far.

Discuss your relationship with Texas Motor Speedway President Eddie Gossage.

TS: A lot of it starts with Eddie Gossage and the respect I have for Eddie and this facility. Eddie and I have had a long relationship with each other and since I’ve become a track owner Eddie has been a guy I have been always able to have the ability to pick up the phone and call him and ask him a question and get his input. And he has always taken the time for me. That’s something that has meant a lot. When this is all said and done and we all quit driving race cars and you guys quit writing articles and quit covering sports, the things that we have left are the people that we have met along the way. Eddie is one of those people that have made a huge impact on me as a person away from racing but on the professional side, too. I believe in everything that he has done and he works hard and any time he asks us to come do an event we are willing to do it.

Do a lot of drivers think that way?

TS: It’s like we were talking about the economy earlier. Everyone wants to do their part to make it better and I’m not sure we know exactly what that answer is but our intentions are to do that and to do what we can to help make it a better experience for the fans and make a better product for them every week. It is one thing for the economy to be bad, but we are competing in a time where everything is on the Internet and there are so many things for people to do. The simplest part about what we do here every weekend is we are in the entertainment industry, and we are competing against everybody else whether it is high school football on Friday night or whatever. We are trying to figure out how we get these people to come watch us do what we love to do. And that is the challenge every week for track owners and sanctioning bodies. It’s how do you make it better. When the economy gets bad like this, it makes it that much tougher of a challenge. You try and find more ways to make it more efficient for the people to come watch us do what we love to do every week.

Thoughts about leaving the door open to compete in the IndyCar Series?

TS: That’s why I’ve learned to say never say never. I retired from open-wheel racing once and it wasn’t about three months later that I realized that that was the dumbest thing I had ever done. You learn to say never say never with it. I don’t know what will happen, but the good thing is I have a plan for what we’re going to do life beyond being a driver. We will still have our race tracks and we want to have our race teams as long as possible. I really enjoy that side of it. I’m still having a lot of fun being a driver to and that’s what I love the most.

Did A.J. Foyt give you any advice on being a car owner during the Daytona 500?

TS: We don’t talk about it a lot. A.J. and I have had a great relationship for a long time. Normally when we get together, we are talking about him tipping over his bulldozer or fighting with something with whatever city on the south end of Texas he’s fighting with. We have fun away from racing. For a long time we always talked about racing, but as time goes on we like those conversations away from racing that don’t have anything to do with what is going on at the race track. We spend more time catching up on what each other is doing.

How special was it to have A.J. Foyt at the Daytona 500?

TS: It was the icing on the cake for the week for me. Anne Fornoro who works with AJ [as the team's publicist] said he had an absolute blast. And that’s something we wanted him to come there and have fun and be proud of us and hopefully be proud that we ran that No.14 [Foyt's number] toward the front. The coolest part about this was the very first race we ran in the No.14 car was at the shootout, and we led the 14th lap. That was cool to have A.J. see that No.14 car out leading again.

What does the team need to do to get your teammate Ryan Newman going?

TS: To get the bad luck and the monkey off his back. He is just had rotten luck. He is just had rotten, terrible luck. We’ve got to find some way to get rid of his bad luck for him. I don’t know how we do that, but whatever the way is we’ll find it. The good thing is the cars are running well and that is encouraging to both of us. We at least know that the cars can run out front. It’s just a matter of getting luck on his side.

Does a testing ban help or hurt a team like yours?

TS: I think it goes both ways actually. It was a blessing in disguise for us through the winter because instead of being gone 15 to 20 days during the offseason — which we probably would have been if the testing was opened up — that helped us keep everyone back at the shop. The little bit that it hurt us helped us at the same time.

Can you learn from the troubles of Michael Waltrip as a NASCAR Sprint up CSeries driver/owner?

TS: I don’t know if we looked at what they did as much as how are we going to do it. How are we going to do it in a way that makes sense and gives us the best shot to be successful. I don’t know if looking at what they did was part of our equation. We never really looked back and said `what did they do.’ We really don’t know what they exactly did and how they were doing it. But looking at the equation when we first sat down and talked about this process was looking at where the key tools and pieces were in place to do it. And, obviously, with Gene Haas and Haas Automation having built a beautiful shop, they had all the equipment there that we needed. It was a matter of having the right group of people together.

Tell me how you’ve been able to manage your time trying to get this team up and running with all the driver commitments you’ve got to make while also being the team owner. That’s got to be stressful.

TS: It is – it’s a good weight-loss program so far (laughing). Honestly, it’s like Ryan [Newman] mentioned earlier. We’ve got what I feel like are the right people in place earlier and getting Ryan as a teammate was a huge piece of that puzzle, Darian Grubb as my crew chief, Tony Gibson as Ryan’s crew chief and when we got [team director of competition] Bobby Hutchins I feel like that really was the glue that started pulling all the pieces together. Once we got that group, there it kind of became their responsibility to go through the system and get the crews together – tire changers, carriers, fuel guys and all the spots at the shop that make the pieces to the puzzle fit. Now I’m more in a learning stage than an ownership side of it. I’m watching Bobby and Darian and Tony Gibson, and learning from those guys.

Has it been as tough as you thought it would be or tougher?

TS: I’ve been a car owner since 2001 with the World of Outlaws sprint car series and in 2002 we started adding USAC programs to our equation and started buying race tracks so we’ve kind of been in this ownership role since 2001. Everybody thought it was going to be something we didn’t really have any knowledge of, but from day one we kind of had an idea what was going to happen. It’s a lot larger scale at the NASCAR level with 150 employees at the shop. I was used to dealing with 14 or 15 guys in the whole open-wheel program, so it’s a ten times bigger program. It’s been different I should say, there have been a lot of things that I didn’t think about but I knew there were going to be situations like that or like human resources departments. I’m normally an HR nightmare and now I’ve got to worry about our HR department at our shop. It’s been fun to learn. Nothing’s been a total shock. By the time we left Daytona, Ryan and I realized that between two drivers we used five cars. Other than that, it’s been pretty smooth so far.

As owner of the team and driver of the No.14 car, how does the owner of the car deal with the driver of the car when he gets out of control?

TS: Easy – they don’t fight with each other. That’s the good thing. It’s hard to unless I just stand in the mirror, and either way nobody wins that. I think it’s probably calmed me down a little bit from the standpoint that there’s 150 people at the shop that I’m responsible for and it’s not only them. It’s their spouses, their girlfriends, their children so easily that number turns into 450 so everything that you do you try to keep in mind how it’s not only going to affect yourself but how it affects the other people in your organization.

So the driver… you don’t see any outbursts from him this season?

TS: Oh, I’m sure there’ll be some somewhere. Let’s not be unrealistic about this

Ryan Newman: Seriously, we’ve got a shock collar for him this year. It’s underneath his collar. And for whatever reason, they gave the button to my wife. So I just give her a little wink and she knocks him right down.

Eddie Gossage: Now we know.

TS: Well, it’s sad because it’s true (laughing).

How do you feel going into this deal as an owner? Obviously you dealt with a backup car at Daytona, but you are running Hendrick Motorsports equipment and motors. Darian Grubb comes out of that program. Does that give you more confidence that you don’t have to sweat start-up issues, like Michael Waltrip did, and that you have a great opportunity to compete for race wins and the championship?

TS: Yeah, we feel that way. That’s why we made this decision. The process started two [NASCAR championship] banquets ago, so two years ago in December is when this first was even mentioned to us. So the process of trying to figure out what pieces were in place, what are the other hurdles that need to be fixed, how do we fix it. We spent a lot of time going through that and weighing those options before we ever decided what we were going to do. It’s not that we expect anything out of the box, not that we expect to do well but we feel like we have a great opportunity to run well right out of the box and that’s because of exactly what you mentioned. We know that the Hendrick engines are proven, we know the Hendrick chassis are proven. Having somebody like Darian Grubb [Stewart's crew chief who came from Hendrick] that is very familiar with their system on our side helps so we feel like all those pieces are in place. It’s like Ryan mentioned getting the right core group of people was the biggest part of the equation to try to make it all work. We went to Daytona and everybody said “Are you surprised?” and I’m not surprised either way but it was because we knew there was potential. It was just a matter of how soon it would come together and how soon would it gel.

How many Nationwide Series races do you plan on running this year and for who?

TS: A total of three. Obviously, we ran for Mr. [Rick] Hendrick at Daytona with the Hendrick car and had an awesome race in the Nationwide Series race there. We’re going to run the second Charlotte race for Dale [Earnhardt] Jr. in the No.5 car and we’re going to run a race for Kevin Harvick here in Texas [O'Reilly 300 on April 4].

You’ve said many times that you would have loved to have won the Indianapolis 500, but now you own a team in NASCAR. Do you ever see a scenario, at some point down the road, where you might give that another try?

TS: As much as my heart wants to say yes, my mind says no. There’s a lot more responsibility obviously now being a car owner and the logistics of it still make it impossible to do. When they moved the start time of it back two hours the logistics of being able to complete the [Indy] 500 and get down to Charlotte on time to start the [Coca-Cola] 600, you can’t do it. I’ve learned to never say never, but unfortunately that is probably a chapter in my life that’s passed. I’ve chosen my path especially being a car owner in this series now so I doubt that it will happen.

With the struggles that the big three have had in the economic climate and racing in NASCAR and Toyota being there, is there a sense of trying to be better than Toyota?

TS: I can’t honestly say that I feel pressure from that standpoint. Obviously, we’re in an economic time that’s tough on everybody, especially the big three [GM, Ford, Dodge]. It’s not at all about what we do here in racing; it’s how much it’s going to affect our country if we lose those three manufacturers. It would obviously be devastating to our sport, but on a bigger scale all the families that it would affect that are all employed by those three manufacturers would be a much bigger concern to us.