NASCAR Notebook: Kurt Busch unveils new sponsor

AVONDALE, Ariz.—Kurt Busch showed his hand on Friday—when he unveiled his new sponsor Global Poker for the No. 1 Ganassi Racing Chevrolet.

 

The online poker site is partnering with Busch and Chip Ganassi Racing on a number of races this year. 

 

Busch, the 2004 NASCAR champion, is currently eighth in the Monster Energy Cup Series standings.

 

“I’m looking forward to having Global Poker on the car starting this weekend at ISM Racing here in Phoenix,” said Busch who won at the one-mile track in 2005. “They are really excited about their first venture into NASCAR and I am glad that it is with our team.”

 

Busch led 23 laps and posted his second top-five finish of the season at Las Vegas Motor Speedway last weekend. His transition as the driver of the No. 1 team appears to be seamless. 

 

Ganassi Chief Operating Officer Doug Duchardt believes Busch has been a great addition to the company.

 

“From the time that Kurt started it’s been a real joy and it’s been fun to watch him get acclimated with the team,” Duchardt said. “I very much appreciate from where I sit, how he has worked to make sure that he and the No. 42 group work closely together. And I think that we are just starting that and I think it’s only going to get better. 

 

“I think that that team in particular after a rough Daytona bounced back and has shown a lot of really good synergy between he and Matt McCall (crew chief) already in two races. We were talking about it last night, I think that Atlanta was a solid race and then in Las Vegas, I thought Matt made a really good strategy call and Kurt did an excellent job of optimizing that strategy call by leading 20 laps on older tires and then hanging on for a fifth place.” 

 

While Busch’s teammate Kyle Larson has had an up-and-down season so far, the highs have been better than the lows. After finishing seventh at Daytona, then winning a stage at Atlanta and leading a race-high 142 laps, Larson sits sixth in the standings.

 

Duchardt remains optimistic, but cautious considering this is just the fourth race of the season.

 

“Heading into Phoenix, I feel really good about where those guys are and I feel good about how we have started as a company,” Duchardt said. “I feel like we are just off maybe the lead cars, but certainly we can compete and that was shown last week by Kurt at Vegas and by Kyle in Atlanta when we led the most laps. I feel good about where we are at, but certainly, it’s a marathon. 

 

“We all tried to extrapolate what has happened in Atlanta and Vegas and what is going to happen the rest of the season. As you guys know, that is all going to change as we get towards the end of the season, but we just have to stay on it as a team and I feel really good about how we are working together. I think Kurt has done a really good job of helping that accelerate us as quickly as we could as a group.”

 

 

 

It’s been a rough start to the season for Ryan Blaney. 

 

After watching both of his Penske teammates win, Blaney is still searching for his first top-20 finish of 2018. 

 

The driver of the No. 12 MoneyLion Ford displayed a glimmer of hope on Friday after topping the speed chart with a lap of 141.716 mph.

 

“It’s the first day with the new package and having the power back and still having the downforce it takes a little bit of getting used to, driving it and setting up the race car,” said Blaney who completed 10 laps during the first session. “But I look forward to stuff like that. It’s exciting. It’s different.”

 

“It’s nice to have the speed already. Hopefully, it carries over to tonight and then to Sunday.”

 

Blaney welcomes the additional horsepower on the cars this week following two races running tapered spacers which choked the output of the engine by 200hp. Under the new rules, Blaney yet to transfer to the final round of qualifying. Showing speed early in the weekend is a good sign for the team. Blaney won the pole at Phoenix for the 2017 fall race and posted two top 10 finishes in his first two races at the track.

 

“You can definitely feel it, for sure, especially getting up to speed and going  through the gears,” Blaney said. “You can really feel it. That part is nice. It just takes a lot to get used to—the lower horsepower stuff. It was nice to have it back and nice to feel the changes but with all the downforce and the power back on these cars, you're hustling them a lot. 

 

“I don’t know what the times were here last year, but I feel we’re going a lot faster. You can really get in the corner, stand on the gas. In the race, it’s going to be pretty good when it gets hot and slick. You’ll see a lot of cars moving around. The first couple of days is pretty cool with a new package, but you can feel it for sure.”


 

 

 

Rockingham Speedway hasn’t seen NASCAR action since Kyle Larson won a truck race in 2013. 

 

But after North Carolina Governor Roy Cooper recommended $8 million from the state for capital improvements for what has been proposed as The Rock Speedway and Entertainment Complex, there’s a new buzz surrounding the one-mile track. 

 

Joey Logano never ran a Cup car at the Rock, but he finished second to Larson in 2013. Would he like to see NASCAR return to Richmond County?

 

“Absolutely,” Logano said. “I think Rockingham is one of the best race tracks there is with the surface the way it is, and I haven’t been there in a few years so I don’t know if over the winters if it has worn out more, but we’ve tested there. I tested there I can’t tell you how many times and how many laps I’ve made early in my career and it’s always so much fun because you had these huge swells that are in the center of the corner.  

 

"The car would go up and down kind of like Atlanta and you had a surface that was so worn out and you could run the top, the bottom, there’s just no grip.  Anywhere you looked there was no grip and that was fun.  That was so much fun…I only raced an ARCA race and a Truck race there, but I loved it.”