NEWS & NOTES
1,000 START: Mark Martin will etch his name in the record books this Saturday night when he makes his 1,000th start in a NASCAR-sanctioned, points-paying event. Saturday’s Sprint Cup race will be the 746th of Martin’s career. He also has competed in 231 Nationwide Series races and 23 Camping World Truck Series events. Martin joins Richard Petty and Michael Waltrip as the only drivers to reach this milestone.
CAREER STATISTICS: Martin has earned 94 NASCAR victories in its three series with 39 Cup, 48 Nationwide and seven Truck series victories. Martin is the winningest driver in Nationwide Series history. He is 17th on the all-time Sprint Cup winner’s list and third among active drivers.
FIRST CAREER START: Martin made his first career NASCAR start on April 5, 1981, at North Wilkesboro (N.C.) Speedway. Driving the No. 02 entry for Bud Reeder, Martin started fifth and finished 27th after suffering mechanical issues. Richard Petty won the event, earning his 194th career Cup victory, and Bobby Allison finished second. Darrell Waltrip, Dave Marcis and Harry Gant rounded out the top five.
LAST TIME AT BRISTOL: Martin earned his second pole position of the 2009 season when the Cup series traveled to Bristol last March. He went on to finish sixth, posting the team’s first top-10 finish of the young season. The No. 5 team jumped four spots to 31st in the standings after that race and has continued its climb into the top 12, which is the cut-off for the Chase for the Sprint Cup.
CHASE RACE: With three races remaining until the Chase, Martin and the No. 5 team are 12th in the standings, 12 points ahead of 13th.
MARTIN AT BRISTOL: Martin has earned eight poles at Bristol, which is double the amount he has earned at any other active track. In his 41 Cup starts at the short track, he has posted two wins, 15 top-five finishes and 22 top-10s.
NO. 5 IN VICTORY LANE: The No. 5 team won the Cup race at Bristol on March 25, 2007, which marked the first victory for the Car of Tomorrow. The win with the Impala SS also marked the 600th victory for Chevrolet and the 200th NASCAR win for Hendrick Motorsports. Under the direction of crew chief Alan Gustafson, the team has earned one win, two top-five finishes and four top-10s at the short track.
BRISTOL CHASSIS: Gustafson has chosen Hendrick Motorsports Chassis No. 5-500 for Saturday’s race at Bristol. This is the same chassis that Martin drove to a sixth-place finish at Bristol in March.
HENDRICK AT BRISTOL: Hendrick Motorsports, which is celebrating its 25th anniversary, has tallied eight wins, 39 top-five finishes and 70 top-10s in 51 Cup events (155 starts) at the short track.
KELLOGG CARES: In honor of Martin’s achievement, Kellogg Company is donating 1,000 pounds of food to the Arkansas Food Bank Network, Inc., which will benefit Martin’s hometown of Batesville, Ark.
ANOTHER MILESTONE: At Dover (Del.) International Speedway on Sept. 27, Martin will make his 750th career Sprint Cup start. Martin will become only the ninth driver to reach this mark in Sprint Cup’s 61-year history. In his 745 Cup starts, he has earned 39 victories, 249 top-five finishes and 407 top-10s (almost 55 percent). He has driven 272,794.4 miles in his 27 seasons.
QUOTES
MARK MARTIN, DRIVER, NO. 5 POP-TARTS/CARQUEST CHEVROLET (ON MAKING HIS 1,000TH NASCAR START.): “I honestly didn’t know this milestone was coming until I had a few reporters bring it up lately. Wow. That’s a lot of races. I didn’t realize that I was even close to that many. To me, personally, 1,000 starts is not that big of a deal. How many wins I have in those 1,000 starts would be a stat I would be more interested in. Don’t get me wrong, I think this is great, but I don’t view starting races as a huge accomplishment. I would say the wins, poles, top-five and top-10 finishes in those 1,000 starts are a bigger deal.”
MARTIN (ON HIS MEMORIES OF HIS FIRST CAREER NASCAR START.): “I remember that it was sprinkling that day. And it was the first race I’ve ever been in that the race actually started under caution. I kind of freaked out about it. It was a new experience. While I was circling under yellow, I completely forgot to turn the rear-end cooler on. I guess it didn’t hit me that the race was actually starting so I didn’t think through turning everything on. I never turned it on, and I ended up burning up the rear end during the race. I was happy that we had qualified fifth for that first start, but I wasn’t real impressed with the way we performed all day. I wanted to run in four more races that year, and I knew I still had a lot to learn.”
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