The ways the stars are aligning, it isn’t out of the question. Mark Martin is off to Hendrick Motorsports next year. There is much speculation about Martin Truex Jr. leaving for another team in 2009. Reports have linked Paul Menard with a possible move to Yates Racing, taking father John’s home improvement chain sponsorship with him. And DEI has been unsuccessful finding full-time sponsorship for Regan Smith. The only driver who seems completely secure for 2009 is Aric Almirola.
I don’t understand why NASCAR hasn’t yet figured out a better way to deal with qualifying rainouts. Magically, you can qualify Nationwide and Craftsman Truck teams just hours before they race. But reschedule Cup qualifying with a two-day window? Impossible!
Front Row Motorsports actually found sponsorship from Weber Grill. You think the Weber marketing crowd is feeling giddy about pursuing the next step after being jettisoned without even getting a qualifying lap?
Roush-Fenway’s marketing arm is free to seek sponsorship for Yates entries. But the question is whether the sponsors already affiliated with Roush-Fenway paid additional money to be on the Yates cars, or whether any of that sponsorship money came from existing contracts with Roush-Fenway. And if so, would diverting those funds count as one team underwriting another, thereby violating the rule?
A Roush-Fenway spokesperson said that issue should be addressed by Yates Racing personnel. And Yates Racing’s response through its PR staff was, “We do not disclose any terms of our sponsorships to media nor other teams,” later adding, “All of our activities with Yates Racing are in compliance with NASCAR rules.”
But what exactly are those rules?
Unless some of the Saturday night hot-shots start getting some time in the IndyCar feeder series we are soon going to see the Indy Car TV ratings and attendance numbers go the same direction as the zipper on Danica’s firesuit.
Fulfilling the sponsor obligations of the current contract can make inking the next one darn near impossible.
“Absolutely. If you can’t get to the office, there’s no way you can sit down and work out details,” said Biffle, who added that the deal might have gotten done this week if not for the trip to LI. “So that’s been one of our things. In May, I had one day off in May. We had something going every day. So it makes it difficult to actually get to sit down and think about it and look it over.”
Archer used the final seconds of the afternoon practice session to record a lap nearly a second faster than the quickest morning session time.
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The 28-year-old former Champion is out to capture a second title this year, and believes the team’s campaign is right on track although he has yet to be on pole this season.
Wendlinger took his 7th FIA GT pole position with a time of 1:23.748 in his nr 33 Aston Martin DBR9 ahead of his team-mate Alex Müller. Gianmaria Bruni took his second consecutive pole position for AF Corse.
“My sessions were quite good – I had a bit of understeer. I know the track quite well, from racing Porsches here, so I could get up to speed very quickly. The Corvette is more settled here than the Porsche was – the Porsche used to be very nervous in the high-speed corners"-- Alois Meir
With just a couple of minutes remaining, the No.10 Aston Martin pulled out a lap of 1:32.214 and tops the first practice session at Oschersleben.
