The NASCAR Sprint Cup Series is at Infineon Raceway this weekend, and you know what that means— road course ringers.
Road course ringers are drivers who normally don't run in the NSCS, but get a ride once or twice a year at Infineon and Watkins Glen, because they have more road course experience than many of the full-time drivers.
Rarely, good performances by these road course ringers can lead to part-time, or even full-time rides in NASCAR.
Last year held every ringer and his brother, in trying to make a road course race.
Klaus Graf, Brian Simo, PJ Jones, Butch Leitzinger, Terry Labonte, Marc Gossens, Ron Fellows, and Boris Said all attempted to make the race Cup race at Infineon, with the Nationwide Series teams dipping further than before into Ringer-land to field cars for Andy Pilgrim, Michel Jourdain, Jr., Patrick Carpentier, Max Papis, and Andy Lally.
Criticism has fallen on these drivers as a group, mainly from full-time drivers in the series.
"There hasn't been a road course ringer to win a race yet, so I don't know why everybody uses that in the equation other than it gives them something different to write about," two-time Series champion and six-time road course winner Tony Stewart said.
Well, Tony, here are a few reasons we write about road course ringers:
1. Many ringers aren't out there to win.
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