“It's amazing," said an ecstatic Carpentier, "We made a couple of changes from [Friday] morning, and the car just rotated beautifully through the middle of the corner. Our Dodge was just stuck to the track.”
Michael McDowell took over in the No. 00 for MWR at Martinsville in April when David Reutimann moved over to the No. 44 replacing retired champion Dale Jarrett. With a best finish of only 21st at Infineon he has failed to produce a top 20 finish in 14 starts.
McDowell finds himself 39th in the standings, outside that coveted top 35. His Cup career started out with a bang, and not a good one. While qualifying for just his second Sprint Cup Series start at Texas, McDowell lost control of his Toyota Camry and took a hard right hand turn head on into the wall.
After he slammed into the wall, his car continued to barrel roll down on to the apron. Miraculously McDowell climbed from his car shaken up but uninjured nonetheless.
"That's one of the worst wrecks I've seen, for sure, in a while and I'm not excited I had to participate in it." said McDowell. "I thank the guys back in the shop. They make these cars extremely safe. They spend the extra time padding everything. For me to walk away from that wreck, right there, is unbelievable."
Dario Franchitti has struggled the most out of this years contenders. The 2007 Indy 500 and IRL champion has had trouble performing at the NASCAR Sprint Cup level. His best finish came at Martinsville, a mediocre 22nd place finish.
After race number 17 of the season, at NHMS Dario Franchitti found himself no longer with a Cup ride. Chip Ganassi announced at the end of June the No. 40 team would cease operation immediately.
"This is a difficult decision for [co-owner] Felix [Sabates] and I that did not come without its share of anguish," Ganassi said. "In this tough business environment, continuing to run the car without proper funding has become increasingly difficult."
Franchitti will continue to drive for Ganassi in the NASCAR Nationwide Series.
"It was a big shock that it happened," he said. "Myself and 70 people lost their jobs down in Concord [N.C.], so a lot of people are upset right now. I understand if there is no money, there is no money.
The timing of these things are never good. "So you can never pick the right time for something like this to happen, but it's particularly frustrating because we really felt that we were getting a hold of it."
So what’s behind the poor performances of this rookie class? The fact that the majority of them have no experience in a stock car could be just the reason.
These open wheel sensations were rushed into Cup rides and should have at least spent one or two years in the Nationwide Series. The five ROTY contenders have failed to produce a single Top 10 and all find themselves below 30th in the standings.
Next year’s rookie class is already looking to be a stronger one than this years. With Marcos Ambrose running full time next season and Joey Logano the leading candidate to replace Tony Stewart at JGR, the 2009 Raybesto’s Rookie of the Year contenders should be able to produce the results this season’s have not. Lets hope so at least.
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