S.M.'s Camping World Update, Issue No. 24

Rumors/Team News

Kevin Harvick, Inc. has added a limited sponsor to it's No. 33 Camping World Chevy driven by Ron Hornaday Jr.

Swedish Match North America will be sponsoring a limited number of races with its newest moist snuff brand "Longhorn," and will make its debut at Daytona.

David Starr and Red Horse Racing have parted ways. Starr, who has backing from Zachry Construction for fewer than 10 races, is looking for a new team to race with in 2009.

Sure, it may have had something to do with adding Benson in the No. 1 truck, since they don't have a sponsor announced yet for that ride.

Starr hopes to stay with Toyota but has spoken with several teams, including one tied to another manufacturer.

TRG Motorsports will have two truck teams in 2009; an announcement on the lineup for drivers and sponsors is forthcoming.

My guess is T.J. Bell will be in the No. 7 Sponge Tech Chevy Truck and J.R. Fitzpatrick will be in the No. 71 Mammomet Chevy Truck for at least 15 races and could be full-time with additional sponsorship.

The team has also added two young drivers to it development program. The first is Connor Cantrell, who will run a limited ARCA Re/Max and Truck Series schedule in 2009.

The second one should be a familiar name and a third-generation driver. Travis Sauter will also be running a limited ARCA Re/Max and Truck Series schedule in 2009.

He the son of Tim Sauter, his grandfather is Jim Sauter, and his two uncles, Jay Sauter and Johnny Sauter, have all driven in NASCAR and come out of the Mid-West Racing Circuit.

In other TRG Motorsports news, in their sports-car division, they will have five Porsche GT3 Cup cars running in the Rolex 24 race on Jan. 24-25 at Daytona International Speedway and hope to win their third Rolex 24 Hour GT.

I'll be rooting for the Justin Marks and Andy Lally-led ride; both are NCWTS drivers and I hope they can get the win. They will be driving the ride full-time in the series for the team and trying to win the championship, as well. 

Thorsports Racing has officially announced that Johnny Sauter will be driving the No. 13 Chevy, as a teammate to Matt Crafton and no sponsor has been announced yet.

Colin Braun, the only Roush-Fenway Truck entry left, will be competing in the Rolex 24 at Daytona for the fifth consecutive year.

He'll run in the No. 60 Michael Shank Racing Riley, with the teams full-season drivers Mark Patterson and Oswaldo Negri, along with IndyCar driver Ryan Hunter-Reay and competing in the Daytona Prototype Division.

To update, Brendan Gaughan will be driving the No. 62 Chevrolet for Rusty Wallace in the Nationwide Series in 2009 and will be a Raybestos Rookie of the Year candidate.

His longtime truck series crew chief, Brian Berry, will be joining him at RWR and serve as his crew chief.

To update, Bill Davis Racing's Truck Program is now owned by Triad Racing Technologies, by Marty Grant and Mike Head.

While they are still evaluating the teams and what it's racing plans are for 2009, it appears like the truck program is gone. With the release this week of Taylor Malsam, Mike Skinner and Brian Scott. (Be sure to check out my latest article on Scott.)

Just bummed these two would make this decision, since the last three years BDR has two second place finishes in a row in the final points standing and won the championship last year.

The truck program has been the successful part of the team; it had a great lineup with the three drivers and basically could have defended their owners championship and duplicated Xpress Motorsports winning back to back with different drivers.

Photo Credit: Zimbio.com