S.M.'s Camping World Update, Issue No. 31

Rumors

Hermie Sadler will be driving the No. 48 Chevrolet for Fast Track Racing/Andy Hillenburg at Martinsville Speedway on March 28th. The teams still needs a primary sponsor, but does have Arcedale Vending on board as a associate sponsor.

Dennis Setzer and MRD Motorsports will team up again at Martinsville in the No. 8 Chevrolet, they also are still looking for sponsorship to add more races.

Kyle Busch and ownership looks like it's on hold. He needs to get a better business model going with his late model team first.

So he doesn't spend the sponsorship money too fast and then use his own money to pay the bills. Plus at 23, he wants to save for his retirement first.

Billy Ballew who owes a two truck team in the CWTS, one is the 51 that Rowdy races part-time. Was arrested Wednesday night, on Atlanta Motor Speedway property for DUI and had a mixed drink in his car's cup holder.

Not sure on the Georgia laws, but have read on several blogs. That since he was on private property and not public, the case most likely will get thrown out in court. Sad to see, hopefully regardless the outcome that he get the help he needs and learns from his mistake.

Chase Austin and Trail Motorsports took the Atlanta race off and may also sit out the Martinsville race. The team had two decent outings with Austin, 13th at Daytona and 21st at Fontana.

The Trail team had leased MRD Motorsports equipment for those two races and apparently don't have a long-term deal with Austin.

Current lawyers are working on finalizing Austin's full-time contract, hopefully with the Truck Series off the next two weeks they get this done.

Also the team is leasing the former Robert Yates racing and Petty Enterprises Race shop. They are moving in and want to concentrate that they ensure they have build a better platform for both Austin and their race team to run out of.

Hope they get this deal done, Austin is to good of a driver not to race in NASCAR and ashamed if it falls thru.

Chris Jones and Copy Wizard Racing will race 10 to 15 races this season in Trucks and with a sponsors help would add more races.

Gabi DiCarlo may or may not be racing at Kansas, sh'e not sure now. Since Martinsville was to be her debut, but upon NASCAR's approval to run larger tracks. She made her debut at Fontana and also Atlanta.

Todd Bodine and Germain Racing have announced they won't race at Martinsville without having a sponsor on board the No. 30.

At Atlanta they had Tilted Kilt on board, for a one race deal and will know later in the week if they will become a full-time sponsor for the rest of the season.

I delayed posting a day, thinking maybe Wednesday they'll announce if they have a deal and no news is bad news.

T.J. Bell Jr. and Red Horse Racing have announced that they need sponsorship help too insure he'll be able to race full-time. Otherwise they only race part-time with his limited race sponsorship from Home4theholiday.org, which Bell is a spokesperson for and he has some form of backing from a Wake-board manufacture.

Which for Bell is ashamed, he's eighth in the points, recorded a career best a fifth place finish and has finished all three races in the top 15.

Plus he leads in some of the stats in the series, a driver rating of 92.1, average running position of 9.6, run 295 laps in the top 15 (89.4%) and passed the most trucks 191 of them.

The other thing about Red Horse Racing, they also run Johnny Benson Jr. in the No. 1 full-time, without a sponsor and out of pocket.

Hornaday's Corner

Horn at Atlanta recorded his third top 10 finish he led for three laps and moved up to fourth in the point standings.

"I'm pretty frustrated with this pit strategy deal," Hornaday said. "It isn't about who has the fastest truck anymore, it is about who can beat you on fuel mileage or tire wear. We easily had a top-five truck, maybe even top three and ended up seventh.

"It is really disappointing for our team who had great pit stops all day long and worked on the truck to make it the best it could be".

He's 124 points behind Rowdy, five points behind Mike Skinner in third and a 10 point edge over Chad McCumbee in fifth place.

He also won the Wix Filter Lap Leader of the Race Award and now is tied with J.R. Fitzpatrick for the lead at one a piece.

Horn recorded his 89th career top 10 finish on a super speedway and 161st in 228 career starts.

Horn will have Longhorn back on his No. 33 Chevrolet at Martinsville as sponsor.

The Rookie Chase

Tayler Malsam was the top finishing rookie at Atlanta, finishing 13th and recorded his second top 15th finish of the season.

It was his first race at Atlanta, which is the fastest tracks the trucks race on and he did a decent job racing all day.

Malsam would qualify 29th position, he worked his way to 20th by the first caution on Lap 29, then his pit crew had a fast stop and helped him get five more position  and on the restart he was 15th.

He stayed the rest of the race in the top 15, but did go down a lap, thanks to a late caution he got the Aaron's Lucky Dog Award and battled back for a 13th place finish.

Malsam raced well, stayed calm and confident, drove through a wreck and is third now in the Raybestos Rookie race.

Now James Buescher would finish 14th, qualified 13th ran tight most of the race and when racing on the high side his Ford would handle it's best.

He ran most of the race in the top 20, had a good day, kept the truck in one piece and should have a good finish at Martinsville. Buescher believes he could possible maybe get his first win or have a top five finish.

Both J.R. Fitzpatrick and Ricky Carmichael, had problems at Atlanta and at the time of their misfortune they were running well.

Fitzpatrick had a loose left rear, that was vibrating really bad after the fist 24 laps and fortunately made it to pit road without having a bad wreck. When he pitted, only two lug nuts were left on the wheel.

He qualified seventh, had a fast truck and sure he would have had his second top 10 finish of the season had the tire not been loose.

Carmichael was running well in the top 15 most of the race and probably would have had another great finish. But unfortunately would have contact with Colin Braun and had damage to the left rear of his truck.

Both rookies would soldier home, to finish 21st -Real Deal and 22nd-the Goat.

After three races, the Raybestos Rookie of the Year standings are;

J.R. Fitzpatrick               33

Ricky Carmichael             30

Tayler Malsam                28

James Buescher              27

Johnny Sauter                24

Chase Austin                  16

Brent Raymer                   6

Chris Jones                      5

The Scott Minute

B/R's Brian Scott used pit strategy, made a amazing save and claimed his first top 10 finish of the season.

He also on a restart after a late caution flag in the race. Scott would storm into the lead, led a lap, before Bodine, Harvick, and Busch out foxed him and created a almost a four wide battle for the lead.

Unfortunately, Scott who's truck was tight, nearly lost it losing traction and spinning. But he was able to gather it up, keep it off the wall and salvaged a 10th place finish.

"As soon as we got the lead I thought we were going to win it," Scott said in the garage area after the event. "I realized after a corner or two that we were a little too tight. Bodine got the inside of me and Harvick had a really good run on the outside and it just sucked me around.

"I went from second or third to 10th place just like that. we had a pretty good truck and we were there at the end. We had a shot at it and that's is all you can ask for. I will learn from what happened today and hopefully be able to capitalize on that in the future".

Upcoming Races

Mar. 28 - The Kroger 250 at Martinsville Speedway on Fox at N/A Pre-race and 2:00 PM Race Time. (Saturday)

Apr. 25 - O'Reilly Auto Parts 250 at Kansas Speedway on Speed at 5:30 PM the Set-Up Show and 6:00PM Race Time. (Saturday)

May 15 - North Carolina Education Lottery 200 at Lowe's Motor Speedway on Speed at 7:30PM the Set-Up Show and 8:00 PM Race Time. (Friday)

2009 NASCAR Camping World Truck Series Point Standings

1.) Kyle Busch                              560

2.) Todd Bodine                            -25

3.) Mike Skinner                          -119

4.) Ron Hornaday Jr.                    -124

5.) Chad McCumbee                     -134

6.) Matt Crafton                          -137

7.) Terry Cook                             -147

8.) T.J. Bell                                 -148

9.) Timothy Peters                       -154

10.) David Starr                           -176

(Editor's note: both Top Five Picks and track Facts will be back in a couple of issues.)