Citing what he called an untenable business proposition in continuing to field a CTS team, Dale Phelon on Tuesday morning told his employees he was closing his truck shop here. Phelon, a multi-million-dollar business operator who has competed in the truck series since 1997, has offered his crew positions working on his fleet of vintage race cars, including Ford Mustangs and Cobras and a Chevrolet Corvette. Phelon formerly drove his own cars in the SCCA Trans-Am Tour before starting his truck team. Driver Rick Carelli gave Phelon his first victory as a truck owner last September at Richmond International Raceway. The victory was particularly significant for Carelli after he suffered life-threatening injuries the previous season at Memphis Motorsports Park. Phelon told the team he would keep the Richmond race winning truck, a Ford, and one other road race-equipped F-150. Crew chief John Monsam said the team had as many as 15 trucks in its shop, including two brand-new Hopkins Ford chassis, five complete Ford trucks and another unraced Chevrolet chassis. Between the 2000 and 2001 seasons, Phelon switched his program from Ford to Chevrolet. The team has the new Chevy chassis, two complete Chevrolet trucks and three Chevrolet engines, including one that was never raced. The remainder of the team’s inventory consists of Ford products. Monsam said he would travel to California Speedway this weekend to assist Carelli with a NASCAR Winston West car fielded by RE/MAX principal Davy Liniger. Carelli and Monsam collaborated for a fourth-place finish in a recent RE/MAX Challenge Series race at Nashville Superspeedway. The crew chief, who has won races in the truck series with Carelli and Ron Hornaday, in the NASCAR Busch Series with Ricky Craven and in ARCA with Joe Bessey, also was Jerry Nadeau’s crew chief when he made his NASCAR Winston Cup debut with Richard Jackson Motorsports. He said he was most concerned about finding jobs for his employees who wanted to continue in NASCAR racing. Monsam said in addition to pursuing his own future options in California, his truck chief, Mitch Jarrett, and mechanic/tire changers, Flip Estrada and Jason Meeks, were anxious to find new positions with NASCAR teams(NASCAR.com)(4-25-2001)
