Eric McClure is hoping to turn some heads while running a limited schedule in the Busch Series this season, enough to impress a sponsor who will fund a full-time effort on one of NASCAR’s elite circuits next year. Fresh off a respectable 13th-place finish in the ARCA series at Daytona earlier this month, the 25-year-old local Late Model racer plans to compete in at least six Busch races this season, beginning at Las Vegas on March 6. His other scheduled Busch races this season include Richmond, Charlotte, Kentucky, Chicagoland and another race to be determined later. Bristol isn’t part of his “I Can Learn” sponsorship deal, however, because the educational software company wants to focus on markets where it has the most potential for growth. “We’re trying hard to put something together for Bristol but right now I’m not sure,” McClure said. “Right now we’re just thinking about Las Vegas and what we need to do to make the race. We tested there with about 21 other teams, including some of the best drivers in the series like Matt Kenseth, Jeff Burton, Greg Biffle and Kyle Busch, and we were middle of the pack. When we come to a track, our first race is just making the field because we don’t have any provisionals, and if we do that we can start worrying about being fast for the race.” As for the ARCA series, McClure said he’d like to take another shot at a 2.5-mile superspeedway when the series heads to Talladega in October, but nothing is definite at this time. He also plans to meet with his Late Model sponsor Dixie Pottery to discuss competing at his home track, Lonesome Pine Raceway, on a limited basis this year. His efforts in the Busch Series, as well as his wedding in May, will prevent him from competing for the NASCAR Weekly Racing Series championship at LPR, but he hopes to head back to the three-eighths mile asphalt oval as many times as possible this summer. After running three full-time Late Model seasons at LPR, McClure admits he has come a long way in his career to compete at Daytona International Speedway. But he knows he’ll need to earn the respect of his fellow competitors in higher-level racing the same way he had to at LPR. He has mixed feelings about his performance in his Daytona ARCA debut. While he’s glad that he finished the race on the lead lap, he felt he had a car capable of placing at least in the top 10 and possibly in second. “We had a car that was capable of beating everybody but the guy that won (Kyle Busch), but we just could not find any (drafting) friends,” McClure said. “I’m glad we finished and we learned a whole lot, but I was disappointed with where we wound up considering what (car) we had.” McClure’s “I Can Learn”-sponsored Chevrolet from the Morgan-McClure Motorsports Nextel Cup stable qualified sixth-fastest at Daytona and stayed in the top 10 most of the race. He got as high as third place at one point, but in an incident that wasn’t shown on TV he got “punted” out of the draft by Billy Venturini and lost several positions before he could get back into the draft. “I’m glad that we at least got to show that we could run up front, but after the race the back bumper and fenders looked like it had been to Bristol,” McClure said. McClure said the team’s Cup driver, Kevin Lepage, was with the spotters during the race. “I got everything from a no’ to a (expletive) you’ and I thought, You’re kidding me.’ Nobody wants to draft with a rookie, but maybe next time I’ll have better luck finding some friends,” McClure said. He added, “I was pretty down about the race, but we had several people in the Cup garage come up and compliment us on the run – that we were being patient and using our head – so that was inspiring.” McClure knows that there are hundreds of capable drivers for every available full-time Cup, Busch or Craftsman Truck ride, but he hopes he’s building a resum that will one day lead him down that path. “There’s a lot of people in this country who can drive race cars who don’t always get the chance, so I’ve been blessed to be given these opportunities,” he said. “I’ve got to walk a fine line because I’m still trying to learn and get experience, but I’ve also got to perform and come up with some good results while I’ve got this chance. I just hope I can convince somebody to take a chance on me.”(Kingsport Times News)(2-24-2004)
