It will be all in a days work, literally, for the NASCAR Busch Series this weekend at Gateway International Raceway near St. Louis. Practice, qualifying and the Charter 250 will all be held on Saturday. Indianapolis Raceway Park has been the only one-day show the last few years in the NASCAR Busch Series, but this year, Gateway is host to the first of three in addition to The Milwaukee Mile June 26 and August 7 at IRP. Drivers Bobby Hamilton Jr. (No. 25 U.S. Marine Corps Ford) and David Green (No. 37 Timber Wolf Pontiac) are all for the new schedule. We are really looking forward to racing at Gateway, now that its a one-day show, Hamilton says. I really believe that when practice time is limited, it falls right into our hands due to my crew chief, Harold Holly. Harold is one of the best chassis men in the sport, and generally, he is one of the first to get the track figured out. With the limited time we are going to have this weekend, I feel like we will be strong and contend for our first win of the season. Its been an up-and-down year so far, but we are capable of winning two or three races in a row if luck will fall our way. Green, fourth in the NASCAR Busch Series driver standings heading into Gateway, wont be concentrating on a qualifying setup as he and his Brewco Motorsports crew prepare for the event. There wont be time for such luxuries. The new schedule should give us a better indication of what well have for race time, Green says. I think its a great format that allows us to work solely on race setup. Itll make for a better race for the fans. Gateways 1.25-mile layout presents a challenge for Green and others. Some have gone so far as to compare it to a road course. Gateway is a little like Darlington, in that both ends are very different, which to me, makes it a lot of fun, Green continues. Being odd-shaped like that creates an opportunity to do a lot of cool stuff from the drivers seat, like shifting as many as four times a lap. Its definitely a drivers race track. You have to get the car to turn well in Turns One and Two, but typically, that makes it too loose through Turns Three and Four.
New and Notes II:
Chevrolet builds on lead in manufacturers standings Chevrolet has built a fairly comfortable lead in the Bill France Performance Cup standings for manufacturers in the NASCAR Busch Series. Chevrolet has five wins and 67 points, compared to 53 points and three wins for Ford following the Greg Biffle (No. 60 Charter Communications Ford) win at California Speedway. Dodge is in third place with 40 points and one win, with Pontiac in fourth, with 38 points and no wins. The standings are determined by a scoring system in which the highest-finishing manufacturer receives nine points, the second-highest gets six, third-highest receives four and fourth-highest receives three.
On the Right Track:
Jason Keller (No. 22 Miller High Life Ford) has more top-five finishes than any other driver at Gateway, with five. His best finishes at the track are a pair of runnerup efforts, in the 1997 inaugural event and in 2001. Only once in seven Gateway starts has Keller finished outside the top 10. He was 37th in 1998. Ashton Lewis (No. 46 Lewis Motorsports Chevrolet) scored the first Busch Pole of his career last year at Gateway. Casey Atwood (No. 14 U.S. Navy Chevrolet) holds the track qualifying record at Gateway, with a speed of 132.423 mph set in July 1999. Ron Hornaday is second on the list of laps led at Gateway, with 142. Greg Biffle won a 1999 NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series event at Gateway, and then won the tracks NASCAR Busch Series race in 2002.
From the Archives:
Few who were there will ever forget the inaugural NASCAR Busch Series race at Gateway International Raceway, on July 26, 1997. Temperatures for the early-afternoon green flag approached the 100-degree mark, and the track surface crumbled in several places. That contributed to 14 cautions for a total of 81 of the events 240 laps at the time, the race was 300 miles, rather than its current 250. When all was said and done, it took race winner Elliott Sadler 3 hours, 48 minutes, 25 seconds to complete the event. It was the longest race, in terms of time, in the history of the NASCAR Busch Series. The next year, the race was moved to October to combat the high temperatures. In 1999-2002, the race was moved back to July, but held at night. Last season was the first for Gateway in its current May slot.
Fast Facts
What: Charter 250 (Race No. 10 of 34 in the NASCAR Busch Series).
Where: Gateway International Raceway, Madison, Ill.
When: 8 p.m. (ET), Saturday, May 8, 2004.
Track layout: 1.25-mile paved oval.
Race length: 250 miles/200 laps.
Posted awards: $1,352,029.
TV: FX, 8 p.m. (ET).
Radio: MRN, XM Satellite.
2003 winner: Scott Riggs.
2003 polesitter: Ashton Lewis.
Pre-race schedule (all times local): Saturday Practice, 9:45-10:45 a.m.; Practice, 11:45 a.m.-12:50 p.m.; Qualifying, 3:05 p.m. (All cars will be impounded after qualifying for race lineup.)(NASCAR PR)(5-7-2004)
