For rookie Eric McClure of Abingdon, Va., driver of the #73 ARC Dehooker/Recreational Fishing Alliance Chevrolet, it has been a big weekend in Las Vegas. “Making the Cup race was big, obviously. That’s an area where we’ve been right on the verge in the first two races but this new qualifying system hasn’t particularly worked in our favor,” said McClure, who, through unofficial estimates, would have run in the season-opening Daytona 500 and had practice times capable of making the California Speedway field under the previous qualifying system. “The biggest thing? I walked into the sports book at the Stratosphere (hotel and casino) to see how the basketball games were going, and they had my name up on the odds board,” McClure said. For a driver making the second NASCAR Nextel Cup start of his career Sunday, the 26-year-old was thoroughly delighted. Even at being 300-1? “Hey, if my last name was ‘field,’ I would have been on the board before. There are a lot of guys who aren’t up there at all, so I’m pretty pumped,” he said. Will he lay a wager on himself? “Probably not for the win,” he laughed. “Not yet, anyway.”(Williams Company PR)(3-12-2005)
