Marty Gaunt’s first priority as the new vice president of Bill Davis Racing is to try to get the #22 team back in the top 35 in owners points. “There’s a lot of good people and resources at Bill Davis Racing,” said Gaunt, who was with Red Bull Racing last year. “If you look down the road at [BDR affiliate] Triad and their capabilities [with Toyota], everything is there. It’s just going over there and trying to get the puzzle all back together.” While the #22 team is the top priority and obviously Gaunt wants the successful truck programs to continue to thrive, he also wants to get a second Cup car eventually back on the track. BDR had hoped to field a second car this season for Jacques Villeneuve but that project fell through when sponsorship fell through. Stabilizing the BDR program is important as it tries to convince long-time sponsor Caterpillar to remain with the team. Not only was Gaunt brought in as vice president, but BDR has shuffled its management team with Mark Chambers moving from his role as the truck series program manager to team general manager and the hiring of a director of marketing in Jim Thomas. “It’s all of our responsibilities is to make sure we keep all of our partners in-house and keep them happy, but I think with the restructure going on we have at Bill Davis Racing and with the top priority getting performance back up, we can squash all those rumors [about Caterpillar leaving],” Gaunt said.(SceneDaily)(4-15-2008)
