Not too much racing this past weekend in the different National racing series, due to the weather or Mother’s Day, I’m not sure. The World of Outlaws got 2 days of racing in, Tuesday at Salina Highbanks Speedway in Oklahoma and Friday at Eldora Speedway in Ohio. The NASCAR Sprint Cup and Nationwide series were in Darlington, South Carolina, but that’s about it.
It also was a difficult week to come up with a “NorCal Driver of the Week“, there wasn’t much racing and no one had a particularly good race. So, we chose, as this week’s “NorCal Driver of the Week“, T.J. Bell from Sparks, Nevada. (We claim the Reno-Sparks area as part of NorCal). T.J. made his NASCAR Sprint Cup Series debut at Darlington Raceway in the #150 Bandit Industries Toyota for Joe Falk Racing. When you think of how many race car drivers have as their ultimate goal to race in the Sprint Cup series, it really is an amazing accomplishment.
After making the race and qualifying in the 33rd spot, T.J. had transmission troubles and finished a disappointing 38th with 67 laps completed. Not the start he had hoped for, but he qualified, and got some good experience. He also just signed a deal with Green Smoke, an electronic cigarette company, to race in 3 more Sprint Cup events including the Coca Cola 600 in Charlotte on May 29th. In addition, T.J. races a partial schedule in the Camping World Truck Series for MAKE Motorsports, driving the No. 50 Pinnacle Rubber Mulch/Liberty Tire Recycling Chevy Silverado. To keep up on T.J.’s race results please visit his driver page at racing-reference.info.
Paul McMahan from Elk Grove, CA competed in both World of Outlaws events this past week. At Salina Highbanks Speedway in Oklahoma Paul was 2nd fastest in qualifying, but struggled in the A-Main finishing in 19th place, one spot ahead of NASCAR star Tony Stewart. He had a much better result at the famous Eldora Speedway in Ohio, coming in 4th. Paul is now in 8th place in the 2011 Championship standings.
Jason Meyers from Clovis also raced in the two World of Outlaws events. He finished in the 14th spot in Oklahoma and at Eldora qualified 3rd fastest but then finished a disappointing 20th. Jason is now in 4th place in the World of Outlaws points standings.
Brad Sweet from Grass Valley has been able to race with the World of Outlaws while the NASCAR Camping World Truck Series has a weekend off. In Ohio, he finished 2nd in the B-Main and then transferred to the A-Main where he ended up in the 12th spot. At Eldora, Brad had a 3rd place finish in the B-Main but in the A-Main he came in a disappointing 17th place.
A.J. Allmendinger from Los Gatos, who qualified 7th, struggled to a 20th place finish in the Southern 500 at Darlington Raceway. A.J. managed to maintain his 11th place spot in the NASCAR Sprint Cup standings heading to Dover, Delaware this coming weekend.
Four time Champion, Jeff Gordon, originally from Vallejo, CA finished in the 12th position in Darlington, South Carolina after qualifying in the 5th spot. Jeff who has had a very up and down year so far, dropped a place to 17th in the points standings.