ATLANTA

One Way to Get to the Finish Line in Atlanta!

    

Atlanta Photos:  By Phil Cavali

Johnny met with the new sponsors in their suite prior to the race	AllStar Financial was prominently shown  on the front hood of the #23 Toyota Tundra
A battle for the lead	Johnny leads a pack of cars  in the Nextel Cup race
Johnny was happy to be part of the Cup race	Another great photo by Phil!

Atlanta Race Recap - Nextel Cup Race
The No. 23 Bill Davis Racing team made its sixth appearance of the 2005 NASCAR Nextel Cup Series campaign at Atlanta Motor Speedway this weekend with Johnny Benson behind the wheel and the Challenger® brand on board.  Coming into the weekend, the team had one goal—to make the show on Friday and then run strong on Sunday.  The first goal appeared to be a breeze for the team, as it lined up 19th to start the race early Sunday afternoon, but the race itself was a whole different story that ended with a 28th-place finish.

In the first of two practice sessions of the weekend, Benson and his Challenger crew focused on race trim, but mostly on qualifying trim.  Benson said his car felt pretty stable so the team made a few minor changes to try to gain as much speed as possible.  At the end of the first practice, Benson was inside the top 15 and felt confident about his chances of getting into the Sunday event.

The Challenger team was one of the last teams to make its trial laps later Friday night under the lights at Atlanta.  With 54 cars entered to try to make the show, Benson knew he must beat 11 cars that were not in the top 35 of the owner’s points, to get his Challenger car into the race.  Benson went out and ran a time of 29.079 seconds on his first lap.  This time was good enough for the 19th-starting spot and put the team solidly in the starting lineup for the Sunday race.

When the green flag waved over the 43-car field for the start of the Bass Pro Shops MBNA 500, Benson’s yellow No. 23 car was immediately too tight.  He called into his crew saying his machine was way too tight from the middle of the corner off.  This tight condition was hurting his lap times, which in turn was pushing Benson further back in the pack.

By lap 40, Benson had fallen back into the 33rd position.  He told his crew it was so tight he could not drive it and they really needed to make some changes to the car in order for him to run competitive times.  The team called Benson down pit road on lap 52, under yellow-flag conditions, to get four fresh tires and fill the car with Sonoco racing fuel.  The team also made major chassis adjustments to try and free up the mishandling machine.

The race returned to green on lap 60 and Benson found himself in the 35th position.  He told his crew the changes did not help, and now he had no bite getting off the corner.  The team struggled to find a balance in which Benson could race and by lap 100, the team was two laps down to the leader.

On lap 110, Benson brought his Challenger machine down pit road for a pit stop under green-flag conditions.  The team changed four tires and filled the car with fuel.  It also made a track bar and wedge adjustment in hopes it would loosen the car up in the corners.  Unfortunately, the caution came out on the next lap and put the team three laps down to the leaders.

On lap 145, Benson picked up a terrible vibration, which he thought was in the drive shaft.  He told his crew the vibration would come and go, but when it was there he could not drive the car into the corners.  Crew chief Doug Wolcott and his team came up with a plan to make changes to the car to try and help locate the vibration.

The team made a pit stop under yellow-flag conditions on lap 160.  The team changed four tires and filled the car with fuel.  They also made track bar, wedge and air pressure adjustments to the car in hopes it would eliminate the vibration.  When the field went back to green-flag racing, Benson came over the radio explaining the vibration was still evident.

For the next 100 laps, Benson struggled to get through the corners due to the vibration he was experiencing and was only able to pick up five positions on the track.  On lap 210, he came over the radio and said, “It is hard to know what the car is going to do.  Sometimes the vibration is not there and I can really drive it into the corner, but when it is there I am just trying to keep it off the wall.  When the vibration is there, it is very severe.”

On lap 250 of the 325-lap event, Benson came over the radio to tell his crew the car was handling the best it had all day.  He went on to run his best lap times of the day and was passing cars on both the high and low sides of the track.  Unfortunately, he was never able to make up the ground he lost early in the race and when the checkered flag waved, Benson found himself in the 28th position.

Atlanta Truck Race Recap
A last-lap mishap that collected multiple trucks during the conclusion of Saturday’s NASCAR Craftsman truck race at Atlanta Motor Speedway left Johnny Benson and his Allstar Financial Toyota race team waiting a good bit after the race was over to find out where they had finished.  Luckily, Benson, retreated to the grass down the front stretch to avoid getting caught up in the late-race mayhem and not only kept his truck clean, but found out he had managed to hold on for a third-place finish, as well.

It was an all-around strong weekend of truck racing for Benson and his Toyota crew.  The No. 23 team was fast right off the truck on Friday in both first and final practice.  By the close of the practice sessions, the No. 23 was one of the trucks turning everyone’s head, concluding the day as the fourth-fastest truck on the track with a lap speed of 182 miles per hour.

Qualifying followed the next morning and the No. 23 Allstar Financial Group team lapped the 1.54-mile speedway in 30.7 seconds at 180.5 miles per hour.  The effort was a strong one that landed the team on the seventh row in the 14th-starting position for Saturday’s EasyCare Vehicle Service Contracts 200.

The 22nd race of the 2005 NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series season got underway just before 4 p.m. Saturday, but was quickly halted due to a multiple-truck pileup on lap two.  The red flag was displayed to give track workers time and space to clean up the mess.  More than 30 minutes later, the drivers were finally given the go-ahead to re-fire their engines.

Racing returned to green on lap six with the No. 23 truck in 11th place, but it didn’t take long for Benson to get his truck closer to the front from there.  By lap 17, he was inside the top 10 and he would only continue to move forward from there.  In fact, by lap 41, Benson was a top-five runner and contending for the lead.

The major and only real setback the team encountered was a set of sticker tires that just didn’t seem to give Benson the grip he needed on the fast track.  So, the team took advantage of the fourth caution-flag conditions of the race and made its second pit stop of the day on lap 90.  The team took four scuffed tires and fuel, along with minor chassis and air pressure adjustments to give Benson the grip he was looking for.  As racing returned to green on lap 94, the No. 23 Toyota was fifth but once the field came around to complete the 94th circuit, Benson was third.

He would go on to hold on to the third-place run for more than 30 laps, while successfully avoiding the spinning trucks around him on the final lap to bring home a third-place finish for his No. 23 Bill Davis Racing team and Allstar Financial Group.

The next stop on the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series schedule will be next Friday, Nov. 4, at Texas Motor Speedway for the running of the Silverado 350.  The race is scheduled to start at 9:15p.m. ET and will broadcast LIVE, starting at 9 p.m. ET, on SPEED (TV), MRN (Radio) and XM Radio Channel 144.

 

NOTES:

• This week’s race truck for Atlanta Motor Speedway is Chassis No. 23-73. Truck No. 73 is a brand new truck to the No. 23 Toyota Certified Used Vehicles team.

• Tested and Approved…The No. 23 team tested at Atlanta Motor Speedway Wednesday, Oct. 19, in preparation for Saturday’s event.

• Welcome Aboard… Bill Davis Racing is pleased to announce it has partnered with Allstar Financial Group for a one-race deal at Atlanta Motor Speedway.  Allstar Financial Group engineers solutions. Allstar’s experienced surety, fidelity and insurance professionals can deliver solutions organizations need for their clients.  The company has been headquartered in Atlanta since 1965.  Allstar Financial Group’s trading companies include Georgia Surety Company, Inc., Statewide Bonding Company, Inc., Allstar Surety Company, Inc., Allstar Underwriters, Inc., and AllstarRe, Inc. Allstar Financial Group offers substantial strength and resources through its superior-rated companies.  Allstar Financial Group has full underwriting and binding authority on most products.

• Double Duty… Johnny Benson will have a full weekend of racing while he is in the Peach State.  He will drive the Allstar Financial Group Tundra on Saturday and attempt to qualify for the 500-mile NASCAR Nextel Cup Series event on Sunday.  It will be Benson’s third Nextel Cup Series start this season in the No. 23 Challenger car.  His other two starts came at his home track of Michigan International Speedway and Bristol Motor Speedway.

• Listen and watch … The EasyCare Vehicle Service Contracts 200 is scheduled to start at 3:15 p.m. ET Saturday, Oct. 29.  It will broadcast live on Speed (TV), MRN (radio) and XM Radio. 

Johnny Benson on racing at Atlanta Motor Speedway:
“I think the feeling of going to Atlanta for me is excitement.  I am really excited about doing double duty this weekend.  To go there and run well in the truck race is the most important thing.  We are going to bring a new truck there that I think will really be good in the race.  I also think we are bringing a really good Nextel Cup car there, which is really exciting.  To run two races is not much of an issue we have a day in between.  If I could run a Busch Series car, I would do that as well.  Atlanta is one of those places where running two races is fun.  There is enough time that it works out, and you are not overwhelmed.

“Atlanta is cool because of the grooves.  There are three racing grooves, and you can run side by side.  If you are not happy with the car on the bottom, you can move to the top and vice versa.  The race has been won running the top groove, which is unusual for Atlanta.  There is a time where I am going to have to choose what groove I want to use during the race and try to adapt to it.  We will just have to wait and see.”

 

Johnny Benson - #23 Challenger Event Preview

Bass Pro Shops MBNA 500 - October 30, 2005

Atlanta Motor Speedway - Hampton, GA

Notes:

• The No. 23 Challenger Dodge Charger at Atlanta Motor Speedway this weekend is Chassis No. 78.  Its most recent notable performance was when it carried the CAT Racing team to a season-best fourth-place start at Kansas Speedway earlier this month (finished 27th).  It then went on to help the CAT Racing team score a 14th-place start at Lowe’s Motor Speedway (finished 20th) the following week.  The No. 22 team also competed with the same car at the Charlotte track in May, racing it in both the NASCAR Nextel Cup All-Star Open and the Coca-Cola 600.  The team’s All-Star open effort produced a 15th-place start and finish.  With less than 10 laps remaining in the Coca-Cola 600 the following weekend, the team was on its way to a season-best top-10 finish when the leader of the race blew a tire just a few cars in front of the Caterpillar car and collected it in the process, relegating it from a seventh-place run to a 23rd-place finish (started 32nd).

• A Winning Combination … The Challenger® brand, which already graces a full line of quality tractors, combines and hay tools, is making its debut as a NASCAR Nextel Cup Series primary sponsor by riding on board with Johnny Benson and the No. 23 Bill Davis Racing Dodge this weekend in Atlanta.  Atlanta is Challenger’s home track, as the corporate headquarters for parent company AGCO Corp. are located in Duluth, Ga. This is not the first association between NASCAR and Challenger.  The Challenger brand made its initial Nextel Cup sponsorship debut as a new associate sponsor of the No. 22 Caterpillar car and driver Scott Wimmer this August in the Allstate 400 at Indianapolis Motor Speedway and has been along for the ride every weekend since.  It will continue its associate program with the No. 22 team through 2006.  For the last couple of years, HOLT CAT in Dallas, Texas, has also supplied Texas Motor Speedway with several Challenger wheel tractors that are used for year-round maintenance of the 1,500-acre complex.  For more information on any of Challenger’s full line of agricultural products visit www.challengerag.com.

• About AGCO … AGCO Corporation, the parent company of the Challenger® brand, is headquartered in Duluth, Ga.  AGCO is a global manufacturer and distributor of agricultural equipment and related replacement parts, with product distribution in more than 140 countries.  AGCO offers a full product line including tractors, combines, hay tools, sprayers, forage, tillage equipment and implements through more than 3,900 independent dealers and distributors around the world.  AGCO products are distributed under the various well-known brand names AGCO®, Challenger®, Fendt®, Gleaner®, Hesston®, Massey Ferguson®, New IdeaÒ, RoGator®, Spra-Coupe®, Sunflower®, Terra-Gator®, Valtra®, and White™ Planters.  AGCO provides retail financing through AGCO Finance in North America and through Agricredit in Australia, the United Kingdom, France, Germany, Ireland and Brazil.  In 2004, AGCO had net sales of $5.3 billion.  To learn more about AGCO, go to www.agcocorp.com.

• Tested & Approved … To prepare for this weekend’s Bass Pro Shops MBNA 500, Benson and the No. 23 Challenger Racing team tested at Atlanta Motor Speedway Monday, Oct. 17.

• It’s a double-header weekend for Benson … Before climbing into the No. 23 Challenger Dodge this Sunday to race in the NASCAR Nextel Cup Bass Pro Shops MBNA 500 at Atlanta Motor Speedway, Benson will race the No. 23 Toyota Certified Used Vehicles Tundra in the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series EasyCare Vehicle Service Contracts 200 at Atlanta Saturday afternoon.  This weekend’s race will be the 22nd Craftsman Truck Series race of the 2005 season.  Benson currently stands 16th in the truck series championship standings.  Qualifying for the EasyCare Vehicle Service Contracts 200 is scheduled to start at 11:30 a.m. ET on Saturday, Oct. 29.  The EasyCare Vehicle Service Contracts 200 will follow later that same day, starting at 3:15 p.m. ET, and will broadcast LIVE on SPEED (TV), MRN (radio) and XM Radio Channel 144.

• Team 23 roster … Along with Bill and Gail Davis, the following is a list of crew members who will help Benson with the No. 23 Challenger Dodge Charger this weekend at Atlanta Motor Speedway:

Co-Crew Chief:	Doug Wolcott	Over-the-wall crew
Co-Crew Chief:	Rick Ren	FT Carrier:	Shane Pugh
Car Chief:	Tom Hubert	FT Changer:	Chris Beeson
Mechanic:	Steve Spahr	Jackman:	Joel Taylor
Mechanic:	Josh Crumpler	RT Carrier:	Curtis Martin
Mechanic:	Dewayne Cassell	RT Changer:	Bill Hagerthy
Engine Tuner:	Chuck Evans	Gasman:	Scott Weston
Tire Specialist:	Steven Berry	Catch-can:	Kevin Gately
Shocks:	Dennis Feibel
Spotter:	Bill Davis
Truck Driver:	Robbie Flint
Driver Support:	Chip Wile

 

• Tune in … Qualifying for the NASCAR Nextel Cup Bass Pro Shops MBNA 500 is scheduled to start at 7:10 p.m. ET Friday, Oct. 28, and will broadcast LIVE on PRN (radio) and XM Radio Channel 144.  The qualifying session will broadcast on a tape-delayed basis on SPEED (TV) starting at 8 p.m. ET.  The Bass Pro Shops MBNA 500 is scheduled to start at 12:40 p.m. ET Sunday, Oct. 30, and will broadcast LIVE on NBC (TV), PRN and XM Radio Channel 144.

Johnny, how did the one-day test session at AMS go for you earlier this week? What was learned?

“It was a tough session for us to get acclimated with the car.  We got through the morning practice and were running both cars to decide which would be the one to focus on for next weekend.  We made that decision, got to that point, broke for lunch, and then went out to test some more.  We put on some new tires and ran about six laps, and then blew a tire.  I hit the wall pretty hard and the hit pretty much killed the car.  So that part was obviously tough.  The focus then, of course, turned to the back-up car, and for some reason we couldn’t get it up to speed the rest of the day.  We just were not fast enough.  We did a lot of stuff to it.  It didn’t show a lot of improvement, so we knew we needed to find another car that would get us in the show.  We came back to the shop to find a car we felt more comfortable taking to the track and that would be more likely to get us into the race, and that is what led us to chassis No. 78.  It is the same car Scott Wimmer and the CAT Racing team have raced the last couple of weeks at Kansas and Lowe’s and have been able to lock in some great starts, so we’re hoping the car will be able to help us do the same this week.”

The last time you raced at Atlanta in a Cup car was in 2003. What do you worry about or look forward to regarding your return to the Cup series at Atlanta?

“I always look forward to getting to race more.  Of course, I am looking forward to it, but I also know we have to qualify.  That puts us in a tough situation especially at an impound track, because which one do you work toward?  You have to work on race setup, but at the same time we have to be able to qualify well.  We want to be good enough to race, but we have to make the race.  We have to find that balance.  I don’t care where I start, just as long as I am in a decent race car when that green flag waves.  I also know we may have to give up a little bit of that to just get to make the start.  It’s all about splitting our time up and being smart about how we do that.  I just want to have a good run and be able to put on a good show for Challenger.  We will be racing practically in the company’s backyard.  Its parent company [AGCO Corp.] is headquartered in Duluth.”

You have had some pretty impressive runs in the past at Atlanta.  You won a NASCAR Busch Series race there in 1995 and your first NASCAR Cup pole there in 1996.  What are some of your most memorable moments at Atlanta Motor Speedway?

“It is a neat place.  I really liked the old track, but I like the new one as well.  I’ve really run well there in the Busch, Cup and Truck Series.  It is a good place to race because it has more than one groove.  It definitely makes for a good show for the fans and enables us to move around a lot more.  It doesn’t make it easier to race, but it gives you options to find what works best for you and your car to get around the speedway.”

Challenger Q&A

Q&A with Doug Durand, Challenger Brand Marketing Manager:

What turned Challenger toward NASCAR or made it something to consider as part of its marketing endeavors?

“Since 2002, when AGCO acquired the highly-respected line of Challenger tracked tractors from Caterpillar and formed an agreement with the CAT dealers to market and service the full line of Challenger machinery, there has been a strong relationship between Caterpillar and Challenger.  We felt that being involved with Bill Davis Racing and having the Challenger logo on the Caterpillar cup car would reinforce this relationship and our commitment.  We are excited at the opportunity to expose the Challenger brand to all the NASCAR fans in North America.”

Are there plans to do more down the road in NASCAR?  If so, what avenues are being considered?

“Our 2005 and 2006 sponsorship represents our first entry into NASCAR.  At this point in the season, it is still early in the sponsorship, but we are constantly evaluating each of our brand marketing initiatives.  With the popularity of NASCAR among our target customer segment, we hope to see growth in Challenger brand awareness as well as increased recognition of our association with Caterpillar and Cat dealers throughout the U.S. and Canada.  These results will lead us to doing more with NASCAR and many different options are being considered.”

What made Challenger decide to team up with Bill Davis Racing and Johnny Benson, as well as Scott Wimmer?

“We’re thrilled to have joined Bill Davis Racing as a sponsor for the 2005 and 2006 racing seasons and believe they have the same winning drive and ambition toward their goals on the track as we do in the field.  That same energy can be felt throughout our CAT dealer network as we all stand behind both Johnny and Scott as they take to the track on Sunday.”