“Everything’s Going Wide Open” With Rusty’s Busch Team
Written by John Davison · December 30, 2003
-New Facility Three Weeks Away; Active Testing Schedule; Parker & Bainbridge Meshing Perfectly-
Mooresville, N.C. (Dec. 29) – According to NASCAR great Rusty Wallace, perhaps the most action during racing’s so-called “off season” is occurring at 161 Knob Hill Road in Mooresville, N.C.
“That’s the address of our brand new facility and we’re only about three weeks away from moving in,” reports Wallace of the home for his new RWI Racing Busch Series team, which will field a fleet of Dodge racecars for promising young charger Billy Parker during the 2004 NASCAR season. “Everything’s going wide open and we couldn’t be any more excited and pleased with our progress so far.”
Wallace’s new state-of-the art team headquarters is located adjacent to his RWI complex and across the street from Penske Racing South, the team he co-owns and drives for on the NASCAR Nextel Cup Series. Current plans call for Wallace’s Busch Series team to compete in 17 races during the 2004 campaign.
“The game plan is to run Billy in 17 races this year, beginning with the March 6 Sam’s Town 300 at Las Vegas,” said Wallace of Parker, a talented 26-year-old racer who started driving go-karts at age 12 and has sharpened his skills on short tracks across the Southeast. Parker, son of legendary fisherman Hank Parker Sr., and younger brother of driver Hank Parker Jr., was chosen in September to pilot Wallace’s fleet of No. 66 Duraflame Dodge racecars in 2004 Busch Series action. “We’re also looking at the possibility of running the ARCA race down at Talladega.
“We’re right on schedule with every aspect of the operation and we have some pretty high expectations for our team,” said Wallace. “We have two brand new Dodge racecars that have had extensive wind tunnel time. The new team transporter is all painted up and ready to go. The engines are coming from Penske-Jasper Engines and we’ve been so impressed with their horsepower and durability.
“We’ve already logged more than 1,000 miles in testing on tracks like Charlotte, Kentucky Motor Speedway and down in Lakeland, Fla., and Billy and the guys have shown a ton of potential,” Wallace stated. “They’ve run under the track record with some of their qualifying setups and been right on race record pace in full racing trim, so they’re definitely on target from the competitive end of the equation and that really has us all pumped up.
“Our Larry Carter-led Miller Lite Dodge (Nextel) Cup team will testing out at Las Vegas on the 26th and 27th and the plans are for Billy and his team to be testing out there, too,” said Wallace. “We want to really be prepared and come out with the guns all loaded when we debut the new team out there in March. We hope to be able to turn a lot of heads, that’s for sure.”
Wallace is extremely confident about his Busch team personnel roster that includes his 1989 NASCAR championship crew chief Barry Dodson, who serves as team manager for the new organization and long-time associate Tom Polansky, who is serving as the team coordinator for the group.
“It’s amazing how Billy and his crew chief, Blake Bainbridge, have meshed,” Wallace said of the 24-year-old Bainbridge, a Hueytown, Ala., native who got his start in racing with the late Davey Allison and came to the new team from Cicci Racing. “Blake is one of the exciting new leaders and his experience is truly incredible for such a young guy. Blake grew up driving late models on tracks like Birmingham and Montgomery and I can certainly relate to that. He went on to work as a car chief and crew chief for some respectable Busch teams and he has even served as the shock specialist for a Cup effort. He has about the best background I’ve ever heard of for a 24-year-old crew chief.
“We’re determined to make our team a first-class organization all the way around and we have a great lineup of sponsors we’re very proud of,” said Wallace. “In addition to the great support we are getting from Duraflame, we have Nikon Binoculars, Emerson Climate Technologies and Jim Barna Log Homes as important backers of our team and we’re delighted about that.
“We hope to have several additional special announcements to make relative to our new team before we take our first green flag out in Las Vegas,” said Wallace. “But we’ve had so many inquiries and the phones have been ringing off the hook, so we wanted to bring everyone up to date and hopefully this has accomplished that here today. Stay tuned for more exciting details about our No. 66 team as we get closer to the March debut.”
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