Friday, June 10, 2005 | 9:11 a.m.
Brian Hilderbrand covers motor sports for the Las Vegas Sun. His motor sports notebook appears Friday. He can be reached at [email protected] or (702) 259-4089.
Brendan Gaughan will return to the NASCAR Nextel Cup Series this weekend as a relief driver for Mike Bliss, who is recuperating from hernia surgery.
Bliss is scheduled to qualify the No. 0 NetZero Chevrolet on Saturday and will start Sunday's 200-lap at Pocono Raceway. Bliss will get out of the car at the earliest opportunity Sunday and Gaughan, a Las Vegas native, will finish the race.
In addition to helping out Bliss in Pocono, Gaughan will be in Texas today and Saturday attempting to win his fifth consecutive NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series race at Texas Motor Speedway.
"I was hoping it wouldn't come to this, but I think it's in our best interest to make sure we have a plan in place before we get to Pocono," Bliss said of having to get out of the car during Sunday's race. "Obviously, if the surgery was something that could have waited until the end of the season, that's what I would rather have done, but it couldn't, so we'll make the best of a difficult situation this weekend.
"I appreciate Brendan helping us out -- especially since he's racing in Texas this weekend -- and I know he'll do a good job for the team."
Bliss has started all 13 races this season and climbed to 25th in points after an 18th-place finish last Sunday at Dover International Speedway. His best finish this season was 12th in February at California Speedway.
"We've got a little momentum going, having picked up a couple of spots in the points after last weekend's race," Bliss said. "Hopefully, I'll do a good job qualifying the NetZero Best Buy Chevrolet and will be able to get the job done until we get a caution on Sunday and can make the switch."
Gaughan will be making his first appearance in a Nextel Cup car since the 2004 season finale at Homestead-Miami Speedway in November. In his two Cup starts at Pocono last season, Gaughan finished 39th (engine failure) and 28th (accident) and was not running at the end of either race.
GOING FOR THREE: Johnny Sauter will attempt to put the No. 15 Billy Ballew Motorsports Chevrolet truck in Victory Lane for the third consecutive race when he pilots the truck in tonight's NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series Chex 400 at Texas Motor Speedway.
Las Vegan Kyle Busch drove the truck the past two races and earned victories at Lowe's Motor Speedway in Concord, N.C., and Dover International Speedway.
Chex cereals, which is sponsoring tonight's race, also will sponsor the No. 15 truck this weekend.
GOING, GOING... : NASCAR Nextel Cup veteran Kirk Shelmerdine is attempting to sell a five-race sponsorship package through the Internet auction site eBay.
Shelmerdine had attracted a bid of $5,600 as of Thursday evening, but the undisclosed reserve price for the sponsorship package had not been met. The five-day auction is set to end Sunday.
SERVIA PICKED: Oriol Servia will fill in for the injured Bruno Junqueira in the No. 2 Newman/Haas Racing entry in the Champ Car World Series while Junqueira recovers from injuries he suffered in a crash in the Indianapolis 500.
Servia drove the car to a third-place finish last weekend at The Milwaukee Mile in what, at the time, was called a one-off stint as Junqueira's replacement.
Junqueira had surgery May 30 to repair two fractured vertebrae. It is not known when he will be able to return to the car.
SALE APPROVED: The Long Beach City Council this week unanimously approved the sale of the assets of the Grand Prix Association of Long Beach to a company owned by principals of Champ Car World Series.
On May 24, it was announced that the Grand Prix Association of Long Beach had agreed to sell its assets to Aquarium Asset Management, owned by Champ Car co-owners Gerry Forsythe and Kevin Kalkhoven, for $15 million. The City Council vote was the final approval on the sale and ensures that Champ Car will continue to be the featured series in Long Beach at least through 2010.
"We are delighted that the Toyota Grand Prix of Long Beach will be a partner of the Champ Car World Series for years to come," Kalkhoven said. "This is a world-class event and we plan to continue to grow the race for the good of Long Beach and the Champ Car series."
The 32nd annual Toyota Grand Prix of Long Beach is scheduled for the weekend of April 7-9, 2006.
EYEING HISTORY: Las Vegas-based Petersen Motor-sports/White Lightning Racing will attempt to become the first privately owned American team to win the 24 Hours of Le Mans three consecutive times when the team returns to France for next weekend's race.
A Michael Petersen-owned Porsche won the pole and the race in conjunction with Alex Job Racing in 2003 with drivers Emanuel Collard (France), Lucas Luhr (Monaco) and Sascha Maassen (Belgium). The team repeated with a pole position and class win in 2004 with drivers Jorg Bergmeister (Germany), Patrick Long (Las Vegas) and Maassen.
Bergmeister, Long and Timo Bernhard will pilot the team's No. 90 Westward Ho Casino-sponsored Porsche 911 GT3 RSR.
LOCAL FLAVOR: Half of the 20 Southern Nevada entries in last weekend's Tecate SCORE Baja 500 desert race finished the 419-mile race in the allotted 19-hour time limit.
Leading the local contingent were class winners Rob MacCachren of Las Vegas and Josh Frederick of Moapa. MacCachren and Bryan Freeman increased their lead in the 2005 SCORE Overall points standings by winning Class 1-2/1600 for the second time in three races. Freeman drove 399 miles of the 419-mile race while MacCachren drove Gus Vildosola's Trophy Truck for the last half of the race to a ninth-place finish.
Frederick remained undefeated after two ATV races in 2005, winning the Overall ATV title and Class 25 on a Honda TRX450R.
Las Vegas' Bekki Freeman-Wik finished sixth in Class 1 and 15th overall driving the first 155 miles for driver of record Ronny Wilson of Long Beach, Calif. Freeman-Wik tied the record she set back in February when she won Class 10 at the San Felipe 250 for the highest overall finish by a female driver in the history of SCORE desert racing.
Other local finishers included Tim and Ed Herbst (sixth overall and fourth in Trophy Truck), Brian Collins (ninth overall and fifth in Trophy Truck) and Pat Dean (20th overall and eighth in Class 1). Serious mechanical problems slowed down Troy Herbst in his quest to win four consecutive Class 1 titles, but he and co-driver Larry Roeseler managed to finish 16th out of 31 starters in the class.
The next event on the 2005 SCORE Desert Series is the inaugural Las Vegas Terrible's Cup I at the dirt track at Las Vegas Motor Speedway on July 29-30. The event is a non-points race.
archive
