David Stremme and No. 40 Lone Star Steakhouse & Saloon Dodge
Sylvania 300 – New Hampshire International Speedway Advance
No. 40 TEAM FACTS:
Chassis: Crew Chief Steve Lane and the Lone Star Steakhouse & Saloon crew are taking chassis No. 615 for the event this weekend. David Stremme raced this car to an 11th-place finish, a NEXTEL Cup career-best, at New Hampshire earlier this season. He also piloted it to a 26th-place finish last week at Richmond.
New Englander On Board: Doug Riepe, who can be found serving as pit support for the No. 40 Coors Light Dodge on Sundays, is a native New Englander hailing from Danbury, Conn. He is a 2000 graduate of Immaculate High School, and was named the 2000 Connecticut State Athlete of the Year. He moved to North Carolina in the fall of 2000 to pursue a higher education at Wake Forest University in Winston Salem, N.C., where he played for the Wake Forest Demon Deacons baseball team for four years and then graduated in 2004 with a Bachelor of Science degree in Communications. Riepe came to CGRFS that following fall to work as an intern in the sponsorship services department and has stayed on with the team ever since.
Loudon Revisited: Stremme’s momentum continued to build when he visited New Hampshire International Speedway earlier this season. In his first Cup Series start at the 1.058 mile oval he brought home his career-best finish of 11th in his 22nd start of 2006.
Savvy Stats: In his first six races of the season, Stremme had an average starting spot of 36th and an average finishing position of 34th. Since his highest finish of the season at Loudon in July, Stremme improved on the last six starts and his average starting spot is 30th and his finish is 29th.
Loudon Laps: Stremme has made 703 laps around New Hampshire International Speedway during competition in two Busch Series races and one NEXTEL Cup start. His highest starting spot was 15th in 2004 and his highest finish came earlier this season when he wheeled the No. 40 Dodge to an 11th-place finish.
Rookie Ranks: Stremme is currently sixth in the Raybestos Rookie of the Year standings. With 141 points, he is 110 points behind leader Denny Hamlin and only 26 points behind fifth-place Martin Truex Jr.
NASCAR NEXTEL Cup points standings: Stremme is currently 34th in the NASCAR NEXTEL Cup driver standings and the No. 40 Dodge is 34th in the owner standings. There are now 10 races remaining in the 2006 season.
David Stremme Quotes:
“The Lone Star Steakhouse & Saloon Dodge that we are taking this weekend was a brand new car that we built for the first race at Loudon. It is probably the best short track car I have ever had and that is what helped the No. 40 team to get the highest finish of our season back in July. I hope to improve on that finish and get a top-10 this weekend in the Lone Start Steakhouse & Saloon Dodge. We had some trouble with the handling of the car last weekend in Richmond but we are looking to turn that around. The crew worked hard to get that car turned around for the race this weekend and hopefully we can give them the results that we all know we can get.”
