Brett Moffitt Heads to Bristol with Former Mentor and New Race Team
[media-credit name=”Photo Credit: hometracks.nascar.com” align=”alignright” width=”225″]
[/media-credit]Young up and coming racer Brett Moffitt has had an interesting journey, from his racing start under the tutelage of four-time K&N Pro Series champion Andy Santerre to racing for some of the biggest teams in the sport, including Joe Gibbs Racing and Michael Waltrip Racing.
But as he kicks off his 2012 K&N Pro Series East season in Bristol, Moffitt is back where he belongs, under the familiar wing of Santerre and with a whole new race team Hattori Racing Enterprises. Moffitt will pilot the No. 11 Toyota Camry and will join teammate Sergio Pena in the Shigeaki Hattori stable.
“Ever since I drove for Andy (Santerre) in 2009, Andy and my dad have been in constant communication,” Moffitt said. “Andy’s been a big help to my career over the past three years.”
“So, when this opportunity came up, Andy told Shigeaki Hattori that he knew should drive his second car and luckily that was me.”
While Moffitt may seem a bit devoted to his old mentor, he knows that Santerre not only has the experience behind him but also has the strength of the new HRE race team with him as well.
“Working for Andy Santerre is just really great,” Moffitt said. “He’s been there. He’s driven race cars, he’s won races and he’s won championships.”
“So, he knows what it takes,” Moffitt continued. “Being able to work for him is really great for a driver because he understands everything you say. He’s always looking out for your best interests as a driver.”
Moffitt has had an eventful three years since debuting as a 16 year old with Andy Santerre in the K&N East Series. Since then, he has had seven wins, four pole positions, 20 top-5 and 25 top-10 finishes and has never finished worse than 3rd in the championship standings.
“After I left Andy last time, I went to Joe Gibbs Racing for a year,” Moffitt said. “I ran in the K&N East Series for them. We were really competitive for them and ended up second in the points.”
“After that, I went to Michael Waltrip Racing,” Moffitt continued. “That was a huge step for my career.”
“MWR made me feel important as a driver,” Moffitt said. “I came in every day and worked on the cars and in the shop.”
“They put a big emphasis on my physical training and I’m still associated with them,” Moffitt continued. “I still have a trainer with them so I go there every day and still work out. That’s always a good connection to still maintain.”
With his return to his mentor Andy Santerre, as well as his new assignment with Hattori Racing Enterprises, Moffitt is excited to get his 2012 race season underway. He just recently finished up testing at Bristol, the first race of the season for the K&N Pro Series East.
“The test went really well,” Moffitt said. “From the first time we unloaded, we had to work on them a little bit but by the end of the day, we were pretty comfortable.”
“We have a couple things we are working with back at the shop and hopefully when we come back to the track, we will be ready to have a good race,” Moffitt continued. “The car was real fast and I’m really looking forward to the race.”
Moffitt has been only been guaranteed eight races with HRE Racing. The remainder of the season’s racing will be dependent on sponsorship, as is so often the case.
“This year Hattori approached me as a driver,” Moffitt said. “They weren’t looking for a driver with a lot of money, just one that they could win races and win championships with.”
“Right now, I’m only guaranteed eight races, with the first race at Bristol on March 17th,” Moffitt said.” That’s where the sponsorship comes into play.”
“We’re still out there searching so hopefully we’re able to find something by then,” Moffitt continued. “But we’re just going to take the first eight and try to be the best we can. Hopefully we’ll find a sponsor and be able to finish it out.”
Moffitt is also looking forward to working with his new teammate at Hattori Racing Enterprises. He will be paired with fellow Santerre protégé Sergio Pena.
“Me and Sergio have always gotten along real well,” Moffitt said. “So, it’s going to be a really fun year. We’re both obviously proven race winners so I think it will be a good year for the team this year.”
In addition to mentor Santerre and teammate Pena, Moffitt is also looking forward to working with Dave McCarty, his new crew chief. McCarty has over 20 years experience in all kinds of racing, from the Nationwide Series to Trucks, ARCA, ASA and the K&N Pro Series East.
“Me and my new crew chief Dave McCarty have spent time getting to know each other,” Moffitt said. “Dave was Darrell Wallace’s crew chief last year at Revolution Racing. Andy felt like he would be a good match up for me so he brought him over.”
Moffitt has been working intensely on establishing that all important chemistry with his new crew chief, as well as their bond on and off the track.
“We’ve just been working together in the shop,” Moffitt said of his new crew chief. “He’s been bossing me around telling me what to do. I say ‘yes sir’ and do it. We have a lot of fun but when it’s time to get things done, we get things done.”
Owner Shigeaki Hattori, as well as HRE General Manager Andy Santerre are equally as excited about having Moffitt with their team as he is to race with them.
“People in an organization are the key to the organization’s success,” Hattori said. “If you hire the right people with knowledge and experience, success will follow.”
“I am excited to have Brett at HRE,” Santerre said. “He is an incredible driving talent and has matured behind the wheel in the last few years. He is more than capable of winning the championship.”
With the confidence of his owner and manager firmly in his corner, Moffitt simply cannot wait to get back to the race track, beginning at Bristol
“I feel like I’ve proven myself as being able to win races and be up front,” Moffitt said. “I’m just looking forward to racing. I love racing and being competitive.”
“That’s what drives me.”
Mark Martin ‘It Wasn’t Even Close’ on Saturday
[media-credit name=”Credit: Todd Warshaw/Getty Images for NASCAR” align=”alignright” width=”225″]
[/media-credit]For much of the second half of Saturday’s Sam’s Town 300 at Las Vegas it appeared veteran Mark Martin had things under control and was heading toward a likely victory.
Martin led for a total of 44 laps and was leading when the race’s sixth yellow flag flew. The leaders all came down pit road for their final stops and by just inches Martin was beaten to the exist by Ricky Stenhouse Jr., would end up being the difference.
Stenhouse went on to lead the final 55 laps and drove away from Martin at one point for a five second lead. He went on to win his third career race as Martin cruised home behind him.
“That was one serious beat down he put on me that last run, just a beat down,” Martin said afterwards.
“I kept up with him for while and about wrecked five times and that’s it. The run before that was no problem, I could stay ahead of him. And anytime he would close in on me I could get up on the wheel and pull back out. But that last run he seemed to be stronger, I didn’t feel my car was off he just had that thing rolling. I’m not ashamed to say it wasn’t even close.”
Last season Martin lost the title he had held for so long, being the Nationwide Series all-time win leader. The man who took it, Kyle Busch, did so in the car that Martin drove on Saturday, the No. 18 for Joe Gibbs Racing.
Had Martin won on Saturday it would have been his 50th career NNS victory. It also would have been his second straight at Las Vegas, he won the race last year while driving for Turner Motorsports.
“Thanks to Joe Gibbs and everybody at JGR and Interstate Batteries,” Martin said. “This Toyota was awesome and they were awesome. I needed to run a race to see if I could find a few things that maybe we could work on to improve. I got a few ideas, but that was one serious beat down Ricky Stenhouse just put on me there at the end. It was just like I can’t do it – man he was gone.”
It’s well known the 2012 season isn’t about championship of any kind for Martin; he’s not running a full schedule in Sprint Cup and would like to do more NNS races. He just wants to have fun and win, accomplishing one of the two goals on Saturday.
“I did, I’d like to start by saying what a special treat it was to be able to join the Joe Gibbs organization, JGR, it’s something that we’ve wanted to do for a long time and the stars didn’t line up until now to do it,” Martin said about having fun.
“J.D. [Gibbs] and I had a little fun with it for sure. It’s a real privilege – I would like to do more of it, but there’s no sponsorship for that right now. I have six more on the schedule, if we could stir something up. It sure was fun to work with Adam [Stevens, crew chief] and all those guys.”
Yet, for as dominant and easy as Martin made things seem, he wasn’t completely satisfied on Saturday. Not because it hadn’t won but with the car he was driving. Going from the NNS from the NSCS garage threw him for a loop.
“I’m going to tell you something, my Cup car drives way better than this car,” he said. “I – whew, I don’t know – you saw me almost wreck I don’t know how many times. Man I can’t wait to get back in that Cup car. I didn’t think it was so slick [Friday], but today it was a handful. I never was real comfortable out there.”
Being behind the wheel of an accomplished JGR car though, will have any driver wanting to come back. Martin is no different and will wait for the call for the next time that he’ll get to take a nice Saturday drive.
“This was so much fun – it was such a great racecar,” Martin said. “It’s so fun to be a part of Joe Gibbs Racing. I’d like to do some more of these. We have some on the schedule, but no sponsorship so far.
“Heck, I don’t know, I enjoy watching these things on TV, but that was a good view I had right there. I enjoyed it.”
Mark Dilley: Racecar Driver, Track Owner, Co-Owner of Wide Open Motorsports
[media-credit id=4 align=”alignright” width=”266″]
[/media-credit]Mark Dilley had a plan in his mind as he knew what he wanted the track to look like. However, explaining it to the construction engineers was another story. They wanted it explained in percentages while Dilley only knew the degrees of banking he wanted.
With just over 12 hours to put together a plan, it was time to hit a deadline. Everything came together that night after drawing at the kitchen table using his kids’ crayons, a dinner plate and tea cup, along with a call to a friend who had a computer program.
Flash forward two race seasons and Sunset International Speedway has gone from a track that was down in the dumps into a track that drivers want to race at.
“First off, the staff they all seem to take pride in their jobs at the speedway and they do it with a sense of professionalism,” 2011 Limited Late Model (LLM) Champion Kevin Cornelius says. “The facility is second to none, in my opinion. I think the new ownership group has done an outstanding job bringing Sunset Speedway back to life and generating a lot of excitement at the speedway. Also, the competition last year was the some of the best in Ontario and it showed with close hard racing every night, and the competitors, I’m proud to race door to door with them.”
Dilley got on the ownership side of Sunset after hearing about the status of track. Dilley himself grew up racing at Sunset and the track still meant a lot to him. He also had enjoyed the time that he spent in charge of Barrie Speedway with Brad Moran. So when it came to this situation, everything just came together.
“When we got involved in this, they put a team of owners together that had money to back it and really wanted to make a difference,” he explains. “They’ve done that by the investment they’ve made into the track, redoing the track. Just whatever they said they’d do, they’ve done and it’s been good to work with partners like that where they have the money to repave the track, redo it and a real fast and exciting place to be.”
For drivers that race at Sunset, they note it’s because of his understanding with them.
“Mark has made Sunset International Speedway one of Canada’s top oval tracks by being a promoter who understands what it takes to make a track work,” Mike Bentley, Sunset LLM Competitor, explains. “Being a driver himself, he understands what the weekly racers at Sunset go through and makes sure their opinions and concerns are heard.”
Becoming in charge of Sunset Speedway came out of a business venture already started with business partner Linda Jones – Wide Open Motorsports. They started Wide Open Motorsports in 2007 because there was a need for race teams to someone to organize the marketing.
“When NASCAR started, there was a need for teams to have organization from the side of corporate representation,” he explains. “As far as organizing things at the race track, activation of sponsorships, and really where the teams are on demand to that, that’s really how it got started. Whether we came in and managed an existing sponsorship or brought in a new sponsorship and did it that way. Basically to organize and do everything under one umbrella.”
One of the keys to the organization is finding sponsorship, which isn’t always easy. Due to that, most businesses, as Dilley explains, ask for money up front.
“A lot of times there are companies and agencies that will do things, but they take a big retainer,” he explains. “So what that means is basically if I was going to get you a sponsorship, you’d give me $40,000-$50,000 up front to hunt that sponsorship down. I guess if I find something, that’s good. If I don’t, well, that’s part of the business.”
However, Dilley and Jones do it differently to make it easier.
“Basically, Linda and I put whatever to some degree – I mean, we’ll come back and ask for some money if its getting real crazy – but generally speaking, we do everything upfront,” he says. “We work on a street permission basis.”
So far in the five years the company has been open, they’ve put together some good sizable sponsorship packages for drivers. One of the biggest was getting Canadian Tire to sponsor Scott Steckly.
“Early on, to get Canadian Tire was huge for us,” he says. “They were basically going to get out of motorsports – we managed to get them back in, so that was huge.”
Finding the sponsorships hasn’t been easy due to the economy as Dilley says when the economy goes down, a lot of companies cut advertising business first. However, it’s still possible to find sponsorship as it’s all about being prepared to give back to the sponsor.
“Make sure to be prepared to give back 30% minimum of what you’re going for,” he advises. “So if you’re basically if you need $10,000 to race, if that’s your race budget, then you really need to get $13-$14,000 cause you’re going to spend $4,000 on activating that $10,000. So what that means – so if you get $10,000, you’re only going to spend on race program about $7,000 cause you’re going to be spending $3,000 on tickets, buildboards, shirts, lettering, shows, whatever it may be to get them involved.”
Dilley adds that most people don’t do that and end up using the full $10,000 they get on the race car and doing their own thing. Dilley says that because drivers are forgetting to give back to the sponsor, sponsors are leaving due to no return investment.
Beyond Wide Open Motorsports and running Sunset Speedway, Dilley is also a driver in the NASCAR Canadian Tire Series. This past season, Dilley finished sixth in points with a win on the season coming at his home track, Barrie Speedway. Keep everything balanced at times isn’t quite easy, he admits.
“There’s a lot of stuff that goes on at the same time; that’s the biggest thing,” he explains.
There was the one weekend during the season in July where Dilley made multiple trips back and forth from Sunset Speedway to Exhibition Place for the Canadian Tire Series race weekend so he could race, while keeping an eye on the double-header show.
When he can’t be there, he depends a lot on his staff to keep things under control.
“We do have good staff that works for us at Sunset that can take up a lot of slack,” he says.
Most notably, he brought Steve Slaughter on board to be part of the management team. Slaughter has experience running race tracks himself as he was in charge of Sunset during the last 1990s.
[media-credit id=4 align=”alignleft” width=”266″]
[/media-credit]Despite all the positives noted, there are some issues that some drivers note about the track.
“Sunset Speedway thinks that they need to have one late model driver to what they call headline the show which I think is a slap in the face to the rest of us other drivers that race at sunset speedway,” Cornelius explains. “It’s my opinion that this do called headliner hurts our car counts and the quality of the show that we try to put on every Saturday night.”
There are also those who feel that there are issues within technical inspection and drivers getting away with breaking the rules.
“They need to stick with the rules when it comes to teching,” Tara Case, Sunset Super Stock driver, says. “They let too many people away with stuff and makes it harder for others to make it anywhere.”
Though overall, everybody says that things with the track are quite positive from their perspective.
“His team has done a great job and you can see this by all the people in the stands,” Evan Towle, who is in charge of CanadianRacingOnline.com. “Every time I go, I notice a new improvement.
“The things I notice is the staff is really friendly and the people in the stands are talking about how much they like the track and what Mark and his team has done.
“Never had anything that I can complain about since Mark took over. I have followed Mark Dilley since his CASCAR days and he loves racing and he is a no bs type guy. I brought my daughter to NASCAR Speedpark and Mark was there with his car. He talked to her and you can really see he enjoys racing and his fans and you can see this with everything he has done for Sunset Speedway.”
