In his first time at the helm of a NASCAR Nationwide Series car in over five months, Rusty Wallace Racing’s Steve Wallace (No. 4 LoanMax Ford Mustang) proved as rock solid as ever. The young driver successfully battled several Sprint Cup veterans Friday night, en route to an 11th place finish in the Virginia 529 College Savings 250 at Richmond International Raceway.
The effort marked Wallace’s tenth-straight top-20 finish at Richmond and was his second-straight 11th-place finish in the track’s spring event.
After starting the race from the 11th spot, Wallace battled among the top-15 until the day’s first caution period on lap 25. Upon the lap 29 restart, Wallace incurred what would be the only major drama of his race, when he quickly lost several positions on the restart and fell as low as 21st place. Two laps later, Wallace radioed to crew chief Blake Bainbridge that their car had a tire going down.
The No. 4 team went on alert, but their services ultimately would not be needed. After Wallace completed several more laps, the tire pressures on his Mustang came up and from that point forward, his lap times went down.
Despite having only three cautions throughout the race, Wallace sped from 21st place into the top-15 just prior to the halfway point of the event. Sporting lap times often equal to the top-five, he charged past Cup Series star Joey Logano for 11th place around lap 170. Just a few laps later, he bypassed Kasey Kahne to crack the top-ten for the first time.
In a twist of strategy, the leaders hit pit road for the final time around lap 200, short-pitting by nearly 30 laps. Kahne’s No. 38 came in for service on lap 204, several laps before Wallace and the No. 4 team. This ultimately gave the No. 38 an advantage of nearly seven seconds over Wallace when the pit cycle was complete.
Over the final 40 laps of the race, a determined Wallace made a furious charge to regain the tenth spot, eventually closing to within one second of Kahne. In the end however, Wallace would bring his No. 4 car home with a solid 11th-place finish.
Said Wallace, “Man, I really wanted a top-ten in our first race back, but I’m not disappointed with our run at all. Blake Bainbridge (crew chief) and I worked our butts off the last month or so. Along with some help from a couple of buddies, he and I put this entire car together ourselves. Our run today definitely made everything worth it; this Ford Mustang was strong.
“Believe it or not, this was the smoothest weekend I can remember having in the Nationwide Series. We unloaded the car and were pretty close on our setup. The Roush Yates horsepower in our Mustang was incredible too. Almost everything we did to the car during practice and the race seemed to make it better and at the end, I think we had a Mustang that could have run in the top-five. If we just could have had a caution to let us get some track position back, I think we would have been right there.
“All in all though, this was a great weekend for our team. To have put this car together like we did and be able to compete with a lot of the Cup guys–after being off the track for five months–feels really good.
“Our goal is to run about ten races this year and try to get back racing again full-time in 2013. This year, we’re looking to run races like Iowa, Bristol, Richmond and the inaugural race at Indy, among others. Just like everyone else right now though, everything depends on sponsorship. We’re working hard to get some things put together and hopefully we can get back on track soon.”
RWR
