FanHouse ReedSorenson

If the starting order of Saturday night's Budweiser Shootout at Daytona left you feeling a little bit uneasy about the start of the non-points dash for cash, well, Friday night's practice likely isn't going to calm your nerves:



Yep, that first yellow car to spin is Shootout pole winner Paul Menard and Scott Speed -- in the silver car -- is scheduled to start fourth with Elliott Sadler and Reed Sorenson in between them.

Paul Menard's new season with a new team is starting out on a refreshingly good note.

Menard, who left the Earnhardt-Ganassi Racing team following 2008 to drive the No. 98 Ford at Yates Racing, drew the pole for Saturday night's Budweiser Shootout at Daytona during a made-for-TV draw "party" Thursday night just outside of the speedway.

The lineup -- one that is set completely at random for the 28 eligible drivers -- has left some drivers that don't fall into "favorites" category sitting at the front while others, including last-place starter and former Shootout winner Jeff Gordon, will have plenty of traffic to negotiate at the green flag.

I suppose you could chalk this up as one of those deals that just makes you want to go "hmmm."

Not only did one of NASCAR's most-storied organizations lose much of its independent identity thanks to a merger cued from financial necessity, but a driver thought to be on axe from the other merged team is back in the fold.

In other words, just another day in the always unpredictable world of NASCAR.

Reed Sorenson made his way to Gillette-Evernham Motorsports earlier this week, transferring across Sprint Cup team lines from Chip Ganassi Racing.

And as he did so, rookie Canadian driver Patrick Carpentier in first year with GEM's No. 10 car could read the writing on the wall.

Simply, the team was placing him on the back burner of its sponsorship search -- meaning he more than likely won't be in a sponsored car if he decides to stick with the GEM team in 2009 because the emphasis will now be on Sorenson.

And when he was asked about Friday afternoon at Auto Club Speedway, he didn't exactly toe the company line:

"They hired Reed Sorenson for next year, so it's over," Carpentier says. "They're working on a fourth team and looking for sponsorship, but you know how that goes."

So Carpentier says he's a free agent. "I'm talking with other teams to see what's out there," the Montreal native says.

I'd classify what was said by Carpentier as another round of those "you can't blame him"-type comments.

You can now call Reed Sorenson the former Chip Ganassi Racing driver:

Reed Sorenson isn't waiting for Chip Ganassi Racing to figure out the Car of Tomorrow.

The 22-year-old driver signed a multiyear contract to join Gillett Evernham Motorsports next season, where he'll join Kasey Kahne and Elliott Sadler.

Sorenson said his decision to leave Ganassi, where he began his NASCAR career as a precocious 18-year-old, was difficult but necessary.

"I'm going over here to try to make myself a better racecar driver," Sorenson said during a conference call Tuesday shortly after the announcement. "I wanted to be more competitive and I wanted to have some more opportunities to win races and things like that."

For Sorenson fans, this is great news, but for Patrick Carpentier fans it's probably not.

Chip Ganassi Racing with Felix Sabates has to be scrambling to come up something -- anything -- in the way of sponsorship for 2009 with Wednesday's news about the sponsor of Juan Pablo Montoya's No. 42.

From Sirius Speedway's blog, "The Motorsports Soapbox":

Sirius Speedway has learned that Chevron-Texaco will not return as sponsor of Juan Pablo Montoya's #42 Dodge next season. [...]

Texaco-Havoline will not move to another team in 2009, electing instead to end their longstanding involvement in NASCAR. That decision leaves Ganassi Racing in need of at least two new sponsors in 2009, and possibly three. Team owner Chip Ganassi recently parked the #40 Dodge driven by Dario Franchitti due to lack of sponsorship, and there are longstanding rumors that Target may not return to the #41 Dodge currently driven by Reed Sorenson.

Of all the sponsorships one would have expected to stay with NASCAR, the Texaco-Havoline ride is near the top of the list mainly because of the staying power it has had in Sprint Cup Series competition.

Jamie McMurray is gone from Roush Fenway Racing after 2008, ThatsRacin.com reported Sunday.

It's not a huge shock to me to see McMurray headed out the door -- the FanHouse talked about this in April -- thanks to a few factors. The most significant, though, is that McMurray has never been able to be a consistent front runner in the Sprint Cup Series in RFR's race cars.

That being said, what is the real likelihood that McMurray even finds a Sprint Cup ride for 2009?

I'd say there are quite a few factors running against him in that pursuit -- the least of which has been his driving statistics over the past few years. Those stats -- one win at Daytona, 6 Top-5s, and 18 Top-10s since signing with Roush -- don't help much, though.

The Sprint Cup Series is entering a pretty busy "silly season" period that will definitely see some moving and shaking for 2009. Among those candidates eligible for moving to different seats are Tony Stewart, Martin Truex Jr., Bobby Labonte, Reed Sorenson, and possibly more.

McMurray, if he is indeed out the door at Roush and seeking new employment, is vacating a seat that won't be filled. His sponsor Crown Royal is expected to move in with teammate Greg Biffle and Roush could use the chance to measure his team down to four cars as NASCAR has mandated for 2010.

All those factors aside, though, if you're a car owner are you hiring McMurray?

Ryan Newman went from first the last Saturday night in a cloud of smoke both from under his hood and from the carnage caused behind him.

Newman, who had led 30 laps, blew a front seal on his Dodge motor on lap 133 during theSubway Fresh Fit 500, ruining his night and several others. Watch as the red flag comes out at 0:06:



As you can see, Newman lost his engine heading into turn three, and behind him several drivers lost control. The list included point leader Jeff Burton, Reed Sorenson, Matt Kenseth, Johnny Sauter and J.J. Yeley.

Now, I'll admit, I was one of the fans yelling at his TV because Newman failed to get off the track after obviously oiling-down the race track.

His quotes, though, after the race helped to settle me down some after Newman fully explained his issue and tried to reason why he caused a full-fledged race-stopping oil cleanup.

Juan Pablo Montoya made a big statement Tuesday afternoon at Las Vegas Motor Speedway to doubters of the NASCAR's next-generation race car for the Sprint Cup series.

Turning a lap of 186.761mph, Montoya would have taken the official track record away from Kasey Kahne (184.856mph in 2007) had it been an official qualifying session.

But one thing Montoya did was to prove that the new race car isn't as slow as everyone thought, and that teams are adapting to the packages well. It should be noted, of course, that teams aren't loudly disapproving of the tires that Goodyear brought like they did last year for the race at Vegas.

As you may recall, Tony Stewart's approval of the tires in '07 terms for describing them was "crap" on the newly configured surface.

As teams, though, head into their travel/work day before testing at California Speedway on Thursday and Friday, the general consensus seems to be that teams are getting a handle on the car and the track in Vegas. That's only good news for race fans.

A.J. Allmendinger, Casey Mears, Kasey Kahne and Reed Sorenson rounded out the five fastest cars at LVMS.

Jeff Burton tore up a race car early Tuesday while Tony Stewart scraped the wall and Michael Waltrip looped his -- all in turn three. The test session was ended a few minutes early after Jeff Gordon laid oil down on the track.

Keep it here at NASCAR Fanhouse for plenty of updates on the Sprint Cup testing in California.

The black helicopters are sweeping in, folks. Somewhere in the heart of central Alabama, the conspiracy is alive and well. NASCAR hates Denny Hamlin. And Tony Raines. And Reed Sorenson. And fill-in-driver-here who had to pit under the last caution because of the extended yellow.

What happened, NASCAR? Did the red flag that your flagman uses fly out of the flagstand? Was it lost in transit from Phoenix? Did the helmet capers get a hold it?

The reason for the second-to-last caution was David Reutimann, who had been having a stellar day, either lost a motor or a rear end gear. Reutimann had to make the show on time, so he was likely running a qualifying package due to the impound race -- causing the failure.

Anyways, Reutimann's problem happened while the field was going into turn 1 of lap 185, meaning the field would take the yellow at the line for lap 186. Reutimann put down quite a bit of oil across the tri-oval, leaving a nice mess to clean up. A red flag would have stopped the cars on the backstretch during lap 186. With the red flag removed, pit road would have been open that time by and the one lap to green could have been given on lap 187. With a green-white-checkered finish starting on lap 188, the race would have finished at lap 190 or sooner.