Ruttman still looking for sponsorship

DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. -- Joe Ruttman’s seen it all in his 40-year racing career.

			Joe Ruttman Credit: Michael Romano, ASP

After driving his No. 79 Obee’s Dodge into fourth in Friday’s Florida Dodge Dealers 250 NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series opener at Daytona International Speedway he hopes he gets to see some more.

“We don’t know where we go from here,” Ruttman said. “We just need more sponsorship. It was good that Obee’s came along and gave us a shot or we would’ve been completely out. That was a blessing, no doubt about it.”

Ruttman’s Rodney Smith Motorsports truck was one of two top-five finishers with sponsorship questions heading into the series’ second race next month.

If the one-race program with Obee’s was his first stroke of luck, missing a six-truck pileup on the backstretch with less than 10 laps to go was the second.

“I think we finally got lucky,” Ruttman said. “The Obee’s sub was really submarining all day long and I think we must’ve lost some tape off the front. There has to be an excuse why I couldn’t catch up.”

Ruttman was seventh when the race was red-flagged with five laps to go and made up three spots in the three racing laps after it restarted.

He actually teamed up with fellow Dodge drivers Ted Musgrave and Brian Rose, who finished second and third to Dodge winner Robert Pressley.

“I just wanted to get as far up as I could,” Ruttman said. “And it just opened up. It looked like I was gonna run sixth and it just panned out that everybody kinda felt sorry for me and let me past ‘em.”

“It was just good we came out of it in one piece -- that was a big crash over there,” Ruttman said. “I was right alongside the 2 (Jason Leffler) and the 4 (Brian Rose) kinda squeezed the 2 up in the wall. He tried to give and he didn’t have enough time to get out of the hole.”