'Rookie' Gaughan brings his experience to Gateway

Brendan Gaughan has driven a complete season in the Cup Series and has 162 starts in the Truck Series, but at age 34, he's a rookie in the Nationwide Series.

"We've been joking all year," Gaughan said. "I finished second in the Cup rookie of the year in '04, won the Truck (ROY) in 2002. I killed the curve in the Nationwide Series for age this year. The average age at the beginning of the year, they told us, was 23 or 24. It would be a whole lot younger if I wasn't there."

Gateway Preview

Brendan Gaughan may be a Nationwide Series but he has Gateway experience and he breaks down how to run at the track.

• Audio: NASCAR Today

The veteran NASCAR driver with the rookie tag has put his experience to use in his first Nationwide season. Driving for Rusty Wallace Racing, Gaughan is eighth in the points entering Saturday's Missouri-Illinois Dodge Dealers 250 at Gateway International Raceway in Madison, Ill.

Gaughan finished second at Lowe's Motor Speedway and fourth at Kentucky Speedway but has only three more top-10s in 18 races. Crew chief Bryan Berry returned from a four-race suspension last week at Chicagoland, and Gaughan believes the work Berry did in the shop during his time away from the track will pay dividends at Gateway, a nearly flat 1.25-mile oval.

"While [Berry] was gone, he spent a lot of time on the flat-track program, spent basically ... a week doing some engineering stuff, what I always call a Bryan Berry science project," Gaughan said. "Usually, when he does a science project, it works out well for me.

"He's basically coming with some new [suspension] geometry that he wants to try for us at Gateway, similar to what we did at Phoenix [where Gaughan finished seventh] and change a few things around because of how tight Gateway's [Turns] 1 and 2 are. When Bryan Berry does his science projects, I get excited."

Gaughan sees additional progress further down the road in the second half of the season from the team's new technical partnership with Kevin Harvick Inc.

"It's still brand new," Gaughan said. "You can't really read too much into it so far. Last week, [teammate] Steven [Wallace] drove a KHI car that they built for our race team. You can definitely see a lot of differences in the aerodynamics of it.

"We're enthused doing something with Kevin. Look at how great his team has been running, no matter if you put Kelly Bires, Kevin, Ryan Newman [in the car]. Every guy that drives it, they end up being in the top 10, qualifying in the top five. They've got great stuff. Kevin has worked with Richard Childress, has all their information. It's only going to benefit RWR."

Gaughan won two Truck races in 2002 and six (including at Gateway) in 2003. He jumped to Penske Racing in Cup the next season, drove all 36 races and finished 28th in points. Then, it was back to the Truck Series, and Gaughan went four seasons without another victory. He decided it was time for a change and joined forces with Wallace, his teammate at Penske.

"I've always enjoyed being with quality race teams and great organizations and people," Gaughan said. "My old South Point [truck] team, I loved it to death. We didn't have a lot of success in the end of it, but we had a lot of success early.

"I'm having a fantastic time. I'm with a great organization. I enjoy the heck out of Rusty, his whole family. The biggest deal is we have great equipment and have great sponsors, which makes life so much easier."

Gaughan trails Justin Allgaier in the rookie of the year standings, 183-175. Even though he qualifies for the award, it doesn't seem high on his list of goals.

"I have to give it up for Justin," Gaughan said. "As far as rookies go, Justin is a premiere rookie, doing a great job this year."

News & Notes

• Kyle Busch has a 192-point lead on runner-up Carl Edwards, with Brad Keselowski 334 back in third.
• Reed Sorenson, the winner at Gateway in 2005 and 2007, will make his first Nationwide start of the season. He's driving Braun Racing's No. 32 Toyota. Harvick is the other Cup regular entered.

THREE TO WATCH

Busch

Kyle Busch, No. 18: Busch finished eighth three years ago in his last race at Gateway. He finished fourth in his only other start, in 2004. Overall, Busch has two wins and four second-place finishes the past six weeks.

Kevin Harvick, No. 33: Harvick is one of three drivers in the race who is a two-time Nationwide winner at Gateway. The others are Sorenson and Edwards. Dale Earnhardt Jr., also a two-time winner, is not entered.

Brad Keselowski, No. 88: Despite five top-fives in his past seven races, Keselowski is losing ground to Busch. Qualifying is very important at Gateway, and in two races Keselowski has started 28th and 20th, which produced finishes of 26th and fifth. If he wants to gain some ground on Busch, he'll have to do better in qualifying. Busch has started fourth and fifth. The winners the past nine years have started eighth or better.

TRACK CHATTER

Sorenson

Reed Sorenson: "[Crew chief] Trent Owens and his team have turned out some really strong cars this season, which I'm looking forward to using to my advantage on GIR's long straightaways. I really think that we can get to Victory Lane this weekend."

John Wes Townley: "[Crew chief] Brad [Parrott] has given me video of past races at Gateway so I have been studying those. [Driver coach and spotter] David [Green] was in the shop Tuesday teaching me everything he could. He explained that Gateway is a non-traditional track with different banking and different shape in both turns; it's more or less a speedway with a short-track feel."