Bliss moves on, sort of; hooks up with Nemechek (cont'd)

Reno didn't want to speak for Finch, who next plans to attend the Bristol races next weekend, but said the owner's decisions were easier than they might look.

"He's been one of our better qualifiers for the start-and-park weekends," Reno said of Bliss. "He needs to make money to support his family. We don't have a problem with Mike and we don't have a problem with him making money. If that works for him, it works for us and as long as it's a smooth deal; it's not like we hate the guy, it's just a decision that James made.

Bliss for Bliss

Mike Bliss may be a bit down now, but one thing can always bring a smile to his face -- his 1934 Ford 5-Window Coupe.

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"It went good, we're in the race and everybody's confused by it, and sometimes that's a bit of fun."

Finch's Nationwide program, backed by the Miccosukee Tribe's gaming and resort property in South Florida, has raced for the championship for 10 of the past 12 years; despite entering every Sprint Cup event this season, Finch's team isn't equipped to fully race in them all, despite winning the Aaron's 499 at Talladega with Hendrick Motorsports development driver Brad Keselowski.

Bliss joined Finch's Nationwide team in the seventh race of the 2008 season, after the owner released Johnny Sauter after five races and used Sterling Marlin at Nashville Superspeedway. Bliss actually left Fitz Motorsports while fifth in the championship and maintained that spot, with two top-five and 13 top-10 finishes in the 29 races he did for Finch.

In the first 20 races this season, Bliss won at Charlotte and had four top-five and 10 top-10 finishes, but Finch and his team expected better. After Iowa, despite finishing 14th and picking up a spot in the standings, Bliss was fired for the second time this year.

"A month ago we had this discussion, and they let me go and hired me back the next day," Bliss said of Finch's post-Daytona move. "We had a talk and James said we'd just get to the end of the year and part our ways, with the points money and all that and I agreed with him. I thought that was the way it was going to go down, but after Iowa I suddenly got the call again."

"I don't know, I'm not sure it makes sense to me," Reno said. "I almost don't know how to explain so it's not taken out of context, but sixth in points -- the split from sixth to third was huge [more than 600 points]. People talk about the win and all the top-10s, but we got [the win] on rain and the top-10s? Right now top-10s aren't good enough, top-10s is pretty easy.

"The team was getting disappointed and disgusted, week in and week out, because we felt like our cars were better than they were getting run. James made the call on his own. If someone did the math and looked at our finishes, we've wiped out five cars this year and we feel like we ought to be third in points, not sixth.

"It's not like anyone dislikes Mike, but we had numerous meetings with him about his performance, because our motto is, we want to win practice, win qualifying and we want to win the race. And that's all we ask. If we can't do that, we want somebody to say, 'What do you need to do that?'

"We've got Hendrick motors and we've worked like dogs on our cars, we've got good wind tunnel numbers, we've got good chassis and we're handling good and at the end of the day, a lot of people don't understand Kyle Busch being mad at [finishing] second. We don't voice it as loudly, but we're mad at second, too.

"We want to run first every week, and the trouble at this level of the sport is, it's really tough to do and we understand that. But once you've gone [50 races] and there's a pattern that exists -- we're not here for anything other than to win. We're not here to have a business in the [Nationwide] series and supply somebody with a paycheck, we're here to compete and compete hard.

"Don't get me wrong, it doesn't mean we're not going to go backwards for a little while trying all these drivers, and doing a lot of things, but at least we'll feel like the guys are putting out 100 percent while they're out there, and that's all we ask." (Continued)