Notes: Mike Wallace steps in 01; Kenny says thanks

Mike Wallace gets a chance, beginning with this weekend's NAPA Auto Parts 200 in Montreal, to revisit his best years in racing, thanks to a deal with team owner Johnny Davis to run the remaining races this season in Davis' No. 01 Chevrolet.

The car is currently locked into the starting lineup thanks to its 27th position in the owners' standings and is more than 300 points clear of 31st, thanks to the work done through 24 races primarily by former series rookie of the year Danny O'Quinn Jr., who left the team following last weekend's Food City 250.

Wallace opened the season at Daytona in the No. 01 and likens Davis' operation to that of his former owner Barry Owen, with whom he won three races, had 11 top-five and 27 top-10 finishes in 69 starts from 1993-95. The pair also won a number of ARCA Re/Max Series events.

"I really didn't know the extent of the operation that Johnny had built until I visited his shop, but it's pretty impressive to see what he's been able to achieve, with a minimal amount of financial backing," Wallace said. "He and Lori [Morgan, Davis' wife] are really committed to this, they have a chassis dyno and all the parts and pieces you need for a successful race team, so I feel like we're really in a position to build something."

Davis has Busch Series championship experience with Larry Pearson, but most recently has moved his operation into a sizeable shop in Gaffney, S.C., where he fields as many as three cars; admittedly with two of them being money-harvesting start-and-park teams if sponsorship isn't available to run them in full races.

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That's not the case for Wallace's car, which uses the money won by the team's No. 0 and No. 04 cars to help it race. Davis has entered road-racing champion Andy Lally in the unsponsored 0 car at Montreal, coming off Lally's successful Sprint Cup debut for TRG Motorsports a couple weeks ago at Watkins Glen.

"We've got some money committed from SunDrop for the races at Atlanta and Charlotte, later this season," Wallace said. "But as many people have said, this is an opportunity to get a taste of racing in this series for a little less, but Johnny's proven this season he can get it done."

Kenny Wallace represents the fans

Kenny Wallace hopes he gets to shake a lot of fans' hands on Saturday afternoon at the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve, when this weekend's race organizers have scheduled a private meet-and-greet for as many of the fans who underwrote Wallace's appearance in Montreal as are able to attend.

Since Wallace's Jay Robinson Racing team's primary sponsor, the U.S. Border Patrol, can't back a race outside the U.S., Wallace undertook what he's called a "one-time effort" to field a fan-sponsored car. The program, which Wallace says his fans demanded he attempt earlier this year, raised more than the $100,000 goal Wallace and Robinson set to "do the race the right way."

"We're calling it 'Thank you fans, from The Hermanator,' and this is really something special that the fans have enabled us to do," Wallace said. "The schedule has really worked out in our favor, with the race at Watkins Glen serving as our test session.

"We figured out a few things there, on a track that I was pretty familiar with, and we think we've got a competitive piece for this weekend, along with it looking really pretty special."

Along with being pumped about his fans' support, Wallace -- who last season was devastated when he had to start the Montreal race without a crew or equipment due to lack of sponsorship -- will have back crew chief Chris Rice, albeit for just one race.

Last weekend at Bristol, Wallace was without Rice for the first time this season when Rice amicably left the JRR team to go to ML Motorsports which, despite being a part-time team, could offer him full-time employment.

Two-timers galore

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A spectacular number -- 12 drivers -- will do double duty this weekend, between the three series racing on the Ile Notre-Dame and at Chicagoland Speedway, where the Camping World Truck Series competes on Thursday and Friday.

Nationwide Series championship leader Kyle Busch and Colin Braun, who practiced Carl Edwards' Roush Fenway Racing car in Montreal last year and won the pole for the last Nationwide Series road race in which he competed, at Mexico City in 2008, will commute between Joliet, Ill., and Montreal, where the first Nationwide on-track session is at 9 a.m. Saturday.

Edwards, the '07 series champion and Marcos Ambrose, the series' most recent road-course winner, will double between Montreal and making their Grand-Am Rolex Series debut in a Daytona Prototype. Nationwide regular Brendan Gaughan makes his Rolex Series debut in a TRG Motorsports Porsche, teaming with series-regular Lally, who'll make his first Nationwide start since '07, when he did two of the three road races including a 29th-place effort in Montreal.

Five drivers will double between the Nationwide Series and the Canadian Tire Series' AutoPro 100 including championship contender D.J. Kennington, Andrew Ranger, J.R. Fitzpatrick, Daryl Harr and debuting Nationwide driver Alex Tagliani.

Canadian Jean-Francois Dumoulin, a former podium finisher at Montreal and a two-time Rolex Series winner in GT cars, will race the NAPA Auto Parts 200 for R3 Motorsports and in a Daytona Prototype for Canadian team AIM Autosport.

Edwards, Ambrose in high-profile debut

Edwards predicts the driver change between he and co-driver Ambrose will resemble "theater of the absurd" in Saturday afternoon's Montreal 200 for the Rolex Series, but after testing Kevin Doran's Ford Dallara Daytona Prototype at Virginia International Raceway, where they turned similar lap times, Edwards is enthused about his first race in the car.

"This is my first time in the series and it should be exciting, everyone on the team is really cool and I know it's going to be a lot of fun," Edwards said. "Now we're battling over who's going to do the most driving."

Edwards has two stock-car starts at the 2.709-mile road course and has posted one top-10 finish, sixth last year. In Ambrose's first start at Montreal, he threatened to win before getting spun out by Robby Gordon in '07, when he finished seventh, and last year when he was third.