TRG hopes for home-field magic on Sonoma's road (cont'd)

Gilliland said he is in constant communication with the personable Buckler, even though Gilliland lives in Mooresville, N.C., and Buckler works out of the Adobe Wineries and the TRG Motorsports shop in Petaluma, just down the road from Infineon.

"He's a great guy," Gilliland said of Buckler. "I get e-mails from him -- I don't answer them, but I get them -- really early in the morning and really late at night. That guy is just non-stop."

Although he is a rookie Cup owner, scratching and clawing to make his way through his first season in difficult economic times, Buckler is no stranger to Infineon or racing in general. He's a longtime veteran of sports-car racing, and used to drive frequently at Infineon.

When he decided to try his hand at Cup racing shortly before this season began -- TRG isn't even listed in the hard copy of the 2009 NASCAR media guide -- Buckler said he knew he faced some formidable challenges. And failing to make the Daytona 500, though it rocked his racing world, only hardened his resolve to make a go of it despite a shop that includes only eight full-time employees.

"When we started the season, our first-ever attempt at making the Daytona 500, and we missed it -- one lesson we learned was to try to take a positive out of a negative," Buckler said. "We went away from there after 10 days, and I told all my partners and friends, 'You know, I think we can do this. It's not like we just started a race team.' We've been racing competitively for 20 years, so we knew what we had to do. We also knew we had some pretty big shoes to fill, to come and race with these guys."

"We put our hands together, kind of like the Four Musketeers and said, 'Let's give it our best. Let's just try to make a couple races and go on.' That was 15 races ago and we're still here. That's pretty cool. We've qualified into every single one."

Buckler is hoping to get the team into the top 35 soon, possibly even this weekend, and to land sponsorship dollars that will fuel the team's run in 2010.

"It's tough. We're working on it. Primarily, my awesome group of partners and friends, everyone has been raising money internally to get us to the next race," Buckler said. "My big goal right now is to find a partner/sponsor for 2010 because this team is ripe. We are ready."

Gilliland said he has been impressed by Buckler's tireless pursuit of sponsorship money.

"He is always working, trying to find sponsorship and do what we need to do to be able to keep racing," Gilliland said. "For that, I give him a ton of credit. He works his tail off. With us only having eight guys [at the shop], that's what everybody [at TRG] has to do just to be here each and every week."

They are here again this week, and approaching possible inclusion in the top 35.

"Anything can happen. The starts here are ugly, and that scares me," Buckler said. "But we've got a history on road courses. This is a track where I can offer the guys a few tips. Not too many, but I've raced here and I've run so many laps here, I know this track and I know what they have to look for.

"This will be a great event for us, with Adobe Road being involved and all our partners watching on television. This is a great race that everyone likes to watch and come to. We've got a lot of friends and guests here this weekend. We've thrown in pretty hard on this race, and hopefully it will yield some benefits."