Driver Profile

Even at the age of five, Bobby Labonte knew he was going to be a race car driver. Folks that watched him race quarter midgets then in his hometown of Corpus Christi, Texas, knew, as well.

About ten years later, Labonte made the move to go-karts. He didn't stay there long, as Labonte moved from Texas to North Carolina to help his family focus on brother Terry's budding Cup career.

In 1982, 19-year-old Bobby took a job sweeping the floors at his brother's shop at Hagan Racing.

"I was working on a race team, making money during the day and moonlighting by working on my late model stock car at night," Bobby said."

When Terry left Hagan Racing after the 1986 season to go to work for Junior Johnson, Bobby was fired.

"Hagan's people didn't think it would be a good idea Terry's brother, and father, too, to be working on someone else's car and we got fired.

"I thought since I've got all this time on my hands, I might as well work on my own car and run some more races," Bobby said.

In 1987, while working for car builder Jay Hedgecock, Bobby tried racing again and won the track championship at Caraway Speedway.

Three years later, in 1990, he ran the entire Busch Series schedule and finished fourth in the series standings. A year later, he scored his first career Busch Series victory at Bristol and went on to win the series championship.

In 1992, Labonte missed back-to-back Busch Series titles by just three points, as Joe Nemechek took the title in the closest points race in Busch Series history.

Bobby finally joined the Cup series fulltime in 1993, running a No. 22 Ford for Bill Davis Racing. He finished second in the rookie of the year battle to Jeff Gordon, but did capture his first Bud Pole Award at Richmond in December.

His career really began to flourish in 1994, when he joined Joe Gibbs Racing. Bobby took his first Cup win that season in the Coca-Cola 600 and swept both races at Michigan en route to a 10th-place finish in the season points.

It all came together in 2000, when Bobby captured the NASCAR title with four wins and 24 top-10 finishes in 34 starts. To this day, however, Labonte says his biggest break in racing was when he was fired from Hagan Racing in 1986.