NASCAR: Odds on E-Z GO 200 Camping World Truck Series
by Charles Jay
Ron Hornaday has finished second in the Camping World Truck Series two years ago and won it last year. So it's understandable that he is not overly concerned about finishing 27th at Daytona in the season's opening race after a crash on the 32nd lap.
Hornaday is something of a physical marvel. He dominated the circuit last year, with six wins and fifteen finishes in the top five. At one point he won five races in a row, and when you consider that in all NASCAR series, only Richard Petty and Bobby Allison have won five straight times, that was a pretty amazing feat. All of this is kind of spectacular when you consider that he was 51 years old.
Also spectacular, however, was Kyle Busch, the 24-year-old who entered only 15 races, and won seven of them. Last year Busch drove for Billy Ballew, but now he is fielding his own team under the banner of Kyle Busch Motorsports, and he is taking dead aim on preventing Hornaday from winning his second straight title and fifth overall. Toward that end, his team lured Hornaday's crew chief, Rick Ren, appointing him Director of Operations.
Odds To Win E-Z GO 200 Camping World Truck Series
- Kyle Busch +225
- Kevin Harvick +275
- Ron Hornaday +500
- Todd Bodine +550
- Mike Skinner +700
- Matt Crafton +800
- Aric Almirola +1000
- Johnny Sauter +1200
- Timothy Peters +1500
- Rick Crawford +1500
- Dennis Setzer +2000
- Field (Any Other Driver) +1000
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Hornaday is priced at +500 to win Saturday's E-Z GO Atlanta 200, but he's not the favorite. Busch, who won last year's race and has won four NASCAR truck races at the Atlanta venue (fall 2005, fall 2007, March 2008, March 2009), is priced at +225, with Kevin Harvick, the current Sprint Cup points leader who owns Hornaday's truck, at +275.
Timothy Peters, who came on to win on the last lap at Daytona, is still a longshot, priced at +1500. But that's okay for him, because he's been overcoming long odds for a while. He was actually dumped by his Nationwide Series team, then came back by financing and working on his own competition truck, in his own garage. He did well enough to catch on with Red Horse Racing, and the rest is history.
Perhaps the most emotional moment at the track this weekend will involve someone who is not expected to be among the top contenders. The gold medal-winning United States four-man bobsled team makes an appearance at the Atlanta Motor Speedway, and there is a certain significance to it, not to mention a connection to NASCAR, because the bobsleds were built by former Winston Cup driver Geoff Bodine.
In a story that has already become the stuff of legend, Bodine was watching the 1992 Winter Olympics and noticed how poorly the U.S. team was doing with their bobsled. He felt he could actually build a better bobsled for them using his own background in designing a race car, and enlisted the help of Bob Cuneo, who built his chassis, to form Bo-Dyn Bobsleds, and embarked on something called the "USA Bobsled Project." Their creation was first used in the Olympics in 2002, and NASCAR drivers have gotten involved in charity bobsled races to raise money for it.
On Saturday the 60 year-old Bodine, who won the 1986 Daytona 500 and sttil holds the overall speed record with 197.478 mph at AMS, will be racing in the E-Z GO Atlanta 200, and he'll have the exact color scheme of that gold medal winning bobsled, as well as the names of the four bobsledders written on the truck. He may not win, but he'll have some good karma going for him.
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