{"id":1286,"date":"2009-04-28T12:57:50","date_gmt":"2009-04-28T12:57:50","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/maineracer.com\/wp\/?p=1286"},"modified":"2009-04-28T12:57:50","modified_gmt":"2009-04-28T12:57:50","slug":"nascar-cup-driver-david-ragan-coming-to-thunder-road","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/maineracing.com\/legacy\/2009\/04\/nascar-cup-driver-david-ragan-coming-to-thunder-road\/","title":{"rendered":"NASCAR CUP DRIVER DAVID RAGAN COMING TO THUNDER ROAD"},"content":{"rendered":"<p align=\"left\">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;Waterbury, VT &ndash; Unidilla, Georgia&rsquo;s Sprint Cup Series aspiring stock car driver, David<br \/>Ragan, will race at Thunder Road Thursday August 27th in the final evening program of its 50th<br \/>season.<\/p>\n<p><!--more--><\/p>\n<p align=\"left\">&ldquo;We wanted superstars from our past, present, and future to highlight our 50th anniversary<br \/>activities,&rdquo; said track co-owner Tom Curley. With 82-time Cup winner and Daytona 500 Champion Bobby<br \/>Allison appearing on Thursday, June 18th and one of the very best NASCAR stars of today, Tony<br \/>Stewart, coming to race the CARQUEST Vt Governor&rsquo;s Cup on June 25th, we wanted a racer who we<br \/>believe is ready for future stardom on NASCAR&rsquo;s top level of racing. David Ragan is the real deal,&rdquo;<br \/>concluded Curley.<\/p>\n<p>The twenty-three year-old Ragan was named by car owner Jack Roush as the replacement for retiring<br \/>two-time Sprint Cup Series Champion Dale Jarrett. Ragan is the newcomer to a powerful Roush-Fenway<br \/>racing team that also includes Carl Edwards, Matt Kenseth, Greg Biffle, and Jamie McMurray. Roush<br \/>believes Ragan is ready to break into the winner&rsquo;s circle before the 2009 campaign is completed.<\/p>\n<p>David Ragan, son of driver Ken Ragan, began winning at age 11, and by the time he was 13 had twice<br \/>won National Championships. Since then he has moved through the ranks, including his stint last<br \/>season racing in both the Sprint Cup Series and the Nationwide Series where he finished 2nd in the<br \/>standings.<\/p>\n<p>This year his contract calls for him to focus on the most competitive series in the sport, the<br \/>NASCAR Sprint Cup Series. &ldquo;But that doesn&rsquo;t preclude me from a few short track races and Thunder<br \/>Road is one place I have really wanted to run. This will be a hoot&rdquo;, said Ragan.<\/p>\n<p>The legendary Richard Petty will make his second appearance at Thunder Road on Thursday night, July<br \/>30. &nbsp;Petty, the winningest driver of all time in Cup history, with a record setting 7 Daytona 500<br \/>wins and 7 National Cup championships, was last at Thunder Road nearly 20 years ago.<\/p>\n<p>Recently ACT stars Phil Scott, Dave Pembroke, and former ACT Canadian Castrol Series Champion,<br \/>Donald Theetge were at the New Hampshire Motor Speedway mile track testing Goodyear tires with<br \/>Sprint Cup stars Jeff Gordon, Kyle Busch and Ragan. &ldquo;We were some impressed with their driving and<br \/>I can&rsquo;t wait to get after them at Thunder Road in August&rdquo;, said Ragan.<br \/>Ragan is going to get the full T-Road experience when he swaps paint with the likes of Cris<br \/>Michaud, defending Thunder Road Champion Eric Williams, and Jean Cyr, who are just a few that are<br \/>anxious to take on the NASCAR star at the &lsquo;Nation&rsquo;s Site of Excitement&rsquo;. &ldquo;It will be a great way to<br \/>bring the Thursday night curtain down on what will be an unbelieveable season of racing coming up<br \/>at T-Road,&rdquo; said 3 time Thunder Road champion Cris Michaud of Northfield, VT.<\/p>\n<p>Thunder Road opens its historic season May 3rd with the 11th annual Merchants Bank 150. Post time<br \/>is 1:00.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;Waterbury, VT &ndash; Unidilla, Georgia&rsquo;s Sprint Cup Series aspiring stock car driver, DavidRagan, will race at Thunder Road Thursday August 27th in the final evening program of its 50thseason.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1286","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-american-canadian-tour"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/maineracing.com\/legacy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1286","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/maineracing.com\/legacy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/maineracing.com\/legacy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maineracing.com\/legacy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maineracing.com\/legacy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1286"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/maineracing.com\/legacy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1286\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/maineracing.com\/legacy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1286"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maineracing.com\/legacy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1286"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maineracing.com\/legacy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1286"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}