Catchfence

No. 32 Dollar General Toyota Camry

Notes of Interest:

· Jacques Villeneuve returns to Circuit Gilles Villeneuve with Braun Racing for the third consecutive year. In 2008, he started the No. 32 Toyota from the fifth position at the 2.71-mile (4.361 km) road course. After leading the race and while running fourth, he was collected in a crash on the final lap of the rain-shortened event. He was credited with a 16th-place finish. He returned last year with the No. 32 team, starting from the sixth position and logging his NASCAR career-best finish of fourth.

· Nationwide Series Road Course Numbers: Villeneuve has four starts in the NASCAR Nationwide Series (NNS) – all of which are on road courses. He logged his career-best start from the outside pole position in June of this year when the NNS traveled to Elkhart Lake, Wisconsin for the series’ inaugural race at Road America. His career-best finish of fourth came in August, 2009 at Circuit Gilles Villeneuve in Montreal. In his four starts, Villeneuve has one top-five and two top-10 finishes, has led for seven laps and has never started further back than sixth!

· Did you know…? Villeneuve won the Formula One World Championship (1997), the CART Championship (1995) and the Indianapolis 500 (1995). He is only the third driver to accomplish this feat (Mario Andretti and Emerson Fittipaldi). He also joined another elite group this year. Qualifying for the 2010 Brickyard 400 at Indianapolis Motor Speedway, Villeneuve joined Juan Pablo Montoya as the only two drivers in history to compete in all three of the historic track’s premier motorsports events: the Indianapolis 500, the U.S. Grand Prix and the Brickyard 400.

· Villeneuve has one win at the track that bears his father’s name. In 1993, he drove in the North American Toyota Atlantic Series. Villeneuve won five events that season, one of which was at Circuit Gilles Villeneuve. Another win here for the Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu, Quebec-native would result in quite a celebration! He also has 10 Formula One starts at the Montreal road course, earning his best F1 finish there of second in June, 1996.

· Villeneuve is not the only Canadian-native on the Dollar General team… Jackman, Shaun Peet, hails from Nanaimo, British Columbia! The Dartmouth College grad was formerly a hockey player in the American Hockey League (which serves as the second highest level next to the National Hockey League) and the East Coast League. Peet saw his hockey experience translated into success on a pit crew when he joined the ranks of NASCAR in 2002 and now serves as the jackman on both the No. 32 Dollar General team (NNS) and the No. 83 Red Bull team (NASCAR Sprint Cup Series).

· Chassis #052 is ready for road course action at Circuit Gilles Villeneuve! This weekend, the Dollar General team heads to Montreal with chassis #52. This chassis made its track debut earlier this season at Road America (June) where Villeneuve started from the second position but was relegated to a 25th-place finish after facing electrical problems.

· The Dollar General team is SIXTH in the Nationwide Series Championship Owner’s Points.

Jacques Villeneuve (Photo Credit: Jason Smith / Getty Images for NASCAR)

“Even though this is my third year with the Braun Racing team at Circuit Gilles Villeneuve, this year we have an added advantage; this will be my third race with the Dollar General team in 2010 and my fourth with crew chief, Trent Owens. I’ve had the opportunity to work with the No. 32 team this year at Elkhart Lake (Road America) and Watkins Glen. We’ve be able to strengthen our communication and I feel we have our best opportunity ever to win the race at Montreal. We are bringing the same car that we took to Road America.

The car handled tremendously well there and I feel it will be very fitting for the course in Montreal. Any time you have a car that reacts exactly the way you want it to and it feels like it is an extension of yourself, you can have a lot of fun driving it! That is how this car was at Road America and I can’t wait to get back in it this weekend.”

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