Catchfence

DAYTONA WINNER, POINTS LEADER TO APPLY
LESSONS LEARNED BEHIND WHEEL OF FORMER, UNDERFUNDED TEAM

Peters: “I found myself on the outside looking in very quickly and am blessed that I was able to get back on my feet … the opportunity of a lifetime and put me on the map.”

Seventeen months ago, there was no Victory Lane, no sufficient funding and no real shot at winning races in Timothy Peters’ future. His crew consisted of himself and one other guy working out of a buddy’s cramped garage in Virginia with only two trucks in their inventory.

But the throwback racer found his way to Victory Lane three weeks ago at Daytona International Speedway and as a result, atop the NASCAR Camping World Truck Series points for the first time in his career.

If the driver of the No. 17 K&N Toyota for Red Horse Racing has any say in the matter, he plans to continue that running start in Saturday’s Truck Series race at Atlanta Motor Speedway (2 p.m. ET live on SPEED™; NCWTS Setup with Krista Voda at 1:30 p.m. ET) and thinks the time he spent with his own, barebones team helped him arrive at this point.

“I learned a lot from being on a small, underfunded team,” Peters said.  “I’ve always had the mindset of ‘never give up’ and my father always taught me perseverance.  Quitters never win and I’m not a quitter and I worked very hard to get where I am today.  When it’s good, it’s good and when it’s low, it’s very, very low.  I found myself on the outside looking in very quickly and am blessed that I was able to get back on my feet with Premier Racing and then Tom DeLoach (Red Horse Racing owner), who gave me the opportunity of a lifetime and put me on the map.”

This year marks Peters’ second full season in the Truck Series.  He began 2009 with the small Premier Racing but teamed up with Red Horse Racing after eight events.  He drove the No. 17 Toyota to his career-first victory at Martinsville last October, racking up five top-five and 13 top-10 finishes along the way.

Looking ahead to Saturday’s race, Peters and his team think they’ve got what it takes to build on their Daytona victory and improve on their stats from last season.

“I’m looking forward to getting to Atlanta because the truck we’re taking is the truck I probably have the most confidence in in the whole shop,” Peters commented.  “We ran really well with it on the mile-and-a-half tracks last year and sat on the pole at Nashville with it, so I’m looking forward to rolling it out of the trailer and picking up where we left off. We’ve got Jeff Hensley on top of the pit box and it’s been awesome to work with him.  Hopefully we can continue our momentum.”

Peters knows he has his work cut out for him at Atlanta with an average finish at the 1.5-mile track of 22^nd and the task of beating to the finish line guys like Kyle Busch, who has won three of the last four Atlanta races.  But those statistics don’t deter Peters one bit, although he is taking a realistic approach to Saturday’s race.

“A good showing for us would be to not wreck the truck so we can bring it back home, improve it and get it to where we can take it to the next event,” Peters said.  “Obviously, I’d like do say ‘Let’s win the race’ and I think we have a shot at that, but realistically a top-five finish would be a good day for us.”

Regardless of where his team finishes at Atlanta, Peters says the second race of the year will be a great gauge of how his organization measures up to the competition because Atlanta is an intermediate track indicative of many other venues on the Truck Series schedule.

“Atlanta absolutely is a good indicator of how strong our team is,” Peters said. “Our team is probably stronger than it ever has been. The pit crew is awesome and we gained spots throughout the race at Daytona. I’m already comfortable with the truck I’m taking but it really puts your mind at ease knowing that coming down pit road, you’ve got the best on pit road waiting for you.”

With top-notch equipment and crew, Peters considers the championship a legitimate goal in 2010.

“We’re doing our best to give the championship a run for the money,” he stated.  “Tom DeLoach and Red Horse Racing have given me all the resources and everything I need to make that happen.  Obviously, a lot of things have to go our way and hopefully the man upstairs will take care of that for us. We’re just trying to stay out of trouble, try not to have any DNFs, try to top-five and top-10 it to death and hopefully another win or two will come.  Hopefully, when the checkered flag falls at Homestead, we can be up on that stage like Hornaday was last year. “

And arguably no one would appreciate a Truck Series title more than Peters.  When he referred to getting “back on my feet,” he wasn’t exaggerating.  Fulfilling his dreams hasn’t come without a hefty price tag for the 29-year-old, who, like many true dirt-under-the-nails racers, put his every penny into racing in the early days. When he elevated Premier Racing to the Truck Series to enter the October 2008 race at Martinsville, he did so with money made from selling his late father’s prized Corvette, a family heirloom.  The truck he bought with that money took him to his first top-10 finish in the Truck Series.

“I’ve put myself in pretty bad financial shape in hopes people would recognize what I’m trying to do and how passionate I am,” Peters said following the 2008 race.  “So far, it’s paid off.  I think my dad would be proud.  When he died, a part of me wanted to stop racing, but he and my mom didn’t go into debt for me to stop.  He’s a part of it even though he’s not here.  A lot of people wrote me off, saying after my dad died, ‘you won’t see him around,’ but my dad went into a lot of debt to get me where I am now.”

And where he is now is perched atop the points.

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- SPEEDtv.com, Press Release