Bechtel thought Pastrana’s skills and star power would blend perfectly with his family’s NASCAR Nationwide team. He began to build a relationship with Pastrana and a series of year-long talks culminated last week when Pastrana announced a seven-race Nationwide schedule in 2011 and a 20-race schedule in 2012 with Bechtel’s team under the newly renamed Pastrana-Waltrip banner. Pastrana’s viral video announcing his NASCAR plans drew over 100,000 hits on YouTube in less than five days.
Click here to watch the Pastrana NASCAR announcement video at http://pastranawaltrip.com/.
QUOTES
BLAKE BECHTEL ON THE PASTRANA-WALTRIP PARTNERSHIP: “When I first moved back to California my brother introduced me to the action sports world. My mom also worked with Spy Sunglasses and I became very familiar with some of the key players in the industry. When dad (Gary Bechtel) and I decided to get back into NASCAR I knew I had to be proactive. I started thinking about how we could integrate the action sports world into NASCAR since it had become so mainstream.
I started to reconnect with some of my old contacts and we decided to meet up at Pastrana’s jump last New Year’s Eve. They all seemed very interested so I brought the idea to my dad and Ty Norris and the talks started to get serious. I am really excited about the future of Pastrana-Waltrip Racing. I think we can help NASCAR reconnect with the younger generation.”
MICHAEL WALTRIP ON BLAKE BECHTEL: “Blake and Gary Bechtel have both done so much for our Nationwide Series program. If it wasn’t for the Bechtels coming along last year and partnering with us, the No. 99 team might have been gone. The Pastrana partnership was Blake’s vision. He went to the New Year’s Eve deal and watched Travis jump a rally car from a pier onto a barge. He started talking about Travis coming over to NASCAR and what that might look like. Blake loves the action sports world and he loves what Travis has accomplished over there. He got the opportunity to talk to Travis and made this deal happen. This was a great vision by one of our young partners.”
GARY BECHTEL ON HIS SON: “It is a father’s dream to have his son as his partner in a business venture and now one of my dreams have come true, I have two sons. Blake’s been proactive in coming up with different ideas in making our race team successful. Bringing Pastrana to NASCAR was something he started working on over 10 months ago. This was his vision and I think it’s something that can help our race team and the sport of NASCAR. The opportunities Pastrana brings to our race team are endless. This gives us the ability to tap into new sponsors that would have never considered sponsoring NASCAR before.”
NOTES OF INTEREST
· Gary and Blake Bechtel along with Michael Waltrip Racing own Diamond-Waltrip Racing that fields Toyota Camrys out of the MWR shop in Cornelius, N.C. The Bechtels have owned cars in the Sprint Cup and Nationwide Series since 1990. The Morgan Hill, California residents’ teams have visited victory lane 10 times in the Nationwide Series.
· Run with the Top Dogs at the Daytona 500®, courtesy of OUT! Pet Care. Simply go to www.outpetcare.com to enter to WIN a VIP Race Experience for FOUR, including roundtrip airfare, hotel accommodations, driver intros and more!
· Truex owns 102 Nationwide starts. He has 13 wins, 10 poles, 40 top-five and 61 top-10 finishes. The Mayetta, N.J. native, has led 1,862 laps of competition and has only scored six DNF (did not finish) in his Nationwide Series career.
· Saturday is Truex’s fifth Nationwide race at Homestead-Miami Speedway. He has a starting average of 20.5 and has a finishing average of 10.2. His best finish is second (Nov. 15, 2002) and he has run 800 of 803 laps of competition (99.6 percent). His last NNS start at the 1.5-mile track was Nov. 19, 2005.
- Diamond-Waltrip Racing Press Release
