ppc Racing

ppc Racing
Owner(s) Greg Pollex
Base Mooresville, North Carolina
Series Nextel Cup Series, Busch Series, Craftsman Truck Series
Car numbers 10, 22, 57
Race drivers Jeff Green, Jason Keller, Kenny Wallace, Terry Cook, John Andretti
Sponsors Auto Zone, Nesquik, Albertsons, Excedrin
Manufacturer Ford, Chevrolet
Opened 1993
Closed 2007
Career
Drivers' Championships 1 (Busch Series)
Race victories 33

ppc Racing was a Championship-winning NASCAR racing team based in Mooresville, North Carolina. The team was owned by Greg Pollex. ppc Racing came about from a merger of Pollex's Busch Series team with a car owned by Steve DeSouza and Ted Campbell in 1999. The team shut down in 2007 due to a lack of funding. Pollex later joined CJM Racing as a shop foreman before departing late in the season.

Winston Cup Series

ppc made its Cup racing debut in 1993 at the Mello Yello 500. Chad Little was the driver of the No. 19 Kleenex Ford, and finished 33rd. They would also run the 1994 Daytona 500 in the No. 97 Ford with sponsorship from Tracy Lawrence, where they finished 29th. In 1995, they had their best finish at Talladega Superspeedway, their second of two races. After making five 1996 races in the Sterling Cowboy Pontiac Grand Prix, ppc moved to the Cup Series full-time with Little in the John Deere car. Despite an eighth-place finish at Bristol Motor Speedway, the team had trouble qualifying for races, and Pollex would sell the operation to Jack Roush in the final weeks of the season. (The team would eventually become Kurt Busch's 2004 Nextel Cup winning team, only to be sold to Latitude 43 Motorsports six years later and then folded.)

In 2005, ppc Racing returned to the Nextel Cup series with John Andretti driving the No. 14 VB Tobacco Products Ford. The team did not make it through the season, however, as VB folded and there was no other sponsorship to be found.

Busch Series

Car No. 10 History

ppc debuted at Darlington Speedway in 1993. It was No. 23 Ford sponsored by If Its Paper and driven by Chad Little. At the time, Pollex co-owned the team with NFL quarterback Mark Rypien. Little competed in 12 races with the team that season, posting three top-ten finishes. Going full-time with Bayer Select sponsoring in 1994, Little finished third in the Busch Series points, finishing in the top-ten in half of the races run that season. The next season was even better, as Little collected six victories and a runner-up finish in the points. When Pollex moved Little and the team up to the Cup Series in 1997, the team did not run the Busch Series.

Pollex returned in 1999 with a new operation. This time it was the No. 32 Kleenex Chevy driven by Jeff Green. Despite failing to qualify for the spring Rockingham race, Green won three races and finished second in the points in what was a comeback season for both Green and the team. For 2000, the team underwent some changes, as it bought the No. 57 car driven by Jason Keller, and Green's car was now No. 10 and sponsored by NesQuik. Green won six races and the championship by a then-record 616 points over Keller. After yet another successful 2001 season where Green visited Victory Lane four times and wound up second in the points in the team's new Fords, he departed for Richard Childress Racing's Winston Cup team. His replacement was Scott Riggs, an up-and-coming driver from the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series. Riggs won twice and finished 10th on his way to winning the Busch Series Rookie of the Year standings. After two more wins and a sixth-place finish in points, Riggs left for MB2/MBV Motorsports, and the team disappeared briefly, before coming back in 2005. Rookie driver Michel Jourdain Jr. was tabbed the car's pilot, and he posted one-top ten finish before being replaced by Brent Sherman with sponsor Serta Mattresses midway through the season.

In 2006, Sherman left ppc and went to the Nextel Cup Series with BAM Racing, being replaced by John Andretti. Andretti had limited success in his rookie season and came into the season finale tied with Danny O'Quinn in rookie points. Although Andretti finished 16th and O'Quinn 36th, O'Quinn still edged Andretti by 1 point to win Rookie of the Year.

For the 2007 season, ppc Racing announced an alliance with Biagi Brothers Racing and Braun Racing. The No. 10 would become part of the Braun stable keeping the No. 10's owner points and running equipment from the recently shut down Biagi Brothers team, switching from Ford to Toyota. The sponsorship, number, and driver were to remain the same however Andretti was released following the first race of the 2007 season. Dave Blaney's No. 32 team for Braun would switch to the number No. 10 that following week at Fontana.

Car No. 22 History

The No. 22 car debuted in 1991 as the No. 14 at Lanier Speedway as the No. 54 Air Products Buick owned by driver Jason Keller and his father. Keller started eighth but finished 29th after a crash. The next year, Keller ran five races, but only finished one. In 1993, the team switched to No. 57 and ran 12 races. Despite the abbreviated schedule, Keller had one top-ten finish and finished 33rd in points. In 1994, Keller and his team signed Budget Gourmet to sponsor his Chevrolets, and posted three poles and had a seventeenth-place finish in the points. In 1995, Keller won his first race at the Kroger 200 and finished fourth in points. Despite not visiting victory lane again in 1996, Keller drove his Slim Jim-sponsored Chevy into a sixth-place points finish. Keller struggled the next two seasons, as he did not finish in the top-ten in points, and was forced to run 1998 without major sponsorship. After that year, owner Steve DeSouza bought his operation, and signed IGA as sponsor. It was the right combination, as Keller won at Bristol and IRP, and climbed to eighth in points.

In 2000, the team merged with ppc and got new sponsorship from Excedrin. While Keller's teammate Jeff Green dominated the Busch Series that year, Keller quietly had a strong season, winning one race and finishing a career-best second in points. Albertsons was the next sponsor to climb on board, and Keller won another race and finished third in points while switching to Fords, before winning four more races and returning to second in points in 2002. After a respectable 2003 season, the team switched to No. 22 and brought Miller High Life on board to sponsor. Keller went winless for the first time since 1998, and departed for Team Rensi Motorsports at the end of the year. He was replaced by Kenny Wallace and sponsor Stacker 2. Wallace had five top-fives and finished seventh in points. He continued to run with ppc with Autozone backing the car in 2006, but Autozone departed at the end of the season and Wallace took a full-time Cup ride with Furniture Row Racing. After a number switch with Fitz Motorsports, the team was merged with Carl A. Haas Motorsports in order to run Kyle Krisiloff in the No. 14 Clabber Girl car.

Craftsman Truck Series

The No. 10 Ford Power Stroke Diesel by International truck is driven by Terry Cook in the Craftsman Truck Series. Cook joined the team in 2003 leaving K Automotive Racing with 4 wins, 9 top 5s, 17 top 10s, and an 8th-place points finish. During the first 3 years with ppc, Cook would go on a winless slump, like the one he suffered from 1998 to 2002. Between the 2003 and 2005 seasons, Cook would amass a total of 3 poles, 4 top 5s, and 28 top 10s. Although the 10 team's first year together was slightly successful, 2004 and 2005 would be complete disasters for the team, with 2 consecutive years finishing outside the top 10 in points.

In 2006, Cook would receive his first victory in 4 years at Kansas Speedway and finish 8th in the points. He would leave for HT Motorsports at season's end. The following year, ppc's truck equipment was purchased by Circle Bar Racing with International's Maxx Diesel sponsoring David Starr in the No. 10 truck.

External links

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