Ryan Newman: There’s No Quit in This Team

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Ryan Newman and his U.S. Army Racing team may have been knocked down, but they refuse to give up and they will not accept defeat.

Following a night-ending accident that resulted in a disappointing 36th-place finish Saturday at Bristol (Tenn.) Motor Speedway, Newman dropped two positions to 15th in the driver standings and, most importantly, out of a wild-card spot with two races to go before the Chase for the NASCAR Sprint Cup Championship begins Sept. 16 at Chicagoland Speedway in Joliet, Ill.

Only the top-10 in points are locked into the 12-driver, 10-race Chase. Positions 11 and 12 in the Chase are wild cards, awarded to the two drivers between 11th and 20th in points with the most wins. In the event multiple drivers have the same number of wins, a driver’s point standing serves as the tiebreaker.

Kasey Kahne holds the 11th-place wild-card spot thanks to his two victories, the most of any driver outside the top-10. Kyle Busch vaulted into the 12th-place wild-card spot after Bristol thanks to his victory April 28 at Richmond (Va.) International Raceway, combined with his 13th position in the standings, which is higher than his fellow single-race winners in the top-20 in points – Jeff Gordon, Newman, Marcos Ambrose and Joey Logano.

With the odds seemingly stacked against the No. 39 Stewart-Haas Racing (SHR) team as the Sprint Cup Series rolls into Atlanta Motor Speedway for Sunday night’s AdvoCare 500, Newman & Company will need to dig its heels in and channel the lessons and attributes learned over the years from the more than 1 million U.S. Army Strong Soldiers the driver and team represent.

It will be imperative that Newman and his team exhibit the same mental, physical and emotional toughness of our Soldiers while they fight to achieve their goal of earning one of the coveted wild-card spots in the Chase.

One thing for certain, Newman and his Tony Gibson-led race team will not give up.

Since its first season together at SHR in 2009, the No. 39 U.S. Army Racing team has showcased an unwavering determination. The team even adopted an anonymously written poem entitled “Don’t Quit” as its mantra during that first season as it battled back from as low as 36th in the championship standings to a berth in the Chase and, ultimately, a season-ending ninth-place finish in the points.

Gibson rallied his troops each step of the way that season, reminding them that if they band together as a team, they could conquer any adversity. In fact, Gibson used his own personal experiences from his racing career as his rallying cry.  

The year was 1992, and Gibson was the car chief for the team owned by driver Alan Kulwicki. Back then, the team was famously known for being an underdog, lacking the funding or the manpower of the super teams, but knowing it had heart and a resolve to be the best.

Its goal was to win the 1992 championship but, after a disastrous outing at Dover (Del.) International Speedway, where Kulwicki destroyed two racecars, it looked as if the championship hopes were over. With six races to go, the team was behind by a seemingly insurmountable 278 points.

As Gibson tells the story, Kulwicki walked into the hauler following the Dover race. He closed the doors behind him and said to his team, “Don’t give up on me, I won’t give up on you. We can still win this championship.”

And that’s precisely what happened. Kulwicki and his team rattled off four top-five finishes in the final six races and the championship battle between Kulwicki, Bill Elliott and Davey Allison went down to the wire that season 20 years ago. Kulwicki conserved enough fuel to finish second in the final race at Atlanta, which earned him the championship crown.

This weekend, Gibson returns to Atlanta in an all-too-familiar position. While the 2012 championship may not be on the line just yet, the No. 39 team knows it must prevail in its heated battle for one of the two wild-card spots so it can continue its fight for its ultimate goal – the 2012 Sprint Cup title.

In 19 starts at Atlanta, Newman has a record-tying seven pole positions, one top-five and six top-10 finishes. While the 1.54-mile oval hasn’t statistically been one of Newman’s best over the years, the No. 39 team has earned two top-10 finishes in five starts there since 2009.

There’s no doubt that Gibson will recall the lessons that Kulwicki, his late boss and friend, taught him 20 years ago, and he will remind Newman and the rest of the team to never give up because nothing is out of reach, no matter how bad it might seem.

It’s a theme that resonates well with the No. 39 U.S. Army Medicine team as that determination and fortitude are the same attributes the Army looks for in its Soldiers – putting the mission first, a never-quit attitude and a refusal to accept defeat.

Newman and his No. 39 U.S. Army Medicine team will tackle the next two races with a brave and gritty determination, just like the Army Strong Soldiers they represent attacks its own missions. This is a team that will not quit.

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