Parker Kligerman and his No. 77 Bandit Chippers Racing team head to Dover (Del.) International Speedway this weekend for race No. 28 of 33 on the 2013 NASCAR Nationwide Series schedule. As the series heads down the homestretch, the Connecticut native hopes that a trip to the northeast will help reverse the recent spell of bad luck that he and his Kyle Busch Motorsports’ crew have encountered the last five weeks.
Mixed in with a solid eighth-place result at Chicagoland Speedway in Joliet, Ill. two weeks ago and an average finish at Atlanta Motor Speedway in Hampton, Ga. four weeks ago, have been three of the four worst finishes of the season for the No 77 team. The disappointing finishes were all the more disappointing considering the fact that they had strong runs going in all three events. At Bristol, Kligerman was running 14th just after the halfway mark when he got collected by Brian Vickers after he hit the wall. At Richmond, the 23-year-old driver was running 10th just past the halfway mark when an electrical issue forced the team to the garage for the remainder of the event. Then last week, he had the Camp Horsin’ Around Camry in a side-by-side battle for the sixth spot late in the race when another competitor made things three wide and the talented youngster’s night ended abruptly in the outside wall of the frontstretch.
A trip homeward this weekend might be just the remedy that Kligerman needs to turn things around. Kligerman was a contender in each of his NASCAR Camping World Truck Series starts at the 1-mile oval and has had solid runs in both of his Nationwide Series starts.
His most recent visit to “The First State” was an eventful one, overcoming two pit road miscues – including highly publicized lap around the track with the jack stuck under the car – in the June Nationwide Series race to post a respectable 11th-place finish. That was one spot better than his first series start in Dover, a 12th-place finish for Penske Racing in 2012. In last June’s Truck Series event, Kligerman’s truck sustained some front-end damage from an early accident, but the talented youngster was able to recover and drove back through the field and ended the day with a runner-up finish in the rain-shortened event. In his first start at the concrete track in NASCAR’s third division, he was challenging Cole Whitt for the second position with eight laps remaining when he got loose, made contact with the wall and was relegated to a 21st-place finish.
Despite his recent stretch of bad luck, Kligerman has been able to remain inside the top 10 in the Nationwide Series driver point standings, where he has been for 25 of the 27 weeks. The Bandit Chippers Racing team is hoping that Saturday’s visit to the “Monster Mile” will help lay the foundation to a concrete finish to his first full-time campaign in NASCAR’s second division.
KBM PR
