CORNELIUS, N.C. — No. 99 Boost Mobile Toyota crew chief Scott Zipadelli would love for nothing more than his driver Travis Pastrana to race well in Saturday’s NASCAR Nationwide Series race at New Hampshire Motor Speedway.
For Zipadelli, the “Magic Mile” in Loudon, N.H. is a special place. The veteran crew chief grew up in East Haddam, Conn., about 180 miles south of the race track.
Zipadelli began his racing career in the NASCAR Busch North (now K&N East) Series before moving to North Carolina to work as a mechanic for Innovation Motorsports. He’s been a Nationwide Series crew chief since 2007.
Zipadelli’s drivers’ own four starts at NHMS highlighted by Kenny Wallace’s sixth-place finish last year. This weekend, the 42-year-old crew chief and 11-time X Games gold medal winner Pastrana join for Pastrana’s fifth Nationwide race of the 2012 season.
ZIPADELLI ON NHMS: “I have high expectation every time I go to New Hampshire. It’s my home track and I have had a lot of success there. I want to go there and run good in front of my family and friends. As far as Travis our expectation is to go there and finish in the top 15. We have high expectation for him this weekend, but Loudon is all about track position. We need to have a great qualifying effort and start near the front of the field. Travis is going to have to race his butt off to get a top-15 finish but I have no doubt in my mind that he can do it.”
ZIPADELLI ON TRAVIS PASTRANA: “Travis has learned a lot but he still has a lot to learn. He doesn’t know what he doesn’t know. We tested Milwaukee Mile a couple of weeks ago and worked on learning a lot of the characteristics of the Nationwide Series car. We also worked on how the car felt with major set up changes. It was a day for him to get more confident and comfortable with the race car. As far as his car control and his talent it’s extremely high. He is a very talented driver. He could be very successful in this sport. He just needs to learn how far he can push these race cars without getting himself into trouble.”
NOTES
· MEET PASTRANA: Pastrana will visit the Boost Mobile Experience located in the NHMS FanZone on Saturday at 1 p.m. ET.
· NATIONWIDE STATS: In four career Nationwide Series starts Pastrana owns a career-best finish of 17th at Darlington Speedway. His best career start of 15th came at Iowa.
· K&N SERIES: In 11 NASCAR K&N Pro Series East/West starts the Maryland native owns 1 top-five and 3 top-10 finishes. He grabbed a career-best finish of fourth on May 19th at Iowa Speedway in the East race.
· LIGHTS, CAMERA, ACTION: Pastrana’s Nitro Circus The Movie 3-D will be released August 10. The movie has plenty of NASCAR references. Pastrana199 Racing prepared the school bus that jumped more than 150 feet in the opening scenes.
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