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Sharpie 500
AMBROSE
RATES AMAZING THIRD PLACE AT BRISTOL AS BEST RESULT
YET
BRISTOL, TN — Marcos
Ambrose rates his amazing third place finish at the daunting
Bristol Motor Speedway in Tennessee as the most
satisfying result of his NASCAR career to date.
The Australian claimed his best-ever NASCAR Sprint
Cup Series finish on an oval in the gruelling 500-lap
Sharpie 500 night race, arguably the toughest race
on the 36-race Sprint Cup schedule.
The result clearly underlines Ambrose’s talent
as a driver to watch in the top-flight Sprint Cup level
of the sport, in his fourth season of NASCAR racing
since leaving Australia as a two-time V8 Supercar champion
to forge a career in North America.
Ambrose declared that this race was even more satisfying
than his two Nationwide Series wins at Watkins Glen
and his second place finish at the Sprint Cup race
at Watkins Glen two weeks ago behind series leader
Tony Stewart.
This superb finish, Ambrose’s seventh top 10
finish this season and his fourth top five result of
the season, keeps Ambrose in 17th position in the Sprint
Cup points standings, clearly the best first year driver.
Ambrose started from 25th place in the 43-car field
and never dropped lower than that position in his charge
towards the front aboard hisLittle Debbie®-backed No.
47 Toyota, exhibiting strong speed all night in the
500-lap race.
For most of the race Ambrose was inside the top 10,
and towards the end of the race he battled with NASCAR
legend Mark Martin (who competed in his 1000th NASCAR
race that night), NASCAR bad boy Kyle Busch and Greg
Biffle in the top five.
It was at this same race in 2003 that Ambrose witnessed
his first ever NASCAR race live and in person, renting
a camper van with an Australian friend and watching
the 500-lap battle from the infield.
Later that season he went on to win his first of two
V8 Supercar championship victories.
When Ambrose first transitioned to NASCAR in 2006,
he admitted feeling intimidated about racing on the
30-degree banks of Bristol – known as the world’s
fastest half-mile – as he learned to race on
NASCAR’s high speed ovals.
At this race, Ambrose stood out in a field of
the world’s best oval track racing drivers, underlining
his status as the best performed first year driver
in this year’s elite Sprint Cup field. He also
finished in 10th place earlier this season at Bristol.
Earlier in the day, global consumer giant Kimberly-Clark
announced that it will back Ambrose and his JTG Daugherty
Racing team next season for five races with its Kleenex
brand, joining existing sponsors Little Debbie, The
Clorox Company, Bush’s Beans and iRacing.com. Contributed
by BAM Media
Sharpie 500
Results:
1. Kyle Busch
2. Mark Martin
3. Marcos Ambrose
4. Greg Biffle
5. Denny Hamlin
6. Ryan Newman
7. Kurt Busch
8. Jimmie Johnson
9. Dale Earnhardt,
Jr.
10. Matt Kenseth
Next Race — Pep
Boys Auto 500:
Where: Atlanta Motor Speedway, Hampton, GA
Time: Sunday, September 6, 2009
Network: ESPN, 7 p.m. / PRN Radio, 6:30 p.m.
(All Times Eastern)
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