When Roush Racing entered NASCAR in the 80s, the team showed a lot of promise. Their racing program was built entirely around a single car – Mark Martin’s No. 6 Ford. As they slowly expanded, their performance dipped, and the organization reached its grave. Until one man pulled them out.
In the mid-90s, the team finally found what they were looking for, or rather whom, and their Cup Series trajectory just changed after that. Hear what the veteran Mark Martin himself has to say about this comeback story.
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Mark Martin sings praises of his former teammate
On his new Mark Martin Archive podcast, the veteran said, “Jeff Burton and his team changed everything and was the greatest teammate I could have ever had. He helped me, tried to help me, tried to bring speed to me. Anything he learned that improved his car, he wanted to share with me. That made him a great teammate, I felt the same way.”
In 1996, Jeff Burton arrived at Roush Racing to sit in the No. 99 Ford, and things were never the same after that. He started to win races for them, like his 1999 TranSouth Financial 400 win, his seventh of his Cup career. But Martin here talks about what he was not just inside but outside that car. A perfect teammate.
In the stretch between 1997 and 2001, he won 17 times and was ranked third among the entire field.
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“The #99 team was completely different. They hired some good, really successful people – Buddy Parrott. That was a different approach, and Jeff Burton was the architect of that entire car. He chose who hung the bodies. People don’t realize it, he knew the springs, setups, he was the total architect of that #99 car in the early years.”
Via NASCAR
According to many interviews, team owner Roush had allowed Burton and Parrott to work in their own way for their #99. With full practical control and knowledge over these things, the results justified it. And Burton was always the guy to share those findings upfront to help the team.
In fact, it was due to this foundational piece of work by Burton that Roush ultimately became one of NASCAR’s premier teams. The later iterations of the organization today, like Roush Fenway Racing and RFK Racing, all have their roots there.
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Nicknamed “The Mayor” in the garage, Burton went on to eventually win 21 and 27 career victories in the NASCAR Cup Series and O’Reilly Auto Parts Series, respectively. Today, the 55-year-old remains active among NASCAR circles, serving as a color commentator for NBC Sports.
Meanwhile, apart from Burton, Martin also made some revelations about his own career.
Martin reveals why he swapped teams with Kurt Busch
Moving ahead from Burton, in 2001, Roush Racing had Mark Martin and Kurt Busch driving for them. Unfortunately, both weren’t doing so well. Martin and his crew chief Jimmy Fenning were unable to produce those results that the team and fans expected them to. So they tried something different.
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Since the same was also happening to Kurt Busch, the young blood in the team, they decided to swap their staff. Jimmy Fencing was not given Busch duties, so that the young lad could benefit from his expertise. Meanwhile, Martin had Busch’s crew chief Ben Leslie.
“Sometimes you gotta make a change, it wasn’t because Jimmy and I wasn’t getting along, but Jimmy and I weren’t getting it done at this time.”
The change had nothing to do with Martin’s rapport with Fenning or anything. It was purely experimental to change their present state to something better.
“So, my team, they changed the colors of cars. I got Kurt’s car, Kurt’s got my car. Kurt’s got Jimmy and my guys, and I got all those young guys.”
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Ultimately, the gamble worked. Martin won the Coca-Cola 600 that year and was a championship contender throughout the season. Busch, for whom all of this was done, won his first-ever Cup win at Bristol.
The post Mark Martin Names the NASCAR Legend Who Revived Roush Racing From Its Grave: “He Changed Everything” appeared first on EssentiallySports.
