Colin Braun rewards team owner’s confidence in him with first Truck series victory

By Tim Tuttle - Special to the Sporting News NASCAR Wire Service

Thursday, June 18, 2009

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Colin Braun had a serious to-do list in the Michigan 200, all centered around the pressure of winning. These were the objectives: Securing Roush Fenway Racing’s 50th win in the Camping World Truck Series; defending home ground for the team, Ford and sponsor Con-way; getting his first victory in the series.

Check, check and check.

“It was pretty special to get all of it done in one fell swoop,” Braun said.

Braun passed Kyle Busch on lap 77 and led the final 24 laps, all under green, to defeat Busch by 1.790 seconds. The fact that he beat Busch was pretty special, too.

“It was cool to beat Kyle,” Braun said. “If I could pick anybody to finish second, it was Kyle.”
Braun was in a strong position to win earlier this season at Charlotte, leading two-thirds of the race when contact from Busch put him into the wall.

It was Ford’s first win this season in the truck series. With the manufacturer’s headquarters located 60 miles to the east, there was no better place to do it than at Michigan International Speedway.

“It was also sweet to beat the Toyotas here,” Braun said.

Braun drove Roush Fenway to its third straight win at MIS. The team’s 50 wins make it the most successful in series history by far. Jim Smith’s disbanded Ultra Motorsports is second with 36.

“It’s great to do it (50 wins) here in the Ford Motor Co.’s backyard,” owner Jack Roush said. “This is my turf.”

Roush Fenway is the only remaining full-time Sprint Cup team in the truck series. Roush uses it for driver development. Greg Biffle, the 2000 series champion, and Carl Edwards both worked their way through the Truck series and made it to full-time Cup rides with the team, as did former Roush driver Kurt Busch. The 20-year-old Braun, the survivor of the team’s reduction to one entry this season, is a likely candidate to get there, too.

“Colin is a good driver now,” Roush said. “He’s going to be a great driver after he’s learned some of the things he needs to know on the race track. He’s well on his way to being as good in this business as anybody has been.”

This is Braun’s second season in the series and the second he’s driven ovals. He was hired to drive top-class sports cars at age 17 and was part of the second-place Ferrari team in the GT class at the 24 Hours of Le Mans in 2007.

Braun finished third in his fifth race at Kansas last year, but had only two more top-fives the rest of the season. He crashed so many trucks that Roush made him a frequent visitor to the team’s body department.

“He’s (Braun) got great mettle that needs some tempering,” Roush said.

Braun crashed out of four of the opening seven races this year, but began his turnaround with a third in the previous race at Texas.

“Jack, thanks for sticking with me,” Braun said on the radio on the cool-down lap.
Braun was third behind Busch and Matt Crafton’s Chevrolet when the caution came out on lap 60. Everybody made one stop for tires and another for fuel. Braun’s crew got him out first on the second stop.

Busch regained the lead on the lap 64 restart, going inside Braun in Turns 1 and 2 and pulling ahead on the backstretch.

In Turn 1 on lap 77, Braun closed hard on the lapped Chevrolet of Norm Benning, who was running one truck width above the white line. Busch decided to pass on the inside and committed to it. Benning made a late move inside, forcing Busch to go down on the apron and lose momentum.

Braun burst past on the outside and immediately established a comfortable lead.

“Luckily, Kyle got stuck in traffic and I got by on the high side,” Braun said. “My spotter did a good job helping out, telling me there was a lapped car pretty far in advance. I was going to pick the lane [Busch] didn’t.”

“I screwed up,” Busch said. “The guy (Benning) didn’t hold his line. I saw a lapped truck running a lane up off the bottom and I had been liking to run on the bottom. I went into the corner underneath him and he kept coming down and coming across. … I lost the race for us, my fault.”

Brian Ickler, Busch’s teammate in the No. 15 Billy Ballew Motorsports Toyota, finished third in his fifth series race. Crafton finished fourth and remained the series leader, by 39 points over Hornaday and 44 over Skinner.