Burton happy about Caterpillar coming on board
By SceneDaily Staff
Saturday, June 21, 2008
- TEXT SIZE: Increase Text Size Decrease Text Size Reset Text Size
- 1 Comment. Leave a Comment
- Digg This
- Add to Del.icio.us
- RSS Feeds
Jerry Markland / Getty Images for NASCAR
SONOMA, Calif. - Wednesday's announcement that Caterpillar would join Richard Childress Racing's No. 31 Chevrolet next season as a primary sponsor came as pleasant news to driver Jeff Burton.
Burton's team had been seeking sponsorship for the 2009 Sprint Cup campaign since learning that current sponsor AT&T will leave NASCAR at the end of the year as part of a settlement with NASCAR over a conflict with cellular competitor Sprint, the sponsor of the Sprint Cup Series.
Burton is looking forward to the new association.
“We’re really excited about it," the veteran driver said on Friday at Infineon Raceway, site of Sunday's Toyota/Save Mart 350. "To have a company like CAT come on board with us and moving into the future, it’s really exciting. The relationship with AT&T has been incredible, and hopefully it will continue to be incredible for the rest of the year. We have a lot of unfinished business.
"We’d like to finish out with AT&T on a real strong note. Moving into the future and moving forward with CAT, a real, real strong company with really high-quality products, really fits well with what we try to do."
Caterpillar, which is the current sponsor on Dave Blaney's No. 22 Bill Davis Racing Toyota, will move to Burton's team after a 10-year relationship with BDR.
Burton considers the acquisition of Caterpillar a testament to the attractiveness of RCR's three-car Cup organization to potential sponsors.
“I think it’s important that sponsors want to talk to us and that we’re under consideration," he said. "Certainly it’s a tough target. There’s a lot of new sponsors out there that we’d like to have for our teams. … We feel good about the amount of interest that we’ve had in our company, and that goes back to [car owner] Richard [Childress].
Latest Headlines
"Richard’s a very competitive person, doing his best to put competitive teams on the race track, but more importantly he’s very honest, very straightforward.”
Ironically, Burton isn't the first member of his family to be associated with Caterpillar in NASCAR's top series. The company served as the primary sponsor on older brother Ward Burton's car when he drove for Bill Davis Racing from 1999 through 2003.
During that time, Ward Burton won the Daytona 500 (in 2002) and the Mountain Dew Southern 500 at Darlington Raceway in 2001.
"I think Ward and CAT was a great relationship," Jeff Burton said. "Obviously they won the Daytona 500 and won the Southern 500 and won some other races together. That was a really neat relationship. I’m excited about continuing the Burton relationship with CAT. It’s a really good fit for us. Our family has been in construction business for forever.
"It is a unique situation that a brother drove with a sponsor and now another one is, but I think that’s a positive thing. The family has really good thoughts about CAT and holds CAT in high regard. To be able to continue that, I think is pretty special.”
- Mentioned Drivers:
- Jeff Burton
Comments
1 response to "Burton happy about Caterpillar coming on board"
steve songer said:
Jun 21, 2008 at 3:47 PMThis is GREAT as far as this Burton fan is concerned! Only thing better would be the brothers as RCR teammates . . . oh, I can dream, can't I?
Report as AbuseReport Abuse
This feature is intended to allow you to report comments that are abusive in terms of foul/vulgar language, harassment, racial/religious prejudice and any words/phrases of a related nature. This feature should not be used to report users who simply make a comment about your favorite driver, with which you do not agree. Commenting is a forum in which we can all express our opinions. Reporting abuse of others should be done with this in mind.
» Confirm Abuse Report