[media-credit name=”darlingtonraceway.com” align=”alignright” width=”199″]
[/media-credit]This Friday, NASCAR Nationwide Series Driver Tayler Malsam will make his first start at Darlington Raceway aboard the #19 G-Oil Toyota Camry from TriStar Motorsports. Fans can tune into the VFW Sport Clips Help a Hero 200 on Friday, May 11 at 6:30 pm ET on ESPN 2.
• Currently in his first full season of Nationwide competition, Malsam, 23, stands 8th as the highest ranking Toyota driver in the 2012 NNS championship. He has been in the top 8 in the standings through all 8 races.
• Tayler and TriStar teammate Mike Bliss are both in the top-ten and TriStar is the top non-Cup affiliated team in the 2012 NNS standings after the first eight races. Darlington Record:
This will be Malsam’s very first start at Darlington Raceway.
May is Global Youth Traffic Safety Month™
Before heading into Darlington, Tayler is in Washington D.C. to promote a “Million Messages in May” as National Spokesman for Youth Safety. He will join the National Organizations for Youth Safety (NOYS®) in influencing up to 80 million people in the U.S. and 200 million people worldwide to use social networking to send traffic safety messages.
• Yesterday Monday, May 7th, Tayler and the G-Oil Toyota Camry show car, along with Emmy award-winning actor Bryton James, were at the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) promoting safe driving with NOYS students from across the country.
• Today, Tuesday May 8th, Malsam will help with the launch of a “Million Messages in May” in Senate Park on Capitol Hill with NOYS® and U.S. Secretary of Transportation, Ray LaHood. There will be a special press release for this event.
Tayler Malsam Comments:
On Talladega: “We were up and down at Talladega and now we’re ready for the next big challenge, Darlington.”
On TriStar Teammate Eric McClure: “I’m glad to see that Eric is recuperating. He took a really big hit. Thankfully the TriStar team builds good cars and the SAFER barriers did their job, too.”
On Darlington: “Darlington is one of the most difficult tracks in NASCAR and coming here for the first time is a very big challenge. Tracks like Darlington have a lot of character and history. If you want to be a real NASCAR driver you have to learn how to race well at Darlington. The length of the track, with two different radius turns, the banking, everything will be new to me, so I’ve got a lot to learn.”
Rick Carpenter, TriStar General Manager, Comments: “Tayler did a good job and had the G-Oil Toyota as high as 6th early at Talladega and we see-sawed up and down the order depending on the draft until finally we got caught in a crash late. Darlington is going to be a tough test since, unlike Talladega, Tayler has never raced here before. We want to make the car as consistent and predictable as we can and make it to the finish without too many Darlington stripes.”
2012 NNS Recap
#19 G-Oil® Toyota—Tayler Malsam Race # Venue Start Position Finish Position NNS Driver Standing #1 Daytona International Speedway 25 6 4 #2 Phoenix International Raceway 24 20 7 #3 Las Vegas Motor Speedway 17 16 7 #4 Bristol Motor Speedway 18 18 7 #5 Auto Club Speedway 22 16 8 #6 Texas Motor Speedway 28 25 8 #7 Richmond International Raceway 27 25 8 #8 Talladega Superspeedway 14 24 8
