JOHN PAUL MENARD - 08/21/1980
an American professional stock car driver. He is the son of Midwestern home improvement tycoon John Menard Jr., founder of the Menards chain. Menard's racing career began at the age of eight when he won the Briggs Junior Karting Class Championship in his native Eau Claire, Wisconsin. He later won the Briggs Medium Class Champion before working his way up to higher level racing. In 2003, Menard joined Andy Petree Racing to compete in NASCAR Cup, Xfinity and Craftsman Truck Series events while still competing in ARCA. A picture of the #55 car he drove in his first Xfinity start is below. In his first ARCA start at Salem Speedway, he qualified second and finished fourth. Later that year, he started on the pole at Winchester, Indiana, and then scored his first ARCA victory at Talladega Superspeedway. He also had top finishes of ninth in the Busch race at Indianapolis Raceway Park and eighth in the Truck race at the Kansas Speedway. In 2004, Menard began the NASCAR Busch Series season driving the #33 Chevrolet. Midway through the season, he
moved to Dale Earnhardt, Inc. in the #11 Chevy. Ten races later, Menard won his first career pole position at Kansas Speedway and finished 23rd in points despite no top-tens and missing seven races. With Dan Stillman as crew chief beginning in 2005, they started out by leading 57 laps at Daytona. Winning the Bud Pole Award at Talladega also had them running up front until getting caught up in a wreck. He got his first Top 10 and Top 5 by finishing fifth at the Kentucky Speedway. From there, the team went from 20th to the top-10 in points before
First Xfinity start - 2003 Nashville
First Xfinity win - 2006 Milwaukee
finishing sixth on the season. In 2006, driving the #15 car part-time for DEI, Menard scored his first top-10 finish in the NASCAR Cup Series by coming in seventh place at the Golden Corral 500 at Atlanta Motor Speedway. Menard also won his first Xfinity Series race on June 24 at his home track of the Milwaukee Mile by holding off a late race charge and bump from Cup regular Kevin Harvick. Harvick eventually caused a multi-car wreck attempting to bump him out of the way; and Menard drove his #11 Chevy to the checkered flag. Menard finished off 2006 with a sixth-place finish in the standings, tying his best finish in the
standings last year (2005). He scored 16 top-10 finishes and 7 top-5 finishes in the Busch Series. In 2007, Menard ran his first full-time Cup season. He failed to qualify for six races that season, but after DEI's merger with Ginn Racing, the owner's points were transferred from Sterling Marlin's #14 car to Menard, who was then locked into the rest of the races. His best finish of 2007 was in the Citizens Bank 400 where he finished 12th. In the Busch Series, he picked up 5 top-5 finishes. In 2008, Menard won his first Sprint Cup Series pole at Daytona International Speedway in early July and remained in the top 35 in owner's points for the entire season. At Talladega in the fall, Menard had the best run of his career leading laps and coming home
First Cup Start - 2003 Watkins Glen
Cup Series 2006
with a strong second-place finish. For the 2009 season, Menard moved over to the No. 98 Ford Fusion operated by Yates Racing. Paul Menard showed limited improvement in 2009, running in the top 10 many times, only to later have problems. For example, he crashed at Las Vegas Motor Speedway while running very well, and was involved in a wreck with only 40 laps to go, while running 7th. These issues lead to the team being in danger of falling out of the top 35 in points standings for much of the year. Paul's best finishes include two 13th-place finishes in the Aarons 499 at Talladega Super speedway as well as the Samsung 500
at Texas Motor Speedway, and a 15th-place finish in the Southern 500. At the second Dover race, Paul showed his "skills" by starting 10th and running in the top 10 for most of the day, only to find his car tighten up near the end of the race and come home 19th. At the end of the 2009 NASCAR Sprint Cup Series, Menard was the only driver to not score a top 10 finish who ran all of the races. Paul ended up finishing 31st in the final point standings. For the 2010 season, his #98 team moved over to Richard Petty Motorsports, due to its merger with Yates Racing. In his first start with RPM he finished 13th in the 2010 Daytona 500. He then went on to have Top 20's at Las Vegas and Fontana. The following race at Atlanta Motor Speedway Paul posted his second highest career Cup series finish with a fifth place showing followed by a few more top
2009 Cup Series
Brick Yard 400 Cup win - Indianapolis 2011
20's. After that he fell from the Top 12 in points. At Charlotte, he finished eighth after running in the top 10 all race long. Menard also posted another top 10 in the circuit's 19th race at Chicagoland Speedway. At Dover International Speedway in September he ended up with a 7th-place finish. Menard moved to Richard Childress Racing in 2011, driving the #27. On July 31, 2011, Menard won his first Sprint Cup race in his 167th start, in the Brickyard 400 at the prestigious Indianapolis Motor Speedway. He did so by making his last pit stop with 36 laps to go. He led late, but with 9 laps to go he was passed by Jamie McMurray. With four to go he regained the lead and held off Jeff Gordon, the winner of the inaugural
Brickyard 400 in the final laps, having enough fuel to do so. He is the first member of the Menard family to win at Indianapolis, in any event held at the track. He also joins Trevor Bayne, Regan Smith, David Ragan, and Marcos Ambrose as first-time winners in the 2011 season. In September 2011 at Richmond, Menard and RCR became the center of controversy when Menard spun in the waning laps. It was believed that his accident was intentional, intended to assist his teammate Kevin Harvick who later won the race against Jeff Gordon who would have won if the caution did not come out. In 2012, Menard did not perform well. He crashed during the Aaron's 499 at Talladega and went win-less for 2012. In 2013, he slightly improved when he was briefly in Chase for the Sprint Cup contention. A blown engine early in the Coke Zero 400 caused him to be knocked out of the Chase with a few races left before the Chase began. In the season-ending Ford EcoBoost 400, Menard's tire exploded upon stopping in his pit box; Menard stated, "About a lap later, they told me I was on fire. I lost my brakes, and the damned wheel blew right off." Menard won the Xfinity race at Michigan for his first Xfinity win since 2006 in June 2014. He won after Joey Logano blew a tire with 4 laps to go. In the 2015 Sprint Unlimited at Daytona, Menard won the pole for the race by drawing. He led the first 7 laps until he was involved in a big wreck, finishing 21st. The race was later won by Matt Kenseth. Menard later finished in the top 5 in Auto Club and in Talladega, and got 5 top 10s and 22 top 15s. He made the Chase for the first time in his career mostly because he had only one DNF
2016 Cup Series
(a blown engine in Texas), grabbing the final spot by 17 points over Aric Almirola. He was eliminated in the first round, but with Matt Kenseth's two-race suspension, Menard passed him and finished in a career-best of 14th in the standings. Also in August 2015, Menard took the checkers at Road America, holding off Blake Koch and Ryan Blaney for his third Xfinity win. Aside from the 2011 Brickyard 400, the win was Menard's biggest of his career, as Menard had grown up a few miles from the track. 2016 saw Menards Cup results decline even more than the previous year. He was only able to post three top 10 results with a best of eighth at Martinsville. He finished 25th in the points. During the past three years Richard
Childress has seemed to be on a down swing not being able to claim a win since 2013. From 2013-2016 Menard and his team mates Austin Dillon and Ryan Newman only posted a total of 25 top 5 finishes. The trio continued on at RCR in 2017. Menard was only able to post two Top 5 finishes this season; a fifth in the Daytona 500; and later also at the 400 mile race at Daytona he finished third. He finished a disappointing 23rd in the points standings. For 2018 Menard left RCR and went to drive the famous #21 for the Wood Brothers team. Like the previous six seasons; Menard wasn't able to produce more than a few Top 5 finishes; but he did have seven Top 10's. The most he has had since 2014. His best finish of the year was a fifth at Michigan. With high hopes of giving the Wood Brothers their 100th career win; Menard entered the 2019 season.
Cup ride - 2019
2019 Throw Back paint scheme to Glen Wood
The downward trend continued as he struggled to have Top 10 finishes; but ran a nice race at Bristol finishing sixth and followed that up the next week with a tenth at Richmond. In July, Menard announced he had a contract for the 2020 season, indicating that he planed to stay with Wood Brothers. Still, most finishes were in the 'teens' as he just couldn't seem to get the car into a front running position. He finished ninth in the Southern 500 at Darlington and tenth the next week posted a tenth place finish. Darlington is "Throwback Weekend" and Paul ran a great paint scheme in honor of Glenn Wood. Two days later, Menard announced his retirement from full-time racing after the conclusion of the 2019 season. He cited wanting to spend more time with family as his reason for stepping away. About this same time it had been announced that Matt DiBenedetto would be released from
his contract to drive the #95 in 2020; and Paul lobbied the Wood Brothers to pick up Matt as their driver for 2020. As it turned out; that is what happened. For his career Menard ran 471 Cup races with the one lone win. He had 20 Top 5 and 69 Top 10 finishes. In the Xfinity Series he ran 220 races with three wins and 43 Top 5's. He also ran six Truck Series races with a best finish of eighth. He has not ruled out the possibility of racing part time at some point. Some info from Wikipedia
All Photos copyright and are property of their respective owners