FANTASY NASCAR Racin

was a professional race car driver. Park last raced in the #35 Waste Management Recycle America Monte Carlo in the NASCAR K&N Pro Series East making three starts in 2010. Park began racing not in an entry-level class, but in NASCAR Modifieds on Long Island as the son of longtime National Modified Championship contender Bob Park. After establishing himself in weekly Modified racing at Riverhead Raceway, he advanced to the NASCAR Featherlite Modified Series. He won several races and became a championship contender before moving on to the Xfinity Series. Steve Park was first hired by seven time Cup Champion Dale Earnhardt in 1996. Initially, Steve refused to return Dale's phone messages, who was calling with interest to hire Steve, thinking his friends were pranking him. After finally being convinced that the

real Dale Earnhardt was calling him, Steve made one start in the #31 Xfinity Series car in Charlotte in October that resulted in a 29th place finish. Steve was then given a full time ride in Dale's #3 AC-Delco car for the 1997 Xfinity Series season where he posted 3 wins and walked away with Rookie of the Year honors. Steve came to the NASCAR Cup Series as the driver for the start-up #1 Pennzoil team of Dale Earnhardt Inc. (DEI). In the 1998 season, Park drove five races until an injury from a hard crash at Atlanta Motor Speedway sidelined him Crash Video can be seen here. Park returned later in the year. During the 2000 NASCAR Winston Cup Series, Park would grab one win at his home track of Watkins Glen, winning the 2000 Global Crossing @ The Glen. In 2001, Park scored an emotional win for DEI by winning the Dura Lube 400 at North Carolina Speedway, as Dale Earnhardt was killed in a crash the week before at Daytona, (Win video here). The same season, driving in the Xfinity Series, Park

was involved in a crash at Darlington Raceway while driving the #31 Whelen Chevrolet owned by Ted Marsh. Under caution and still driving on the track, the steering wheel came off in Park's hand, causing him to veer left. By complete chance, lap down car Larry Foyt was speeding up to join the lap down line at the same time Park turned. A video here shows Park was T-boned on the drivers side upon collision with Foyt's car. The severity of the crash caused a massive brain injury as well as several broken ribs. Foyt said that the car was traveling "well over 100 miles per hour." Park was left with noticeably slurred speech as a result of the accident and some have theorized that he never fully recovered from his injuries. Park returned to race six times in the 2002 season and had many accidents. The largest incident was a flip at Pocono Raceway when he spun into, and was turned by, teammate Dale Earnhardt Jr. and hit the infield barrier with tremendous velocity, flipping over several times. That video is from YouTube, and can be seen here. During the 2003 NASCAR Winston Cup Series, Dale Earnhardt, Inc. let Park go midway into the season, and he was effectively "traded" to Richard Childress Racing for Jeff Green, who took over the #1 car from Park with Park taking over the #30 AOL car. At the end of the 2003 season, Park announced he would not return to the #30 AOL car and would join the Craftsman Truck Series

the following season. He joined Las Vegas-owned team Orleans Racing and piloted the #62 truck, vacated by Brendan Gaughan who was offered a ride in the #77 Kodak Nextel Cup car for Penske Racing. Although Steve never won a race in 2004, he finished 9th in CTS driver points, and was voted Most Popular Driver by his peers. In 2005 Park won the Craftsman Truck Series American Racing Wheels 200, the second race of the season at California Speedway, and became the tenth driver to win a race in all three of NASCAR's top racing series. Parks has only competed in two Cup events since 2003. One at Daytona in 2010, and one in Talladega in 2011. These were the last two Cup races of Parks career. For his career Park had 183 Cup starts with two wins. His Xfinity stats show he ran 56 events, and collected three wins there. He has over 14 million dollars in career earnings. Some info from Wikipedia

Fantasy NASCAR Racing

STEVE PARK - 08/23/1967