FANTASY NASCAR Racin

an American stock car racing driver. He most recently competed in the NASCAR Xfinity Series, driving the #89 Shepherd Racing Ventures Chevrolet. He is a born-again Christian who serves as a lay minister to the racing community. He has been competing in NASCAR for over 40 years and at age 71, had decided that (next year) 2013 will be his final year in the NASCAR series (but it wasn't). He has competed in the Cup series for 27 years (stopping in 2006) and still currently races in the NASCAR Xfinity and ARCA race series. Shepherd became the second oldest race winner (after Harry Gant) in 1993, when he won the spring race at Atlanta at the age of 51 years, 4 months, and 27 days. Shepherd's racing career began when he used his souped-up moonshine car to earn extra money on the weekends. He won 21 of 29 races to win the North Carolina title. In 1973, Shepherd finished second in the championship to Jack Ingram in NASCAR's Late Model Sportsman

division, driving in 17 different cars. In 1980, he won the series title. He is also a well known roller skater, dancer, and car collector. Most races he drives a car with "Jesus" emblazened on the hood. Shepherd made his Cup debut in 1970 at Hickory Motor Speedway. He started tenth but finished nineteenth out of twenty-two cars due to rear end failure. He made two more starts that year, his best finish a fourteenth at Hickory. He did not race in Cup again until 1977. After running two races in 1978, Shepherd moved to the Cup Series full-time in 1981, driving the #5 Performance Connection Pontiac for Cliff

Stewart. He won the pole in his first race at Richmond International Raceway, and also picked up his first career win at Martinsville Speedway. Shepherd was runner-up to Ron Bouchard for Winston Cup Rookie of the Year honors. The following season, he moved over to the #98 Levi Garrett Buick. Shepherd began 1983 without a full-time ride, running the Richmond 400 with Wayne Beahr and the Virginia National Bank 500 with Emanuel Zervakis, before driving the #2 ACM Equipment Sales Buick for the rest of the season for Jim Stacy, his best finish being a second-place run at the Firecracker 400. For 1985, he drove for multiple Cup teams, the most of which for the #00 Helen

Rae Special. After failing to finish all but two Xfinity races in 1985, Shepherd drove for Whitaker and himself the following season, winning a career high four Xfinity races during the season. In the Cup Series, he won his second career race driving the #47 Buick for Jack Beebe. The following season, he drove to the #26 Quaker State Buick for King Racing, winning the pole at Martinsville and finishing seventeenth in the standings. It was also the first time in his Cup career that he competed in every scheduled event. He won another three races in the Xfinity Series, including his only career road course win at Road Atlanta. In 1990, he scored a career high season-end ranking of fifth for Bud Moore Engineering in the #15 Motorcraft Ford Thunderbird. In addition, he picked up his third career win at the season-closing Atlanta Journal 500 driving for Bud

Moore. After failing to win and dropping to twelfth the following season, Shepherd moved to the Wood Brothers Racing #21 Ford. He finished second in the 1992 Daytona 500 to Davey Allison with a margin of victory of 2 car lengths. In 1993 he won his final race at Atlanta in March 1993 while wheeling the Citgo Ford owned by the Wood Brothers. For the rest of the 1990's Shepherd drove for many under-funded teams often failing to make the race field. Shepherd began 2000 in the Craftsman Truck Series driving the #7, finishing seventeenth at Homestead-Miami Speedway, but a lack of sponsorship caused the deal to fall through. In 2001, Shepherd formed his own Truck team, Victory in Jesus Racing, and began campaigning the #21

Ford F-150 on a part-time basis. During this time, he served as his own one man pit crew during a truck race as he often climbed out of his truck to change his own tires and fill his own gas tank during pit stops. He was out of the CUP series for 2000 and 2001. He returned to the CUP series in 2002 in his #89 Red Line Oil Ford. From 2002 through 2006 he only attempted a hand full of races, except for 2004, when he raced in 19 events. His best finish was 32nd in Martinsville. He did run one race in 2015 and two events in 2015. Shepherd also operates his own charity, "The Morgan Shepherd Charitable Fund,", is an organization set up to assist the needy and handicapped in the Virginia Mountains. The Charity raises funds to support the PARC Workshop, an organization that provides

handicapped adults job and daily living skills. Each year the group makes an annual trip in December to various places in the northeast. For his efforts, he was awarded the "Spirit Award" by the NMPA and Pocono Raceway in December 2005. Since 1976, Morgan Shepherd has been devoted to raising funds and gather donations to help those less fortunate, and using his racing to help his group get attention. Over 26 years, Morgan's efforts has materialized into a federally licensed 501C(3) charitable organization and an outstanding fun-filled event every December in the Blue Ridge Mountains of Virginia to celebrate the true meaning of Christmas. For his race career Shepherd raced in 517 Cup events claimed the four wins mentioned above. He claimed 63 top five finishes. He has ran 453 Xfinity races, and accumulated 15 wins. In

2017 he raced in the Xfinity series at the age of 76; running 19 events; with a best finish of 32nd. Shepherd continued to race into 2020. Morgan still runs a very underfunded team and just loves to race. So far he has been racing since 1970 in various NASCAR series. He was still racing in 2019 as he ran 12 races in the Xfinity Series. Due to being a team that is severely underfunded he wasn't even able to have his equipment finish one of the races. His best finish was 31st. He also fielded a car for Landon Cassill in 10 Xfinity Series races in 2019. Mostly with the same results. But the final race the car held together for the entire race and Cassill finished an impressive 15th. He has the record for the oldest driver to ever start a NASCAR race. When he started his final race of 2019 at Indy he was 77 years old. He does have plans to race more in 2020. He hasn't raced in the Cup Series since 2014. The Truck series saw him make 57 starts but has failed to win there. On November 23, 2020 it was announced veteran NASCAR driver and team owner Morgan Shepherd had been diagnosed with early stage Parkinson’s disease. News of Shepherd’s diagnosis with the nervous system disorder was shared on his team’s website, which indicated the illness comes after “a long year of health issues.” The 79-year-old driver has fielded cars in the NASCAR Xfinity Series in recent years with driving duties shared by Landon Cassill and himself. Shepherd became the oldest driver to compete in a NASCAR Cup Series race in 2014, making a start at New Hampshire Motor Speedway at age 72. He marked his most recent taste of NASCAR competition with 12 Xfinity races in 2019. Cassill drove Shepherd’s #89 Chevrolet in four of the first five races this season. The team noted its 2020 campaign marked the first time in 52 years Shepherd did not compete in a

Fantasy NASCAR Racing

MORGAN SHEPHERD - 10/12/1941