Gainsco DP Car to appear at Moonshine Festival

DAWSONVILLE, Ga. (October 21, 2009) —GAINSCO/Bob Stallings Racing clinched its second Grand-Am Rolex Sports Car Series Team and Driver Championships less than two weeks ago at Homestead-Miami Speedway, and primary team sponsor GAINSCO Auto Insurance hasn’t slowed down one bit. The No. 99 GAINSCO Auto Insurance racing show car – an exact replica of the 185-mph Pontiac Riley Daytona Prototype that carried GAINSCO/Bob Stallings Racing and drivers Alex Gurney and Jon Fogarty to the 2007 and 2009 championships – will maintain a busy touring schedule for the rest of the year. Its next stop is this weekend’s 42nd annual Mountain Moonshine Festival in Dawsonville, Ga.

GAINSCO’s award-winning show car program has been on the road for over 200 days each year since debuting in 2007, but this weekend’s Mountain Moonshine Festival will mark its first visit the annual Georgia festival of speed and racing heritage. A weekend crowd of over 100,000 people is expected to celebrate the legend of “moonshine runners" who were racing’s pioneers, local hero and NASCAR Champion Bill (“Awesome Bill from Dawsonville") Elliott and, more recently, every facet of the motorsports world.

The unique sight of an exotic rear-engine Daytona Prototype sports car in the heart of stock car country actually makes more sense than it might seem for GAINSCO Auto Insurance and one of its independent agent partners. GAINSCO expanded its business into Georgia early this past summer and Mark Misirly, owner of M+H Insurance Services, met some of the Dallas-based company’s representatives at an insurance expo in Duluth, Ga., in August. It was there Misirly had the idea of bringing the bright red No. 99 race car to town for the Moonshine Festival.

“I saw the GAINSCO car at the Expo and it made a lot of sense," said Misirly, who will move his business from nearby Cumming to Dawsonville soon. “With the racing heritage of this region, along with the brand awareness the GAINSCO show car brings to their company and my business, it seemed perfect to get the car here for our big weekend."

The GAINSCO Daytona Prototype race car may not be familiar to some NASCAR faithful, but one name on the car certainly will be. Three-time reigning NASCAR Sprint Cup Champion Jimmie Johnson is also part of the GAINSCO/Bob Stallings Racing team and has been on the four-driver line up at the annual Rolex 24 At Daytona the past two years.

Johnson, Gurney, Fogarty and former CART Champ Car Champion Jimmy Vasser finished second in the 2008 running of the day-long race.

The No. 99 GAINSCO show car will be on display near downtown Dawsonville Square all weekend. Interested media can call (321) 890-2848 in advance or (214) 517-9575 during the event weekend.