Hunter-Reay next open wheel driver to NASCAR

At Caraway Speedway this week, General Motors officials set up cars in Chevy's version of the"Gong Show". Drivers ran in a Ron Hornaday-prepared Busch car. Two days of testing at Caraway, with a platoon of engineers from Richard Childress' operation, under the watchful eyes of GM racing execs Pat Suhy and Alba Colon, then the group will go next month to a Georgia dirt track and then to Nashville's high-banked concrete track. The drivers being tested are: Jeff Earnhardt, grandson of Dale Sr's, Joey Logano, Ryan Hunter-Reay, Colin Braun, Chase Austin, Landon Cassill, Jeremy Clements, Marc Davis, Jay Gerst, Drew Herring, Woody Howard, Tim McCreadie, Chad McCumbee, Josh Richards, Jason Sarvis and Kody Swanson. One of last year's diversity drivers, Allison Duncan, is running this year for Childress at the same Virginia track at which Jeff Earnhardt is running. But there's no word yet on whether Childress plans to move Duncan up next season. Car owners Childress and Rick Hendrick were the most visible in this round of testing, but Kevin Harvick, who has his own NASCAR teams in addition to his day job with Childress on the Nextel Cup tour, is expected to have some input, too, along with several other Chevy teams. More at the Winston Salem Journal

[Editor's Note: We hear that Hendrick Motorsports and Chevy were very impressed with Hunter-Reay. Another American, AJ Allmendinger, could not win in Champ Car until given the proper ride. Now he's giving Sebastien Bourdais fits and has won 4 of 7 races. Hunter-Reay never had a top ride in Champ Car yet still won two races. So what does Champ Car do with this good-looking, well spoken All-American boy who just happens to be lightning fast when given a decent car? They do like they did with Jeff Gordon, Tony Stewart, Ryan Newman, JJ Yeley, and all the other good potential Americans – they let them get away to NASCAR to become superstars.]