HENDERSON, Nevada -- H-Town Racing, a local NASCAR Whelen All American Series participant, is proud to announce the beginning of the “Race to Success” Reading Program. The program is an opportunity for local driver and car owner Jim Petrie to be able to help local elementary school students. The “Race to Success” Reading Program is a program that encourages the students to set and accomplish goals through number of books read. H-Town Racing provides awards for each goal met by the student and class. At the conclusion of the program, May 2008, H-Town Racing is proud to make a $500.00 donation to the participating school libraries.

“The goal of the program is to challenge and mentor students through reading, using the race team as the subject of interest to set goals, accept and achieve challenges, and help steer the kids down the right path during the critical transition year before heading into middle school,” explained Jim Petrie, owner and driver of H-Town Racing.

The program focuses on the fifth grade and is implemented in schools in connection Elaine Wynn’s After School All Stars. The H-Town Racing Team has participated in Nevada Reading Week for the last few years at different area schools and has seen the excitement from the kids for racing. They hope to transition the excitement into the yearly program. The participating schools for the 2007-2008 school year, are Dr. C. Owen Roundy Elementary and C.T. Sewell Elementary, as the team hopes to find a third participant.

The race team will spend approximately 150 hours at the schools through out the year, reading to the kids, delivering prizes, mentoring, and emphasizing the importance of reading, all while using the race team and cars as subjects of interest.

“This is not going to one of those things where we show up to the school once and then the kids don’t see us again, we are going to spend a lot of hours at the schools reading, talking, and interacting with the students as a way to help keep these kids on the right track,” stated Jim Petrie, owner/driver. Petrie, added “We have been very lucky to have

the sponsor support from Nevada State Bank, Findlay Chevrolet, Dr. MaryAnn Shannon, Black Mountain Graphics, and Cintas, that we thought it was time to give something back to the kids.”

As H-Town Racing and its primary sponsor, Nevada State Bank, renewed their partnership for the 2008 season the race team thought this would be a good time to start the program. The program runs from September 2007 to May 2008.

H-Town Racing competes at The Bullring at Las Vegas Motor Speedway on a weekly basis. LVMS also has contributed to the Race to Success Reading Program by donating 500 tickets to this past weekends Smith’s Craftsman Truck Race and over 2000 tickets to The Bullring.