RECAPPING IRWINDALE:
**** Steve Portenga picked up his first series victory in only his 10th NWWS race. It also marked the first series win for Jim Offenbach's Golden Gate Racing Team.
**** Series rookie Dean Kuhn had his best showing of the season at Irwindale. He qualified 8th and finished 11th in the Lucas Oil Chevrolet of Dan Chittenden.
**** The Bud Pole Award that Butch Gilliland won at Irwindale was his 15th. He is tied with Jim Bown in seventh on the list of career Bud Pole winners in the modern era of the series (1971-present).
**** The Irwindale race featured 26 lead changes. Only one modern era NWWS race, a 500-lap event, featured more lead changes.
NOTES ABOUT MONROE:
**** The Coors Light 200 is the eighth of 14 races on the NWWS schedule and the only visit by the series to Evergreen Speedway this season. It is one of eight short-track races slated in 1999
**** There have been three different Bud Pole winners in the three NWWS races since the series returned to Monroe in 1996. Mark Krogh won it in 1996; Gary Smith won it in 1997 and Kelly Tanner won it in 1998.
**** Gilliland and Smith are the only NWWS drivers to finish in the top five in all three recent NWWS races at Monroe.
**** Gilliland won this event in two of the past three years -- 1996 and 1998. He finished fifth at the .646-mile track in 1997.
**** Smith has finished in the runner-up spot in this event in each of the past three years. Smith, who is running a limited schedule in the series this season, is expected to be among the entries at Monroe -- which he considers his home track.
**** NASCAR Winston West Series events at Evergreen Speedway have varied in length. Since 1971, they have included distances of 100 laps, 150 laps, 200 laps, 250 laps, 300 laps and 500 laps.
**** A NVVWS event that garnered a lot of attention was the annual 500-lap race at Evergreen Speedway. The races, which were held from 1985 to 1993, featured NASCAR Winston Cup drivers such as Bill Elliott, Geoffry Bodine, Davey Allison and Sterling Marlin
**** Ray Elder, with five victories, has the most NWWS wins at Evergreen Speedway. He reached victory lane once in 1971 twice in 1972, and twice in 1975.
**** Chad Little was the most recent driver with back-to-back NWWS wins at Evergreen Speedway. He won in 1988 and 1989. Little also had a Victory at the .646-mile track in 1986.
**** Elliott has the most Bud Pole Awards at Wvergreen Speedway, with four. He started from the pole spot in 1986, 1987, 1989 and 1990.
**** Hershel McGriff has taken the green flag in 15 NWWS races at Evergreen Speedway since 1971, more than any active driver in the series,
**** Ford tops the list of manufacturer wins at Evergreen Speedway, with eight. Those include victories in two of the past three years.
NOTES OF INTEREST:
**** Many drivers in the top 10 of the NWWS championship standings shuffled positions following the Irwindale event. Competitors moving up in the standings include Brandon Ash, who moved back into first; Portenga, who moved up to third; and Gilliland, who moved up to sixth.
**** Ash has the best average finish so far this season. After seven races, he has an average finish of 7.57.
**** Ash has completed the most laps of competition in the series so far. He has run 99.9 percent of the laps-- 1,099 of the 1,100 possible.
**** Bill Sedgwick has led the most laps of competition in the first half of this season. He has kept the DuPont Stainmaster Carpets Chevrolet out front for 171 laps.
