Already, at only 20 years old and in his second NASCAR season, Cole Whitt sounds like a veteran. He finished 15th in Saturday’s NASCAR Camping World Truck Series race at New Hampshire Motor Speedway — fighting the good fight for track position, which he never had after starting 18th and losing a lap under the furious pace set by the leaders.

““We never went backward, which is a good thing. But we never went forward, either,”” Whitt said. ““We just can’t to put together a full weekend. Track position is so important here, and we never had any of it. “We’ll keep trying. Right now, we’re tying to get a win. We have a good group. We can do it … just need to put a full together. The good thing is we have a series of tracks coming up that we’ve run well at.”” Whitt ranks eighth in the championship — 66 points out of the lead, but only 19 out of fifth.

UP NEXT: Kentucky 225, Saturday, Oct. 1, Kentucky Speedway, Sparta, Ky.

September 17th, 2011 – Portimao, Portugal

David Fumanelli found a way to win the opening race in the European F3 Open in Portimao, Portugal. On a sweltering afternoon, the Italian prodigy sponsored by Fuel Doctor Racing took advantage of the problems that affected the early leader Juan Carlos Sistos to grab a victory ahead of Fahmi Ilyas. The current leader, Alex Fontana, was fourth (but later was penalized), while Fabio Gamberini was second and Francisco Diaz third.

JOLIET, Ill. — On target for a top five Friday night at Chicagoland Speedway, Cole Whitt uttered the ugly words “out of fuel.”

That’s never good, and it only got worse for Whitt, who on lap 43 crept down pit road on fumes. Turn One Racing’s No. 60 team filled up the truck and gave it four tires, but by then Whitt was a lap down. He remained within striking distance of the free-pass position and finally got it under the race’s third caution on lap 82. After a pit stop, Whitt restarted 15th, climbed into the top 10 37 laps later and finished ninth. It was the ninth top-10 finish of Whitt’s rookie NASCAR Camping World Truck Series season, and he dropped a position in the standings to ninth — only eight points behind fifth place.

“We were running good up there in the top five, which was pretty solid for us on a track like this,” Whitt said. “Had a pretty good truck but ran out of gas before the first pit stop. Not sure exactly what happened. We couldn’t really rebound from there because we were so far back. We had a top-five truck, and that’s probably where we were going to finish. We weren’t winning (the race) tonight, weren’t the truck to beat. It’s just frustrating we can’t put a whole race together.”

UP NEXT: F.W. Webb 175, Saturday, Sept. 24, New Hampshire Motor Speedway

BRISTOL, Tenn. — Rookie Cole Whitt had his work cut out for him from the get-go Wednesday night at Bristol Motor Speedway.

Starting 30th in a 36-truck race is no easy task, considering the front-runners are free, clear and turning 16-second laps. They’re there, on your rear tailgate, before you know it. But Whitt used a three-wide move at the start and quickly picked up a handful of positions to provide a bit of a buffer.

From there, Whitt moved into the top 15 as various strategies played out during early-race cautions — a few of which forced Whitt to take evasive maneuvers. Whitt pitted his Turn One Racing No. 60 truck for the only time on lap 51 and stayed within striking distance of the top 15. He ended up 12th at the checkered flag, improving 18 positions from where he started.

“After qualifying so bad, we were worried about getting lapped really quick — being stuck back there behind slow trucks and your day is kind of done early,” said Whitt, who paced opening practice in his first visit to Bristol. “I just kind of kept rolling the top until it fanned out. That got us to about mid-pack. There was a string of cautions as the race went on and different strategies played out.

“When we did pit, we were the only truck really to come. Then later, some trucks came and got fresh tires. We were the last truck holding off on old tires. That was hard. Seems like rookie luck couldn’t get any worse when we were trying to do something right.”

Whitt remained fifth in the driver standings. He’s 42 points behind leader Johnny Sauter and 13 behind fourth-place Austin Dillon.

UP NEXT: Atlanta 200, Friday, Sept. 2, Atlanta Motor Speedway, Hampton, Ga.

DRIVER: Cole Whitt (No. 60, Turn One Racing)
EVENT: VFW 200 (NASCAR Camping World Truck Series)
DATE: Saturday, Aug. 20, 2011
TRACK: Michigan International Speedway, Brooklyn, Mich.
RESULT: Start 17 / Finish 10

BROOKLYN, Mich. — Saturday’s VFW 200, for Cole Whitt anyway, came down to contact so early in the race that Whitt had plenty of time to earn his eighth top-10 of the season.

Whitt’s No. 60 Fuel Doctor/Red Bull truck and Max Papis’ No. 9 kissed sides on lap two of 100. The right-side damage was heavy enough that Turn One Racing twice serviced the truck — first, just to keep up; and second, to fix a sagging splitter. Whitt fell two laps down.

Through a series of cautions and pit stops, Whitt reached the top 20 for the final fifth of the race, and he avoided the five-car wreck at the front of the field with 10 laps to go.

Back on the lead lap, Whitt noted: “Guess this still falls into the category that no one wants to win this championship, huh?” And crew chief Marcus Richmond replied: “Just you.”

Whitt gained six positions in the final four laps and two-lap overtime to finish 10th. The rookie still ranks fifth in points, but he picked up eight points on leader Johnny Sauter. He’s 32 points behind Sauter and has 20 to make up on fourth-place Timothy Peters, but only 12 points separate positions 1-4.

“I wish we could have raced for the win like we should have been able to,” Whitt said. “Great job by the pit crew getting us back out there so quickly. A 10th-place finish still keeps us in it.”

The NASCAR Camping World Truck Series has a quick turnaround. On Wednesday night — only four days removed from the Irish Hills of Michigan — Whitt enters Tennessee’s Thunder Valley for a visit to Bristol Motor Speedway.

UP NEXT: O’Reilly Auto Parts 200, Wednesday, Aug. 24, Bristol Motor Speedway, Bristol, Tenn.

(Photo: Getty Images)

Cole Whitt may be just 20 but he’s shown skills and maturity in his rookie season.

Read the rest of the article on SpeedTV.

(July 28th, 2011 – Photo by Jason Smith/Getty Images North America)

DRIVER: Cole Whitt (No. 60, Turn One Racing)
EVENT: AAA Insurance 200 (NASCAR Camping World Truck Series)
DATE: Friday, July 29, 2011
TRACK: Lucas Oil Raceway, Clermont, Ind.
RESULT: Start 9 / Finish 8

CLERMONT, Ind. — Halfway of Saturday night’s AAA Insurance 200 marked the halfway point of the 2011 CampingWorld Truck Series season.

Cole Whitt finished eighth at Lucas Oil Raceway while throwing around a slew of adjectives to describe the handlingof his Turn One Racing No. 60. First it was “tight,” then “killer tight,” then “super tight” and, lastly, on a scale of 1-to-10, it was “10 tight.” But Whitt hung on at the .686-mile short track and, knowing that his truck couldn’t make iton fuel, pitted late for tires and gas.

From there, Whitt charged to eighth, hoping a few of the front-runners would be forced to pit or that the race mayenter overtime. It didn’t, and the strategy of cycling to the front just missed.

“It’s a little frustrating,” Whitt said. “We couldn’t quite get through the field the way we needed to and were fightingthe truck a little bit — tight in the center, tight off. It took a little while to get used to it. Once we got the truckhandling a little better, we were definitely faster but the pit cycles just never worked out. We knew we couldn’t makeit to the end and came in and got our tires, made up a lot of time. I think we would’ve been pretty sporty ifeverything had cycled around. We’ll just take it and move on.”

Recapping the first of Whitt’s rookie season in the Truck Series:

+ DIGITS THAT MAKE A DIFFERENCE: Starts: 13; Poles: 1; Wins: 0; Top fives: 2; Top 10s: 7; Average start:11.5; Average finish: 11.8; Laps completed: 2,057 of 2,171 (94.7 percent); Laps led: 67; DNFs (1); Fastest laps:83; Laps in top 15: 1,690 (77.8 percent); Laps on lead lap: 1,879 (86.6 percent).

+ HIGHLIGHTS: March 12, Darlington Raceway — Whitt won the pole, his first in only four tries, with a track-recordlap of 173.933 mph. … May 20, Charlotte Motor Speedway — Coming off a career-best second-place finish at Dover,Whitt, still more than a month from his 20th birthday, finished third and became the first rookie and youngest driverto lead the NASCAR Camping World Truck Series points standings.

+ LOWLIGHT: June 10, Texas Motor Speedway … The motor in Whitt’s truck quit with 56 laps to go. Whitt finished28th — a sour ending to what was shaping up to be a promising night. After starting 14th, Whitt had climbed to fourth while avoiding a slew of cautions. He lost the title as the only Truck Series driver complete every lap.

+ POINTS LANDSCAPE: Whitt ranks fifth — 29 points behind leader Johnny Sauter with 12 races remaining. The standings read like this: Sauter (453), Austin Dillon (-4), James Buescher (-20), Timothy Peters (-22) and Whitt. “We’re hanging onto a top-five spot. With everything tightening up we could jump right up there in one race. We just have to go out there and try to win races.”

UP NEXT: Good Sam RV Emergency Road Service 125, Saturday, Aug. 6, Pocono Raceway, Long Pond, Pa.

Check out more candid photos from this event on the official Fuel Doctor Flickr page.

DRIVER: Cole Whitt (No. 60, Turn One Racing)
EVENT: The 17th Annual AAA Insurance 200 NCWTS Race
DATE: Friday, July 29, 2011/Live on SPEED TV at 7:30PM EST
TRACK: Lucas Oil Raceway in Indianapolis (LOR)

July 26, 2011 (Mooresville, NC) There is no one questioning the talent that NASCAR Camping World Truck Series driver Cole Whitt possesses, but everyone is wondering
when this young talent is going to break his streak of bad luck.

Whitt currently sits fourth in the point standings after falling 43 points behind leader Johnny Sauter, after consecutive less-than-stellar performances; some completely out of his control in the last few NCWTS races.

Whitt has been plagued by a few consecutive bad runs. First, with a motor issue, then another driver losing control of their truck and slamming into Whitt, and then struggling with their set ups. These are all things that Whitt is hoping to put behind him beginning this week at LOR, as his #60 Turn One Racing truck will roll off the hauler with a brand new look and primary sponsor Fuel Doctor USA.

“We have been unloading okay,” Said Whitt. “We have good trucks and a good team; we have just had some bad luck lately.” Whitt is hoping that with the new look and changes this week beginning at Lucas Oil Raceway, his luck will shift as well. Whitt and the #60 Turn One Racing team will now have Fuel Doctor USA taking over as primary sponsor of his Chevy truck. Fuel Doctor was previously a primary on Jeffrey Earnhardt’s #1 truck earlier in the year, and has been an associate sponsor on Whitt’s #60 Chevy for the past eight races. However, Fuel Doctor USA has now exchanged places with Red Bull and will remain Whitt’s primary sponsor for the remainder of the 2011 season.

“We know the talent that Cole Whitt has as a driver,” said Mark Soffa, president/CEO of Fuel Doctor USA. “Fuel Doctor is proud to step up our marketing efforts as the primary sponsor of the #60 Fuel Doctor Racing Team and we are looking to have some good runs starting this weekend in Indianapolis. Stacy Compton, owner of the Turn One Racing Team and Jay Frye, from Red Bull Racing have made this an extremely positive experience thus far and it is a pleasure to continue working with them”.

Whitt is excited not just for the Fuel Doctor truck, but for returning to a track in Indianapolis that he refers to as “his old backyard”. “I love coming to Indy,” said Whitt. “I have actually raced a handful of times at this track in my USAC cars so this track is a little more familiar to me than any other track. I love the fact that my family, good friends and people like Chuck Gurney Jr. and John Stanbrough, guys that I worked with and raced against will be there watching. I am hoping to eat at my favorite restaurant Tegry Bistro or maybe get over to one of my favorite spots while I am in town; Kokomo Speedway. I am really looking forward to this weekend. I am appreciative for Fuel Doctor USA becoming my primary sponsor, and look forward to racing the new Fuel Doctor truck and breaking this streak of bad luck.”

IMAGES: Photos for editorial purposes: http://editorial.gettyimages.com or www.fueldoctorusa.com
MEDIA CONTACT: Tanya Hall, Sr. VP of Motorsports at Fuel Doctor USA tanya@fueldoctorusa.com or @ (602) 448-6069

NASCAR launched a program this summer called ‘The Cure for the Common Summer’ where each Tuesday they have both a Truck and Nationwide Series driver come to the HOF to sign autographs, take photos, and play simulator games against fans at the HOF.

Schedule:

1PM Arrival
1 – 1:30PM Race simulators against fans
1:30 – 2:00PM Autograph session
2 – 3PM Media

Rookie Cole Whitt got back to what made him the youngest driver ever to lead the points standings earlier this season: logging laps. After the first eight NASCAR Camping World Truck Series events, the 20-year-old Whitt was the lone driver to complete all 1,301 laps.

His average finish was 8.25 and he ranked second in the standings after being No. 1 two weeks earlier. But in the past two races, Whitt’s Turn One Racing No. 60 lost an engine at Texas and got sideswiped at Kansas. Translation: Only 277 of 320 laps completed for an average finish of 27.0. His points deficit expanded to 23 entering Saturday night’s 175-miler at Iowa Speedway. Whitt finished sixth in the Iowa 200, as driver and crew put together a weekend without major issue when they needed one most.

The No. 60 Red Bull/Fuel Doctor truck was fastest in Friday’s final practice, qualified 14th a day later and spent 99 percent of the laps in the top 15. He restarted 10th coming out of final caution period and slowly picked up four positions in the final 40-lap run. Despite his sixth top 10 of the season, Whitt dropped to third in the standings. He’s 26 points behind leader Johnny Sauter and four behind second-place Austin Dillon.

UP NEXT: Lucas Deep Clean 200, Friday, July 22, Nashville Superspeedway, Lebanon, Tenn.