REAR END GEAR FAILURE RUINS REUTIMANN’S CHANCES AT MARTINSVILLE

Source: Darrell Waltrip Motorsports/J. Romesburg
Date: 10/24/2005

MARTINSVILLE, Va.-- Approaching halfway in the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series event at Martinsville Speedway, a rear end gear problem forced David Reutimann’s No. 17 NTN Bearings Toyota Tundra out of the race resulting in a 34th-place finish.

“The rear end just broke,” said Reutimann. “It’s disappointing because this was by far the best truck I have ever had at Martinsville. Between our test and the changes Jason and the guys made during the race, the truck was great. I was really enjoying myself. It’s a shame we had problems because we would have had a strong finish.”

After starting 18th in the Kroger 200 on Saturday, Reutimann nudged his way into ninth-place before his first pit stop at Lap 55.

“Since we didn’t qualify up front, we didn’t have the greatest pit selection,” said Reutimann. “We had a good pit stop, but we got boxed in a little bit by another truck and lost some positions. We weren’t concerned because we were confident the truck was really good. I knew the changes were only going to make it better. We started back up through the field and the truck was getting better the longer we went.”

Reutimann was riding around in 12th-place at Lap 90. Five laps later, Reutimann radioed crew chief Jason Overstreet that he had a problem with either the rear end gear or transmission. Reutimann entered pit road for the Darrell Waltrip Motorsports team to determine what went wrong.

“Something happened in the rear end,” said Reutimann. “We didn’t hit anything. Something just broke. When the rear end broke, it contaminated everything; all the cooling lines. All that stuff had to be changed out. Laps go by so quick at Martinsville. It got to the point where we weren’t going to gain anything by going back out. We plan on taking the same truck to Phoenix so there was no sense in taking the chance of destroying it.”

Reutimann is now 11th in the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series points standings with four races remaining.

“We’re approaching some tracks that we are really strong at and I see us easily getting back into the top-10 in points,” said Reutimann, who is 12 points from tenth-place. “We had a really good test at Texas and we learned some things that we can transfer over to Atlanta. We ran well at Phoenix last year until we had a flat tire right at the end. We started from the pole at Homestead and finished fourth. We’ve been farther back than this in the points and clawed our way back up.”

The NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series returns to Atlanta Motor Speedway next weekend. Live race coverage of the EasyCare Vehicle Service Contracts 200 on Saturday, October 29th begins at 3 p.m. Eastern live on SPEED Channel. MRN Radio will broadcast the event.

ABOUT NTN

NTN, headquartered in Osaka, Japan, is one of the world's largest producers of ball and roller bearings. With manufacturing plants throughout the world, NTN is a leading bearing supplier to both the industrial and automotive markets. In addition to bearings of all sizes and types, NTN is also one of the largest producers of constant velocity joints for automotive front-wheel and four-wheel drive applications. Over 70% of the bearings sold by NTN in North America are manufactured by one of the seven manufacturing plants the company operates in the USA and Canada. Founded in 1918, NTN has long been recognized for the most stringent quality standards in the industry and counts some of the most recognized automotive and industrial brand names as its customers. NTN employs more than 13,000 dedicated people throughout the World and is traded on the Tokyo stock exchange. For more information on NTN, please visit the company's website at www. ntnamerica. com or www. ntn. ca.

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