Sunday, January 3, 2010

Jeff Green

Jeffery Green was born on September 6th of 1962 in Owensboro, Kentucky, which is the same place three time Champion Darrell Waltrip, his brother Michael Waltrip, and Jeremy Mayfield was born and raised; his two older brothers, Mark and David, are also successful NASCAR drivers. He currently resides in Davidson, North Carolina with his wife Michelle.

Jeff started his fruitful career by winning the historic Nashville Speedway track championship in 1990. In the 22 races he entered, he won 15 of them and only finished below 3rd once. After the Nashville schedule was over he entered the Autolite Platinum 200 Busch (Nationwide) series race at Richmond International Raceway. He started 23rd and finished 22nd, John Boatman the team owner was very pleased because his goal was only to qualify. He raced 2 more races that year.

From 1991 to 1994 he raced from time to time in the Busch (Nationwide) series with random car owners, and in 1994 he made 3 Winston (Sprint) cup series races driving for the Sadler brothers and Junior Johnson.

He started driving in the Busch (Nationwide) series full time in 1995 driving for Dale Earnhardt Inc.

In 1996 he made a couple Winston (Sprint) cup starts with DEI.

In 1997 he raced for Diamond Ridge Motorsports in the Busch (Nationwide) series part time in the unsponsored #8; he won his first NASCAR Busch (Nationwide) Series race at the Las Vegas Motor Speedway. He also made 19 Winston (Sprint) cup series starts in the #29 Cartoon Network Chevy, finishing second in the Rookie of the year battle only to his brother David.

Green returned to the Busch (Nationwide) Series full time in 1999, it was the first time he had run a full time season in the Busch (Nationwide) series since 1996. He raced in the #32 Kleenex Chevrolet for Progressive Motorsports, and finished second to Dale Earnhardt Jr. in the points even though he had one DNQ (Did not qualify).

In 2000, his team was changed to be the #10 Nesquick Chevrolet and was renamed PPC racing; his biggest competition in the Busch (Nationwide) series, Dale Earnhardt Jr. and Matt Kenseth left to drive in the Winston (Sprint) cup series so everybody thought he was the only person left to win, which of course happened, he won the championship by 616 points which is the most ever up until 2006, his PPC teammate Jason Keller finished second that year. Him and the 1994 champion David Green are the first brothers to win championships in the Busch (Nationwide) series.

Green participated in the International Race of Champion’s (IROC) 25th season in 2001.

In 2002 he raced his first full time season in the Winston (Sprint) cup series driving the #30 Richard Childress Racing ride with American Online as his sponsor; in this year he finished a career high second, and also a career high 17th in points. Jeff and Mark Green founded The Green Foundation in 2002, a non-profit charity assisting people with severe injuries and life-threatening illnesses.

Jeff’s 2003 season started off as good as it can get, he won the pole for the Daytona 500. At Richmond there was an incident with his teammate and longtime rival Kevin Harvick, which led to Jeff being fired by Richard. Two days after being fired, Dale Earnhardt Inc. asked him to drive the #1 Pennzoil Chevrolet for them; Steve Park, the driver who was replaced by Green started driving Green’s old #30 for RCR. After 12 races Jeff didn’t finish any better than 16th so he was replaced by John Andretti. He missed 3 races before Petty Enterprises picked him up to drive the rest of the season.

Petty Enterprises asked Jeff to drive for them full time in the Winston (Sprint) cup series for the 2004 season and he agreed. He had 11 DNF’s (Did not finish) which is the most in his career, and finished 30th in the points, which was his worst points finish in the Winston (Sprint) Cup series in his career.

He had a very public feud with Michael Waltrip during the 2005 season that some believe led to his being fired at the end of the season. Him and Michael spun each other on several occasions during the season but never got penalized.

At the end of 2005 Petty Enterprises replaced Green with Bobby Labonte, which left him without a ride; Haas CNC Racing hired him to drive the #66 Best Buy Chevy for 2006 with Bootie Barker as his crew chief. He ended up 2006 28th in the points.

Green returned to Haas in 2007, and had three sixth-place finishes but was released with four races to go in the season. He finished 32nd in the points even though he missed those four races.

In 2008, he attempted four Cup races with Wood Brothers Racing and Front Row Motorsports respectively, but did not qualify for any of those races. He did qualify for three races in the Nationwide Series in the #31 Key Motorsports Chevy with a best finish of 28th, and ran eight races with their #40 truck team. His best finish was a seventh at Las Vegas.

In 2009, Green continued his part-time schedule in the Nationwide Series, running for Day Racing, and MacDonald Motorsports. His best finish was 21st at Nashville Superspeedway.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeff_Green_(NASCAR)

http://www.racingone.com/driver.aspx?driverid=142&seriesID=1&subID=2

http://www.edu.pe.ca/sourishigh/Pages/Cmp6-03/Jacob/homepage/index/drivers/bios/green.htm