Road course ringer

Road course ringer (or road course specialist) is a term used to describe a non-NASCAR driver who is hired by a NASCAR team to race at a road course (Infineon Raceway, Watkins Glen International, Autodromo Hermanos Rodriguez, or the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve).

"Ringer" is a slang term commonly used in sports to describe a particularly good competitor who is brought in to win in a specific match as opposed to competing in the entire schedule. It can also be used to describe a professional athlete who competes in amateur sports; a softball team might have a "ringer" who used to play minor or major league ball. The term does not relate directly to racing and does not refer to the shape of the race course.

A road course ringer is often brought in when either the normal driver is inexperienced at road courses, or if the driver is having a poor season and the team needs an excellent qualifying run to qualify for the race. Road course ringers have competed in championships which race primarily road courses, frequently in sports car racing series such as the American Le Mans Series or the Rolex Sports Car Series.

Famous road course ringers

For a more complete list of current ringers, click here.
*Ron Fellows
*Boris Said
*Scott Pruett (although he ran the 2000 season full-time, and took wins and poles in open-wheel oval racing)
*Brian Simo
*Robby Gordon (runs series full-time now, has won at both Infineon and Watkins Glen since becoming full-timer, winning at both tracks in 2003)
*Mark Donohue
*Terry Labonte (after retirement in 2004, he has now run the road courses for struggling teams ever since)
*Tommy Kendall
*Dan Gurney

uccess

Dan Gurney won 5 NASCAR races as a ringer, while also succeeding in Formula One. The last win by a road course ringer in a NASCAR Sprint Cup race was by Mark Donohue in 1973 in a Penske Racing AMC Matador in the Motor Trend 500 at Riverside. [Bowles, Tom and Heffelfinger, Toni. [http://www.frontstretch.com/md/616/whats-the-call-road-course-ringers What's the Call? Road Course Ringers] , Frontstretch, June 29, 2005]

Fellows, Said, and Pruett have combined for 12 Top 10 finishes in their 33 career road course starts. Said has the only two poles by a road course ringer: one in the 2003 Dodge/Save Mart 350 at Sears Point Raceway and the other, ironically, a superspeedway pole for the 2006 Pepsi 400 at Daytona International Speedway.

However, the modern-day "ringer" has yet to win a Sprint Cup race. Often, the disadvantage of having the NASCAR race car in itself, with its heavier car, narrower tire, smaller (compared to premium road-racing cars) brakes, (especially with inexperienced drivers) pit stops, and most often longer races (all NASCAR road course races are at least 200 miles/322 kilometers or longer) have hurt the "ringers".

Also see: List of NASCAR drivers whose only wins have come on road courses

References