Musgrave, No. 9 Team ASE Toyota Finish 16th at Mansfield

Musgrave Disappointed with 16th Place Finish in Mansfield; Remains Second in Championship Standings Mansfield, Ohio (May 29, 2006)  Ted Musgrave's streak of top-four finishes came to a disappointing end when the defending series champion registered a 16th-place finish in the No. 9 Team ASE Toyota in the City of Mansfield 250 NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series race Saturday afternoon at Mansfield Motorsports Speedway.  Musgrave shared the front row with Germain Racing teammate Todd Bodine, and followed Bodine for the first 117 laps before taking over the lead for two laps on an exchange of caution flag pit stops.  Once back on track, Musgrave was trapped in heavy race traffic and thanks to a series-record 18 caution flags he never had a chance to regain the lost track position.

"Once we were back in traffic it was tough because this is such a difficult place to pass," Musgrave said.  "There were so many cautions that we couldn't get any green flag laps put together to get past any of the guys in front of us.  The tire compound was so hard that you pretty much just rode around and hoped people in front of you made a mistake."

Even with the disappointing finish, Musgrave continues to ride second in the series championship standings, now 20 points behind Bodine.  Musgrave is 86 points ahead of third-place David Reutimann.

"It's disappointing to come away with our first finish outside the top five after such a strong start to the season," Musgrave said, "Especially after we had such a strong truck here to start.  The guys put together a great truck and we were able to pull away from the guys behind us whenever we were able to get some green flag laps early on.  It was all about track position at the end, and there were some teams that pitted a lot earlier than we thought they would.  Todd finished right there with us, so we didn't lose anything to him and it's still Germain Racing one-two at the front."

Musgrave and the No. 9 Team ASE Toyota return action at Dover International Speedway on June 2 in the AAA Insurance 200 on the one-mile concrete oval.  Musgrave is a former winner at Dover, going to victory lane in 2002.  Practice and qualifying for the eighth race of the 2006 NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series is set for Thursday June 1, while the 200-mile race is slated for Friday June 2 at 4:30 P.M. Eastern.  Speed Channel will have live coverage of the event, with the radio call on selected Motor Racing Network affiliates nationwide.  TruckSeries.com will have complete event coverage, including practice, qualifying, and race updates at www.truckseries.com.

What is Team ASE? In the early days of racing, the driver was often recognized as the main reason for a team's success. Recently, the crew chief and crew have been acknowledged as equally important in creating a winning situation for every race team. A parallel exists between racing and the automotive service industry. Similar to the way a crew chief and crew must deliver a satisfactory product to the driver in order to win the race, an employer and the technicians in a service and repair shop must satisfy the needs of their customer in order to create return business. But what makes TEAM ASE most unique is the level of commitment from our certified technicians involved in the program - both on and off the track. Being competitive on the race track is important to TEAM ASE because ASE is itself a standard of excellence. However, TEAM ASE's success in motorsports is not solely measured by pole position, top-five finishes or by slapping hundreds of decals on racecars. There is much more to the TEAM ASE program. http://www.ase.com - http://www.germainracing.com