Honoring Boston Victims

KANSAS CITY, KS - APRIL 19: Martin Truex Jr., driver of the #56 NAPA Auto Parts Toyota, drives through the garge area during practice for the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series STP 400 at Kansas Speedway on April 19, 2013 in Kansas City, Kansas. (Photo by Jerry Markland/Getty Images)
KANSAS CITY, KS - APRIL 19:  Martin Truex Jr., driver of the #56 NAPA Auto Parts Toyota, drives through the garge area during practice for the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series STP 400 at Kansas Speedway on April 19, 2013 in Kansas City, Kansas.  (Photo by Jerry Markland/Getty Images)
KANSAS CITY, KS – APRIL 19: Martin Truex Jr., driver of the #56 NAPA Auto Parts Toyota, drives through the garge area during practice for the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series STP 400 at Kansas Speedway on April 19, 2013 in Kansas City, Kansas. (Photo by Jerry Markland/Getty Images)

KANSAS CITY, Kan. — The numbers on Michael Waltrip Racing’s three NASCAR Sprint Cup cars will have a specific, distinctive look this weekend. They will present themselves as bib numbers from a marathon.

Team owner Michael Waltrip has competed in the Boston Marathon, and he and his drivers are honoring the victims of Monday’s bombing at the historic race with the special number schemes.

“I’m very proud to be running the bib numbers on our race cars this weekend,” MWR driver Martin Truex Jr. said Friday morning after a tree-planting ceremony at Legends Toyota near Kansas Speedway. “Obviously, the whole deal, when we heard about it, it hit Michael really close to home, because he’s run in the marathon before. He understands what it’s like to put all the work in, the effort in to be a part of that event.

“It was obviously a huge honor for all those people to be a part of, and then, getting ready to cross the finish line and realize their goal and be proud of something, somebody had to take that away from them and hurt a bunch of people. It’s sick. We’re very proud to have those numbers on the race cars this weekend. We’re all thinking about all the folks from Boston that were affected — everybody that ran in it, everybody that watched and was around the area, everybody that was affected by it. Hopefully, we can do a little bit to help them out and let them know we’re thinking of them.”

Greg Engle
About Greg Engle 7421 Articles
Greg is a published award winning sportswriter who spent 23 years combined active and active reserve military service, much of that in and around the Special Operations community. Greg is the author of "The Nuts and Bolts of NASCAR: The Definitive Viewers' Guide to Big-Time Stock Car Auto Racing" and has been published in major publications across the country including the Los Angeles Times, the Cleveland Plain Dealer and the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. He was also a contributor to Chicken Soup for the NASCAR Soul, published in 2010, and the Christmas edition in 2016. He wrote as the NASCAR, Formula 1, Auto Reviews and National Veterans Affairs Examiner for Examiner.com and has appeared on Fox News. He holds a BS degree in communications, a Masters degree in psychology and is currently a PhD candidate majoring in psychology. He is currently the weekend Motorsports Editor for Autoweek.