2005 SEASON SUMMARY

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NICK JOANIDES HAS STRONG SHOWING AT THE ALL-STAR SHOWDOWN

After running virtually every race more than 2,000 miles from home this season, it took Nick Joanides more than 40,000 miles of round trip travel to compete in the Nascar Autozone Elite Division Midwest Series with a goal (and just about every full time drivers goal in the Elite Division) of earning an invitation to the Toyota All-Star Showdown which ironically is held at his home track, Irwindale Speedway, just 40 miles from his home.

Due to the distance for Nicks EDS Motorsports team which is based in Appleton Wisconsin to Irwindale Speedway, team owner asked Nick if he could make other arrangements for the Showdown. Nick teamed with Gail Chase and Jackson Race Cars to compete in the even. 

Practice began on Thursday and the team showed their strength out of the box, posting lap times in the top 5 in both practice sessions. They followed up their efforts on Friday with another top 5 practice run and were poised for the first preliminary race. Nick started the event in the 5th position and by lap 5 had already charged up to the second position. Once there, leader Greg Pursley had built about a 2 second lead on the field, however Nick was posting the fastest lap times and closing in. A caution flew at lap 15 to bunch up the field. Pursley got a jump on the restart, however as the race settled into it's first long green flag run, Nick's car became loose exiting the corners. Nick managed to hold on to a top 5 finish.

The team headed to main event on Saturday evening with high hopes. Nick started the race in the 10th position and settled in to that position through the first portion of the race when the loose condition developed again. The team pitted several times through the remainder of the event to make adjustments to the car, falling as far back as 36th. With the last third of the race being plagued by several cautions, passing opportunities were limited, but Nick still managed to get back up to the 15th position in the 40 car field. Not what the team had hoped for after being solidly in the top 5 all weekend, but still a solid finish after coming from the rear.

NICK JOANIDES QUALIFIES FOR THE ALL STAR SHOWDOWN

After traveling over 40,000 miles this season to compete in the Nascar Autozone Elite Division Midwest Series, Nick Joanides headed to La Crosse Speedway needing to maintain his 10th place position in the point standings to qualify for the All Star Showdown which is practically in his backyard at Irwindale Speedway, located just 40 miles from his home in Woodland Hills, California.

Nick blew a tire early in practice and the team was not able to get the new tires back from Hoosier in time for him to get back on the track for practice. Having never seen the track before this weekend, expectations for qualifying were low since the team never really got an opportunity to work on the handling of the car in practice. Nick and the team however were pleasantly surprised with a strong 12th place qualifying effort. 

In the first five laps of the race, something in the right front collapsed, causing the car to be extremely tight. From this point, Nick just concentrated on the big picture and raced only the cars he was competing against for the top 10 finish in the standings. While he struggled with the car all night long, Nick did manage a respectable 14th place finish and gained one position in the points to finish 9th in the final point standings. His finish secured his invitation to the Showdown, where he will rejoin Jackson Race Cars, driving a car owned by Gail Chase, combining his 2005 EDS Motorsports Midwest Series team with his 2004 Colorfast Southwest Series team for this event.

NICK JOANIDES TO RUN FINAL TWO EVENTS IN THE WEST SERIES

Nick Joanides and Puskarich Racing are teaming up to run the final two races in the Nascar Grand National West Division at Thunder Hill Raceway and Mesa Marin Raceway. "After a great top-3 at Mesa Marin last year, I really wanted to go back this year and with Nascar's influence, we decided to go ahead and run at Thunder Hill Raceway in Texas as well".

"I love Mesa and although it has not always returned the same love to me, it was very important for me to be a part of the final event ever run there and thanks to Tom Puskarich and his team, I will have the opportunity to do that" Joanides said. FULL STORY

TABLES FINALLY TURN FOR JOANIDES AT KENTUCKY WITH A 4TH PLACE FINISH.

 After a season with great performances, but horrible luck, resulting in no top 10 finishes going into Kentucky, Nick Joanides and his EDS Motorsports team hoped to get on the right track. This time however the tables were completely reversed as it appeared their season was not going to improve at Kentucky Speedway, qualifying just 26th out of 30 cars, nearly three seconds off the pace. This event was a special combination race between the Southeast Series and Midwest series. The Southeast series clearly had the advantage at Kentucky, where restrictor plates are used to slow the cars overall speed. The Midwest series teams had never competed in a restrictor plate race, where as the Southeast series has several restrictor plate events and their experience showed as they took 17 of the top 20 positions in qualifying. Nicks times were just 8/10ths of a second off of the majority of the Midwest series competitors. FULL STORY

As the entire season has gone for Nick Joanides and his EDS Motorsports team, their performance and speed has been solid, but out of the ordinary problems keep preventing the team from getting the finishers they feel they deserve. Milwaukee was no different with a broken wheel being the culprit this time, ruining what was sure to be atleast a top 5 finish. FULL STORY

The team ran old tires in practice and still appeared to be among the top 10 in practice. Nick felt that with new tires being put on for qualifying, that he could pick up 4 or 5 tenths when it came time to qualify which would have challenged for the pole position. NIck drove like we would for a 16.1 second lap, however the car did not agree and resulted in a lap time of 16.504 and 14th place on the grid. On fresh tires, the car ran strong and allowed Nick to move up from his 14th place starting position to as high as 7th by lap 21, however as the tires continued to build heat and pressure, the handling drastically went away. Additionally there were three accidents directly in front of Nick, which Nick had to slow dramatically to avoid and in doing so lost positions each time. The end result is a 13th place lead lap finish. The team will head to the Milwaukee Mile in three weeks and look to finally get their season on track and they look forward to having the opportunity to truly show what both the driver and the entire team are capable doing!

The monkey hanging onto Nick Joanides' back seems to have a firm grip and just doesn't seem to want to let go! Nick and the EDS Motorsports team again were fast in practice, posting the 8th fastest time among 42 competitors, however drew the unlucky #1 spot for qualifying. Being the first car out, Nick got the greasy track with the incompatible Goodyear rubber from the Busch Series cars and while he picked up 3/10th's of a second from practice, the majority of the cars that went out later picked up 6 to 9/10th's, resulting in a disappointing 25th place qualifying run (7th among the Midwest Series competitors). Nick and the team knew the car would be good for the race and it showed. Nick cruised through the first 20 laps of the race, however by lap 42 he had already moved into the top 10 when something broke in the rear end of the car forcing him to ride around well off the pace just to finish the race. Another potential top 5 turns into a disappointing  27th place finish. Being that this was a combination race with the Southwest Series, Nick was credited with 14th place among the Midwest Series cars and still managed to gain one position in the standings to move up to 11th with 5 races to go, just 9 points out of the coveted 10th position which qualifies for the year end All-Star Shootout. The team heads to Mansfield Speedway in Ohio this coming weekend with hopes that the monkey will get lost along the way!

Three races, three missed opportunities. Nick Joanides' Midwest Series career has not gotten off to a good start after three races. Brake failure in the first race took Nick out of third place at Rockford. Overheating took him out of 6th place at Colorado National Speedway, so the team was hoping to turn their luck around and appeared on their way as they had one of the fastest cars in practice and were competing for a top 5 finish when a cut tire forced Nick to pit under green. With the pit area at Raceway Park in Shakopee, Minnesota being outside of the race track, it is impossible to come to the pits without losing multiple laps. By the time Nick made it back to his hauler, got the tire changed and back to the track, he had already lost 7 laps, however Nascar does not allow cars to return to the track under green flag conditions, forcing Nick to wait an additional 7 laps for a caution. Nick still managed a 12th place finish, but a huge disappointment  when the team clearly had one of the fastest cars on the race track. The team hopes their luck will change next week at Pikes Peak International Raceway, which is a one mile superspeedway that Nick has run well at in the past.

Nick Joanides headed to Colorado National Speedway with high hopes due to his past success at the track. In what is one of the biggest events of the season as the race was billed as a mini-shootout as this event combined the best of the Midwest and Southwest Series. The day started off well as the team ran laps in the top 5 in practice, but Nick was still not quite happy with the car. Practice was run early in the morning when the track was still cool. By the time qualifying rolled around several hours later, temperatures had increased nearly 20 degrees and the hot track resulted in a very loose race for Joanides and a 24rd place qualfying effort among nearly 40 competitors at the track. Nick's speed however was 7th fastest among the Midwest series teams in which Nick was competing in. FULL STORY

SOLID DAY GETS ROUGH FOR JOANIDES AT MESA

Nick Joanides, in a team car to Eddie McKean struggled in practice posting only the 20th fastest time. Nick made several changes to the car before qualifying and it paid off as he picked up over 4/10th's of a second with a solid 10th place qualifying effort among 30 competitors. The McKean team showed that both cars were virtually identical as both Nick and Eddie McKean qualified within 3/1000th's of a second of each other with Eddie taking the 11th spot. FULL STORY

Nick Joanides went back to school as he ran his first first ever laps at Rockford Speedway in Illinois, with his new EDS Motorsports team. Nick quickly adapted to his new team and the track and started the race from the outside of the front row. Nick ran solidly in the top 5 through the first 100 laps of the 150 race when his brakes began to fail, forcing him to cruise to the finish, ending up with a 14th place finish. "It's not the finish we had hoped for, but we had a solid top-5 run going until the brakes went out, so I'm happy about the potential I see with this team and how well we ran for our first race together. I was really impressed with how hard this team works, they're a great bunch of guys and I look forward to getting to the next race in Colorado", said Joanides.

As the first race at Phoenix came and went, Nick was convinced he would not have the opportunity to run for a championship, but then David Stammer, owner of the #45 Nascar Autozone Elite Division Midwest Series EDS Motorsports team called and the two came to terms to team up for the entire 2005 Midwest series schedule. Stammer has fielded cars in the series for many years and with rookie drivers the last two years. His team finished in the top 10 in the final standings both years and was a consistent top 5 finisher in 2003. Both hope that their combined experience will lead to a successful campaign in the 2005 season championship chase. FULL STORY Also see Stories at RacingWest.com or Nascar.com or L.A. Daily News

JOANIDES FINISHES 8TH IN FOUR WIDE BATTLE AT TUCSON!

Nick Joanides took another step forward in his pursuit for a top 10 finish in the Southwest Series standings. Just six races ago, Joanides was 20th in the point standings. After his 8th place finish on Sunday at Tucson Raceway Park, he has moved into the 11th position, just 116 points out of 10th. FULL STORY

BLOWN RIGHT FRONT TIRE ENDS GREAT RUN FOR JOANIDES

Nick Joanides and the Puskarich racing team’s day started off well as the car came off the truck fast, posting the 7^th quickest time in the first practice session and improving to 5^th fastest in the second session, both times on old tires while most teams were on new tires. FULL STORY

ON 7 CYLINDERS, JOANIDES HANGS ON FOR A TOP 10 FINISH AT COLORADO.

Nick Joanides had high hopes heading to Colorado National Speedway, a track where he has never finished outside of the top 10. Nick kept that streak alive in the West Series race on Saturday, but it wasn't easy. 

The Puskarich Racing team concentrated on race setup in practice as the cars were being impounded after qualifying, so the teams had to qualify on race setup. Expecting the track to loosen up for the race, the team had the car slightly tight for qualifying and Nick qualified in the 15th position. FULL STORY

JOANIDES WINS POWERADE AWARD AT COLORADO

Nick Joanides and the Colorfast/Jackson Race earned the Powerade Move of the Race Award at Colorado National Speedway for passing the most cars during the race, to improve on what had actually looked to be a great day, then suddenly turned to a horrible day, but resulted in a solid run. FULL STORY

JOANIDES STARTS LAST AND DRIVES TO A 5TH PLACE FINISH AT MADERA.

Going into Madera, Nick Joanides and the Colorfast/Jackson Race Cars Monte Carlo have had they type of season you wouldn't even wish on your worst enemy, having bad luck find them in every conceivable way throughout the season. The team dedicated alot of time to making changes to the car during the off weeks to improve upon their sub-par performances at the last few oval races and in practice it appeared to be paying off as they were among the top 5 cars in practice times. FULL STORY

JOANIDES CHARGES FROM 40th TO 5th, GETS TAKEN OUT WITH 5 TO GO.

Nick Joanides and the Colorfast/Jackson Race Cars Monte Carlo had a nightmare of a weekend at Infineon Raceway. To start, Nascar apparently did not receive the team’s entry for the race and pitted them last in line, therefore instead of being teched in the top 20, they were last of 45 cars and did not complete Thursday’s tech until the next day, putting the team behind in getting out for practice. FULL STORY

2005 Schedule and Results

2004 Season Summary

2003 Season Summary

2002 Season Summary

2001 Season Summary