Stremme, ML Motorsports geared up for Nationwide race in Indy
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Its shop sits just outside of Warsaw on U.S. 30.
The majority of its team members hail from Kosciusko County, while its driver is a South Bend native.
For ML Motorsports and wheel-man David Stremme, Saturday night’s NASCAR Nationwide Series race at Lucas Oil Raceway in Indianapolis is a Hoosier homecoming.
“We prepare the cars with the same care we do for every race, but yeah, we definitely want a good showing and a good finish this week,” said ML Motorsports Team Manager Tony Barnes, a Warsaw Community High School graduate who also serves as the team’s front tire changer during pit stops.
“We’ll have a lot more family at the track this week,” continued Barnes. “Every race is big, but since this is our only race in Indiana, this one is pretty big.”
As of now, it’s also the last time the Nationwide Series will race at the historic short track, where it has made stops every year since the series began in 1982.
The Nationwide Series competed in Indianapolis more than a decade before the Cup Series first ran at Indianapolis Motor Speedway.
Saturday night’s 30th annual Kroger 200 will be special – and bittersweet – as NASCAR announced a few weeks ago the series will begin competing next season at the 2.5-mile oval made famous by the Indianpolis 500.
“It’s bittersweet,” said Barnes. “We all got our start in short-track racing, that’s how the guys on the team got started, that’s what David (Stremme) likes, and this is our home-track.”
ML Motorsports has competed at Lucas Oil Raceway – which was previously known as Indianapolis Raceway Park and then O’Reilly Raceway Park - four times.
The team’s best start and finish was last year with Shelby Howard, when Mary Louise Miller’s No. 70 Chevy started 17th and finished 14th.
Stremme has also competed in four Nationwide Series races at the track, with an average starting position of ninth and an average finish of 12th.
Stremme’s best Nationwide Series effort at the track was in 2005, when he started on the outside of the front row and finished fifth.
Stremme won an ASA race at the track in 2002.
Stremme has competed in one short-track race this season with ML Motorsports, finishing ninth at Richmond International Raceway in just his second time in the No. 70 car after replacing Howard.
“We’re competing against full-blown Cup teams and drivers every time we go to the track,” said Barnes. “We’re getting better at the big tracks, but it’s hard to compete with the teams from Charlotte. They have a lot of resources and technology and they spend a lot of time at the wind tunnel working on their aero packages. At the short tracks, it’s just old-school racing. That’s what we’re comfortable with, and David is a good short-track racer.”
ML Motorsports is the only NASCAR team based in Indiana.
Saturday, the team will fly a state flag from it’s cart on pit road.
The car carries logos of local business like Creative Marketing Concepts, Flexaust, Klotz Lubricants, Noa Noa, Spikes, Stonehenge and Vision It Now.
Team owner Mary Louise Miller has vowed to keep the team in Warsaw, and team president Ed Mullen said the team is “extremely grateful” for the support it has received from local businesses.
“We’re looking forward to racing in Indianapolis this weekend, we consider it our home track,” said Mullen. “It’s important to us at ML Motorsports to stay local and to be a big family. We love this community, and we’re extremely grateful for the support we’ve gotten from this community. We want to be a team and an organization this community and state can be proud of.”
The Warsaw-based team’s car will also display a logo this weekend in memory of fallen Indiana State Trooper Brent Long, who was shot and killed in the line of duty earlier this month in Terre Haute.
