2006 Season
2006 was the third year for Lucky Dog Racing and once again marked new and exciting changes for the league. Near the end of 2005, the Council conducted an online meeting where they would meet and discuss changes for 2006. From that meeting, a few changes were implemented for the 2006 season. The biggest change was the removal of the Superstar driver. It was agreed that there was too much importance placed on the superstar driver and that it took something away from the 5 normal drivers. A player could get lucky in a race and pick the race winner as his superstar and the rest of his picks would be mediocre. The result was that he could often steal a win or at least a top 5 finish. Therefore, the superstar driver option was dropped.
The only other rule change this year was a change to the scoring of the top 10 drivers. The two previous years had a decrease in points in each of the top 5 positions, while the rest of the top 10 were all the same value. It as voted that the entire top 10 would degrade 5 points each position except for 10 points between 1st and 2nd place. That gave more points to the race winner as well.
A yearly membership fee didn't cause too much friction in the Cup league, nearly all members returned. Only 5 teams that ended 2005 chose not to return for the following season for other various reasons. They were replaced by new Busch members that signed up early in the off-season. Long time members from season one, Ron Racing and Dodge Boys Racing decided not to return. Also Fast Eddie Racing, who raced the entire 2005 season also decided to leave during the off-season.
Just like last year, a lot more players were signing up for the league. However, since the Cup league had been full for a year now, the Busch league was getting all the attention. In 2005 the Busch league ended with 23 members. The 2006 season started with 43 members. Like the Cup league in 2005, the league was forced to implement a cap on the Busch Series as well. Since the Busch series takes less work to run than the Cup Series, there could be a few more teams added than the standard 43. The President decided on a maximum of 54 members but preferred to operate it at 43. Luckily enough, no teams were totally shut out of Lucky Dog Racing for the start of the season.
Finally after a long off-season, Speedweeks at Daytona had arrived. Like last year, the league would run the Budweiser Shootout as a pre-season exhibition race. One of the league's new rookie teams, DixieLee won the non points race.
Beginning new in 2006 was the first race of a 4 race season for the LROC Series. The LROC Series was a showdown between Lucky Dog Racing and The Cool Pool. 6 members from each series would be eligible to take place in the series based on their performances in both leagues. The first race took place on Feb. 17, 2006. The Cool Pool's Robert Lambert won the race and Lucky Dog Racing took an early lead in the overall points between the two leagues.
The very next day, one of the many new Busch rookies, Sullivan Smashers, won the first Busch race of the season.
Finally the big race had arrived, the Daytona 500. This year the President decided to place Daytona 500 trophies on each winner's page since it was the biggest race of the year. Also new, was the addition of 5 bonus points going to each of the Gatorade Duel winners. Jimmie Johnson won his first Daytona 500 while Lucky Dog's 2005 rookie of the year, Pappy's Drivers, took the league win. Jeffjoeracing, who won the best of the rest award in 2005, won the 2nd race of the season at California. Little did the league know this would be the start of a great season for the team.
After the early week off, Galaxy Inc. won his 2nd (and eventually final) career race in Vegas. Jeffjoeracing won again the following week in Atlanta. Just four weeks into the season, and Jeffjoeracing had won half the races. Newcomer Riney Enterprises won in Bristol which would be the final race before the 2006 owner points went into effect. After the salary re-alignment, Jerry Jones Racing won his 7th and eventually final race at Martinsville.
Texas provided the 2nd LROC race of the season and once again a Cool Pool member won. This time it was Stephen Miller taking the win. The Cool Pool also took over in league points and would never look back after that.
Texas also provided West Coast Racing, Inc. his first Cup win after going winless in 2005. Jeffjoeracing picked up his third win of the season at Phoenix, who by then had a nice lead going in the standings. Zipperhead Racing won his 2nd career race at Talladega which marked the end of the first segment of the money pit. The money pit was broken into 4 segments this year unlike only two the previous year. Intimidator Racing won the first segment for a payout of $105.00.
Greenhouse Racing won in Richmond and the 2005 Champion, Miller Motorsports finally won his first career race at Darlington after going winless in his champion season. We also had our first team leave during the season here. ChromeCrow Racing decided to depart for reasons unknown, and the highest Busch Team was called up, which happened to be Greg Miller's brother, Stephen, who headed Home Depot Racing.
The 3rd Lucky Dog All-Star Challenge took place the following week. No big changes were made to the format since it had worked just fine the previous year. What was added this year was a separate stats and standings page that would track all the teams that had raced in previous years. Just like 2005, when Denton Wolves came up from the Lucky Dog Open to win the race, the same thing happened this year. Lefflerfan had not yet won a Cup race, but smoked everyone in the all star field. He set a new record by scoring 230 points. This was also the first race when a few teams actually were able to correctly guess the race winner. Miller Motorsports won the All Star Cash Challenge.
The following week, Intimidator Racing finally won his third career a race, after going winless in 2005. The President's team was not able to make the All-Star field by just one race, but the win guaranteed him a spot in next year�s field.
After Lowe's, the salaries were re-aligned again and Jeffjoeracing won his 4th race of the year at Dover. CrazyAboutRusty2 won in Pocono, and Trapt Racing, who had not won a race since the league's very first race, won in Michigan. The next three races were won by Gasitnpassit, NASCAR Fan Racing, Inc. and Shawnda's Redneck Racing. The 2nd segment of the money pit came to an end and was won by Pappy's Drivers.
During those three races, the 3rd race of the LROC Series was run at Daytona. One of the members of Lucky Dog Racing failed to submit their picks which severely crippled any chance the league would have at beating the Cool Pool. Four Cool Pool members occupied the first 4 spots of the race, led by Nathan Helton. Not too long after this race a new rule was created that would protect a league if a member did not submit their picks. The lowest score or scores would be dropped from the opposing league to make sure that there would be an equal amount of teams on both sides.
New Hampshire saw a win by Helton Motorsports and Jeffjoeracing's 5th win of the season at Pocono. Jeffjoeracing had now tied High Octane's record set last year of most wins in a season. Unfortunately that would also be the final win of the season and the team had to settle for just tying the record for now.
After the next salary re-alignment, Oceanside Racing won for the third time, giving Gwen Demian a win in each season. Gasitnpassit won at Watkins Glen, which would eventually be his last career win. Warpigs won in Michigan while DixieLee, who won the pre-season Bud Shootout, finally won her first official race in Bristol
The Chase for the championship was drawing close with just two races remaining. There were many teams still eligible for the chase but the points were so tight that anyone could be back in it or way out of it with each race. Jeffjoeracing was still leading the standings and many teams down near the cutoff were praying that he would falter.
Jeff Burton Racing and June Bug Racing won the next two races. At the conclusion of the Richmond race, we found out that 17 teams would be making the chase this year, 6 more than last year.
After the chase began, controversy erupted within the league when it appeared that the President�s picks were switched after the start of qualifying. The pole-sitter was not changed, but one of the D class drivers was changed to allow for the new salary structure. The switch was made shortly before qualifying but not revealed on the board until 45 minutes into qualifying. A few members called foul on the matter including Jerry Jones Racing, the Vice President. The council voted on the matter and the majority agreed that there would be no penalty since it was decided that picks were in before qualifying. It was also agreed that the President would start submitting his picks to a council member to avoid this from happening again. Unfortunately there were still heated discussions on the board and eventually Jerry Jones Racing felt like he should leave the league. This would only be the beginning of some dark weeks for the league. JG24BD was brought up from the Busch series to replace JJR.
Home Depot Racing won the first race of the chase. Jeffjoeracing, who had led the standings for most of the year, finished 15th at New Hampshire and fell to 4th place in the standings. High Octane took the lead in the standings, but it wouldn't last very long. Speed Demon Racing won the next two races in the chase and jumped to the top of the standings after Kansas. Unfortunately he would only sit on top for one week since he would struggle the rest of the chase. Syracuse Alpine Racing won at Talladega which pushed her up to the top of the non-chase teams. She would eventually sit there for the rest of the year.
Jeff Burton Racing took the win at Lowe's Motor Speedway for the third of his career. By then, Miller Motorsports moved up to the top of the standings, where he would sit comfortably for the rest of the year. Suezbele Racing finally scored a long time 2nd win in Martinsville.
The final race of the LROC season took place at Atlanta. Just like before, another Cool Pooler won again, this time it was Greg Miller, the owner of the league. The Cool Pool cruised to an easy win over Lucky Dog Racing who never could get going during the season. The league was short two players this time around. High Octane chose not to send his picks in for the 2nd race and Jerry Jones Racing was out of the league. Also at Atlanta, Warpigs won the Cup race there, his 2nd of the season.
During the chase a couple more teams would leave due to the controversies that were still going on. Gasitnpassit and Galaxy Inc. soon exited as well.
The final few races of the season left just a few teams alive in the championship. Miller Motorsports had the lead over Jeffjoeracing, Bump And Go Racing in third place after a couple of nice finishes in Atlanta and Texas while Moonshiner Racing was in a distant 4th place. Texas gave West Coast Racing, Inc. his 2nd win of the season. Phoenix provided a shake-up in the top 4 spots after Moonshiner Racing won his first career race there. Moonshiner Racing moved past Bump And Go Racing to stay alive for the championship in third place. Going into Homestead, only the top three teams were still left in contention.
The final race of the season was a nail-biter for both Miller Motorsports and Jeffjoeracing. Moonshiner Racing was still alive in the championship hunt, but was behind by quite a bit. If Miller Motorsports had a poor race, any of the two teams could beat him for the championship. It turned out that the team did struggle in the final race, but luckily for Greg, both Jeffjoeracing and Moonshiner Racing finished behind him. A 28th place finish was good enough for Miller Motorsports to win his 2nd championship in a row. He set a new record by becoming the first team to win two championships and to do it in consecutive years. Greg won the championship fund and would also receive a real trophy this year as well.
DixieLee beat Helton Motorsports to win rookie of the year while Syracuse Alpine Racing took the best of the rest award for highest non-chase team. Miller Motorsports also won the Heatseeker Award for most points scored on the Power Gauge. Jeffjoeracing did not win the championship, but the league in many other categories . The team had the best avg. Standings points, race points, average finish and best picks average. Warpigs picked the most race winners during the season at 18, tying the record held by Gasitnpassit and Bump And Go Racing. Jeffjoeracing picked the most top 5 drivers in the year at 48, setting a new record. Diego MotorWorks picked the most top 10 drivers at 37, coming just one shy of Diego MotorWorks record. Bump And Go Racing set new records of most lap leaders during the season at 92 and drivers leading the most laps at 18. Intimidator Racing picked the most poles again this year, but at a much lower record than past years with just 13 pole-sitters picked.
Late in the season it was announced that the league would be starting a new truck series league in 2007. Since the Busch Series had become popular, Lucky Dog Racing would need to expand yet again for the following year. The future looks bright for the league as they look for new and exciting things in their fourth year of operation.
2006 Teams at the End of the Season
Click on each team to see their 2006 league stats
Listed in order of sign-up date
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These are the teams that left us after the 2005 season or at some point during the 2006 season.
Defunct 2006 Teams
Team Name |
Driver |
# |
Sponsor |
Starts |
ChromeCrow Racing |
Tony Cromer |
#320 |
Auto Zone |
10 |
Dodge Boys Racing |
Kenneth Fitz |
#106 |
Pepsi |
65 |
Fast Eddie Racing |
Ed Sonius |
#247 |
Mug Rootbeer |
36 |
Galaxy Incorporated |
John K. |
#269 |
Mrs. T's Pierogies |
69 |
Gasitnpassit |
Mark Walraven |
#266 |
Margaritaville Cafe |
69 |
Jerry Jones Racing |
Shawn Jackson |
#105 |
Dallas Cowboys |
94 |
Labonte Motorsports |
Thomas Brownie |
#213 |
Twinkees |
11 |
Puma |
Dan Jackson |
#221 |
Northwest Airlines |
11 |
Racingfan8 |
Merline Glenn |
#381 |
Hershey Kisses |
28 |
Rock Bottom Racing |
Ryan Jackson |
#145 |
The Athelete's Foot |
78 |
Ron Racing |
Ron Cyphers |
#122 |
WalMart |
67 |
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2006 Race Results
Click on the race to see the results
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