Team Menard
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Team Menard was an auto racing team in the Indianapolis 500 and Indy Racing League owned by John Menard. From 1991 to 1996 they modified their own Buick V6 engines for racing. This combination won pole for the 500 with Scott Brayton in 1995 and 1996 and Tony Stewart used this combination for the first part of his 1996-1997 IRL Championship. With more stringent regulations, the team continued to shine winning the 1999 Championship with Greg Ray. However, with the influx of former CART teams to the IRL in the early 2000's, Team Menard struggled to compete and merged his team in 2004 with Panther Racing, although their car continued to carry Menard colors and be driven firstly by Mark Taylor, who was then replaced by Townsend Bell. In 2005, Menard was an associate sponsor for another team and the former Menard #2 car driven by Tomas Enge carried no identification to its Menard lineage. For 2006, the #2 car was dropped by Panther and all vestiges of the once dominant Team Menard lineage disappeared.
The Menards sponsored cars in NASCAR of Paul Menard, Matt Crafton, and Dale Earnhardt, Jr. currently use the "Team Menard" name in some sponsorship-related materials and TeamMenard.com is a portal to information on these drivers and their sponsor, however, Team Menard is not the name of any of their race teams and none of those cars are owned by John Menard.
[edit] Drivers who have driven for Team Menard
Townsend Bell (2004)- Gary Bettenhausen (1990-1993)
Raul Boesel (2002)
Geoff Brabham (1993-1994)- Scott Brayton (1994-1996)
- Robbie Buhl (1997-1998)
- Eddie Cheever (1993, 1994, 1996)
- Kevin Cogan (1991)
Jim Crawford (1990)- Wally Dallenbach, Jr. (1987)
- Mark Dismore (1996-1997)
- Robby Gordon (1999-2000, 2002)
- Richie Hearn (2003)
- Herm Johnson (1980-1982, 1984, 1986)
- Steve Kinser (1997)
- Buddy Lazier (1995)
- Jaques Lazier (2001-2003)
Arie Luyendyk (1995)- Vitor Meira (2002-2003)
- Danny Ongais (1996)
- Nelson Piquet (1993)
- Greg Ray (1999-2001)
- Tom Sneva (1991-1992)
- Tony Stewart (1996-1998)
- Mark Taylor (2004)
- Al Unser (1992)
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