The Greatest Driver To Never Wear The Crown

history of Roush racing

Jack Roush initially formed Jack Roush Performance Engineering in in 1976. That company went on to continue building engines for other teams throughout the early 1980s, then in 1984 Roush returned to racing in the Sports Car Club of America (SCCA) and International Motor Sports Association (IMSA) road racing series’. He went on to claim 24 national championships and titles in the two series, including 12 manufacturer’s championships, winning 119 races, while working with acclaimed drivers such as Tommy Kendall, Scott Pruett and Willy T. Ribbs. Roush also captured 10 consecutive sedan-class championships at the prestigious 24 Hours of Daytona, teaming with drivers such as Kendall, Pruett, Mark Martin, Bill Elliott, Ricky Rudd and Kyle Petty, as well as actor Paul Newman and Olympic star Bruce Jenner.

In 1988, Roush launched his first NASCAR Cup Series team with driver Mark Martin. In October 1989, Roush and Martin claimed their first NASCAR Cup Series victory at North Carolina Motor Speedway. From there the two would go on to form one of the most successful partnerships in NASCAR history. Martin, who won 35 NASCAR Cup Series races with Roush, was inducted into the NASCAR Hall of Fame in January 2017.
(Credit) Taken from the RFK website

History of Chassis 51

Chassis 51 was run by mark martin during the 98 season, one of the best seasons in NASCAR history against the eventual champion Jeff Gordon and Mark Martin who combined accounted for 20 of the 33 wins, gordon with 11, mark with 7. Chassis 51 brought home 4 victories, and most notably the first race win at Las Vegas ever, and the first victory for the new Taurus body that was implemented for the 98 season. It ran a total of 10 races with mark in 98, and was runner up to jeff multiple times, including the brickyard 400, which this scheme is from. The last thing done to the car was testing for the 2000 body in 1999, and then its sat for 20 years until Landon Best stumbled onto the car in 2020. Landon knew Mark and sent him a picture of the chassis tag on the dash, and once he learned that it was a car mark ran, he instantly bought it. I'll link a video where they go fully in-depth with the history of chassis 51, and the story of how Landon Best found the car, and Mark Driving it at Las Vegas one more time.
Stapleton42: Mark Martin Drives his Favorite car again! Reunited with Legendary Roust racing chassis "jr51"

This car at indy in 1998

History of Mark Martin

He came incredibly close to that elusive title many times—finishing second in the championship standings five times. In 1990, Martin finished 26 points behind NASCAR Hall of Famer Dale Earnhardt, his closest run at the championship.

He set career highs for wins (seven), top-five finishes (22) and laps led (1,730) in 1998 but was left with another second-place finish, this time to Jeff Gordon. He also finished second in 1994, 2002 and 2009. Over the course of his 31-year NASCAR premier series career, Martin compiled 40 wins (17th all-time) and 61 runner-up finishes (sixth all-time) in 882 starts (fifth all-time). His 56 career poles rank seventh on the all-time list. Martin won 49 times in what is now the NASCAR Xfinity Series, holding the series wins record for 14 years.

He retired with 96 wins across NASCAR’s three national series, seventh on the all-time list. In 1998, Martin was named one of NASCAR’s 50 Greatest Drivers.
(Credit) taken from the NASCAR hall of fame website

Mark Martin with Chassis 51 at the 2022 Last Vegas 400 about to take one more lap around the track, 24 years after his victory in 1998

Controls

Pitch and roll movement
No special controls or ag groups

Builders Note: after watching the video above about mark martins chassis 51 I wanted to recreate it in sp. I took the body off my 2001 monte carlo and replaced it with this body of the 98 taraus. I couldn't find reliable blueprints for the 98 body so most of it was built by eye, so there may be slight errors in the actual build. Overall the car is as close as i could get it to the real car, and really like how it came out. Unfortunately couldn't get the whole livery as it would have taken up so many more parts that i couldn't add, as well as they interior beening very bare bones. Regardless of that its a good model, and mobile friendly enough to be run around easily. It has no special aero so it should handle the gold prix race track just fine. Enjoy driving a piece of history!

Thanks to Musraskrois for testing and feedback!

keep looking to the stars