Drivers are counting down the days to the Feb. 2 Cook Out Clash at Bowman Gray Stadium in Winston-Salem, N.C.
But there is one driver making his Cup Series debut in the pre-season event and one could almost see this is a NASCAR version of Disney’s “The Rookie,” except that it’s on wheels and not the baseball diamond.
That 2002 movie that starred Dennis Quaid and chronicled the true story of pitcher Jim Morris, who finally made it to the big leagues at age 35.
Tim Brown is 53 years old and works full-time at RWR as its suspension and drivetrain specialist. He is also the all-time winning driver at Bowman Gray Stadium.
The 53-year-old from Yadkinville, N.C., owns 101 victories, 146 poles and 12 track championships at Bowman Gray (1996, 1997, 1998, 2002, 2004, 2005, 2008, 2009, 2012, 2015, 2021 and 2022).
When he started racing at 19, his goal was to go Cup racing. It took almost 35 years, but he’s finally getting his shot, and Brown will do it in a car that he’ll build while driving for Rick Ware Racing.
Brown spoke to the media via Zoom on Wednesday to introduce himself to some of the media that don’t know him and present his case for “The Rookie” on wheels.
“I’ve worked my whole life to try to be a Cup driver,” Brown said in a news release. “I’m good with working on race cars for a living because it’s still a pretty cool gig, but I always wanted to drive for a living. For Rick Ware and everybody involved here at RWR to give me the chance to go run a Cup race is so humbling and so heartwarming. It’s really cool.”
Ware is the owner of Rick Ware Racing and will field the No. 15 Ford Mustang Dark Horse that Brown will drive in his first career NASCAR Cup Series start. But this isn’t his first time in the “national spotlight” and his first time working with Ware.
Brown’s only NASCAR national-series start came in 2009, also through a partnership with the Ware operation, where he works full-time as a suspension and drivetrain specialist. Brown finished 27th in a Craftsman Truck Series effort at Martinsville Speedway that year.
But before the Cup Series Clash on Sunday, Brown plans to participate in the Madhouse Classic on Feb. 1 (1:45 p.m. ET), a 125-lap Saturday preliminary for the track’s Modified Division.
Racing in the modified race will provide Brown a chance to see the enhancements that have been made to Bowman Gray’s historic layout, including new SAFER barriers that ring the racing surface’s outer perimeter.
“That time in the Modified will be very helpful for multiple reasons,” Brown said. “NASCAR has already done some updates to the stadium with soft walls and things like that. That’s going to change the line of the race track because you make the track smaller. So, the line that we generally run, you won’t be able to run because they run right out against the wall. If the soft walls take up 2-and-a-half or 3 feet, now that’s 3 feet that you can’t let the car drift out to the wall. Just getting some track time before we climb in the Cup car, which I’ve never driven before other than on the chassis dyno, will be very helpful.”
Another bit of life imitating art, Brown will be a part of the NASCAR Cup Series’ return to the track for the first time since 1971, which coincidentally was the year he was born. Just knowing that ranks as a special moment full of anticipation for Brown.
“The guys who race these Cup cars today are elite,” Brown said. “They’re the best drivers in the world, and I’m not even going to put myself in that same category. I’m just going to do the best I can. I want to climb out of that thing at the end of the Clash and see my son and our family with big smiles on their faces and knowing that we did the best we could because, I promise you, I’m going to give it 110 percent. I just want to enjoy the moment, relish it and soak it all in. I’m not going to leave there and say, ‘Hey, I’m a Cup driver now.’ I’m just going to leave there knowing this was the experience of a lifetime.”
Rick Ware Racing has not announced its full Cup Series driver lineup for the 2025 season.
The Feb. 2 exhibition race will be held at 8 p.m. ET, on FOX, MRN Radio and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio.
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