The Canadian will be driving a Cup car from Bill Davis Racing Jacques Villeneuve, the 1997 Formula 1 champion and former Indy 500 winner, has brought the scheduled date of his first Nextel Cup attempt five weeks forward, following an impressive test at Talladega. Villeneuve, who qualified seventh and finished 21st in his NASCAR debut at Las Vegas last week in the Craftsman Truck Series, had originally planned to enter just the ARCA and Truck races at Talladega on October 7. He will now attempt to put a Bill Davis Racing Toyota on the Nextel Cup grid. Talking to the reporter of the Journal de Montreal, Villeneuve said, "I'm really happy that NASCAR has given me its approval so quickly. It's perfect. Having run Talladega with the Cup drivers, I'm really looking forward to it. It's a huge step in my learning process. However, the car is not automatically qualified, so putting it on the grid will be our first target. We should be okay. Driving is not very challenging at Talledega. You simply plant your foot down and hope the car is quick enough. The testing we did there prove that the car is quick, so we should make the cut in qualifying." "Villeneuve's BDR crew chief "Slugger" Labbe believes the Canadian can make the Nextel Cup field at the Alabama superspeedway. "Jacques ran a lot of laps in the Car of Tomorrow test at Talladega, he ran well in the draft, he earned a lot of respect, and he didn't make anybody mad," he said. "It's really neat that he's been approved so quick. Everybody at the shop is so fired up, we can't wait to go to Talladega next week."
Jacques Villeneuve to race in the NASCAR Nextel Cup