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NASCAR Sprint-Cup Series
CUP: Keselowski’s Fire Can Lift Him And Series
Brad Keselowski will be campaigning his first full NASCAR Sprint Cup Series season in 2010...
Mike Hembree  |  Posted January 19, 2010   Concord, NC
Brad Keselowski will compete in his first full NASCAR Sprint Cup Series season in 2010 as driver of the No. 12 Penske Racing Dodge. (Photo: LAT Photographic)
Brad Keselowski could turn Sprint Cup racing on its head. He’s already turned Carl Edwards on his.

Few drivers have come into the sport in recent years carrying as much promise for spunk and fire as Keselowski, who moves into a full-time Sprint Cup ride with Penske Racing this season. Keselowski tends to put his money – and his bumper – where his mouth is, and he seldom backs away from confrontation.

He could be a big part of the stimulus NASCAR needs to recharge the competitive landscape at its top level.

Keselowski stamped his name on the 2009 season by racing for the high ground with Carl Edwards in the closing moments of last spring’s race at Talladega Superspeedway, producing the now-famous finish that won the race for Keselowski and sent Edwards’ car flipping into the grandstand fence.

Much has happened since then. Keselowski engaged Denny Hamlin in an ongoing on-track, off-track feud that was at once tense and comical, and Keselowski left a potentially lucrative future with the JR Motorsports/Hendrick Motorsports hybrid to jump to Penske, where he is expected to stir the waters.

Has he always been the sort of guy who upsets apple carts and pushes foes to the sidewalk?

“That depends on whether you’ve talked to my middle school principal or not,” said Keselowski, declining to provide a name. “I got in a fair amount of trouble. I was always a fighter. I don’t know if I kicked ass, but I was always involved in some scuffles.

“There’s always been a part of me that when I get in that competitive mood it just elevates the personality to where, for lack of a better word, you just don’t take no s---. That’s where I feel like I’m at.

“I feel like I have a pretty good tolerance when I’m out of the car. When I get in it, I’m a little mean sometimes. But that’s what’s fun to me. It brings out that edginess and that drive. That’s why I love racing. It has that ability to pull that out of me.”

Keselowski seems to relish his quick-draw reputation.

“I think you can be anything you want to be as long as you’re willing to pay the consequences,” he said. “And from what I’ve seen from the team, they don’t mind that as long as you’re not being a jerk about it. It’s one thing to race hard, and it’s another thing to get out of the car and piss everybody off on the team, which I don’t feel like I do. I’m not going to say I haven’t had verbal diarrhea every once in a while. As far as the team and its relationship, I feel like we’re all pretty supportive of each other. I think my team enjoys seeing the aggression on the track.”

Keselowski, 25, grew up in a racing family. His father, Bob, and his uncle, Ron, raced, and Brad – when not involved in schoolyard fisticuffs – jumped into the fray as a teenager. He won early and often on short tracks but eventually ran into the difficult task of finding equipment to match his talent as he tried to advance.

“When I first started my racing career, I won my first race,” he said. “I had the same confidence I have now. And I got into a period where the money ran out. Where do you go from there? I started to take the underfunded rides, the ones where you never had a shot at winning, not a chance in hell. That took that part of me out. It took that confidence and enthusiasm away, and I lost that for three or four years. That changed me as a person.

“Once I started winning again, I’ve almost returned to myself. Finally got my confidence back and some swagger in myself. I feel with confidence I can do anything in these race cars. With a team like Penske, the sky’s the limit.”

Beginning next month, the Sprint Cup world finds out how fast Keselowski can turn that confidence and fire into solid results.

Barrett-Jackson Scottsdale: Jan 19th-24th
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