HARRISBURG, N.C. — JTG-Daugherty Racing will add a second car in NASCAR’s premier series for the 2017 season, with Chris Buescher set to drive as a teammate to A.J. Allmendinger next year.
The team will lease the charter from Roush Fenway Racing’s No. 16 team, which competed this season with driver Greg Biffle. Biffle left the Roush Fenway organization last week after 19 years with the team.
Buescher will be loaned to JTG-Daugherty under an arrangement with Roush Fenway, after competing this season and making the Chase with Front Row Motorsports while under contract to RFR.
Roush Fenway racing confirmed the lease of the charter in a press release on Tuesday, while JTG-Daugherty Racing co-owner Tad Geschickter released a statement on the team’s social media channels shortly thereafter confirming their plans for 2017 were in motion.
“We can confirm at this time that JTG Daugherty Racing is currently in the process of starting a second team in the NASCAR premier series,” JTG Daugherty Racing co-owner Tad Geschickter said. “We would also like to confirm and welcome Chris Buescher to the team as our driver for the second car. More details will follow.”
Buescher won the NASCAR XFINITY Series championship with Roush Fenway in 2015 before making the jump to the Sprint Cup level this past season with Front Row Motorsports. He won his first-career premier series event in a fog-shortened affair at Pocono Raceway on July 31, making the Chase playoffs as a rookie.
2017 will mark the Prosper, Texas native’s second full-time premier series season with his second different team.
“I can confirm that I have signed to race for JTG Daugherty Racing as they expand to a two-car team in the NASCAR premier series in 2017,” Buescher said. “I’m thankful for the opportunity and look forward to competing for a spot in the Chase.”
JTG-Daugherty Racing began competing in NASCAR in 2009, fielding Australian Marcos Ambrose full-time at the Cup level that year and housing a full-time XFINITY (then Nationwide) team that saw various drivers compete throughout the year.
Ambrose stayed with the team through the end of the 2010 season, at which point former Cup champion Bobby Labonte joined the team for a three-year stretch from 2011 to 2013. Current team driver Allmendinger raced in nine events with the team late in 2013 before taking over the team’s flagship No. 47 car full-time at the start of the 2014 Cup campaign.
Allmendinger, who scored the team’s lone victory at Watkins Glen Int’l in 2014 and made the Chase that year, will return to the No. 47 entry for JTG-Daugherty’s ninth full-time NASCAR premier series season in 2017.
Additional details on the second JTG-Daugherty team, including Buescher’s car number, crew chief and sponsors, are expected to be announced in the near future.
About the Writer
Jacob Seelman is the Managing Editor of Race Chaser Online and creator of the Motorsports Madness radio show, airing at 7 p.m. Eastern every Monday on the Performance Motorsports Network.
Seelman grew up in the sport, watching his grandparents co-own the RaDiUs Motorsports NASCAR Cup Series team in the 1990s.
The 22-year-old is currently studying Broadcast Journalism at Winthrop University in Rock Hill, S.C., and is also serving as both the full-time tour announcer for the Must See Racing Sprint Car Series and the co-track announcer at Millbridge Speedway.
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