DAVID RAGAN FINISHES 5TH IN THE DAYTONA 500
David Ragan and the No. 6 AAA Ford Fusion

DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. (February 18, 2006) – David Ragan got off to a rocky start at Daytona International Speedway when a flat right rear tire during the Gatorade 150s sent him spinning into the wall followed by the wreck that took him out of the Busch race after only three laps, but things made a turn for the better during Sunday’s Daytona 500.

Ragan started the race in 43rd position after being forced into his backup car after Thursday’s qualifying race.

Throughout the first half of the 500 mile race he ran in the back of the field, struggling with a tight race car. Crew chief, Jimmy Fennig, ordered that several air pressure adjustments be made to the No. 6 AAA Ford Fusion during the first three pit stops. However, about 20 laps into a green flag run the car would start to get snug again.

Finally on lap 126 Ragan bought the car down pit road under the green flag for four tires, fuel and a wedge adjustment followed by a track bar adjustment on the following stop, 30 laps later. These changes put the No. 6 AAA Ford in great handling condition for the last 40 laps of the race.

On the final stop of the day Ragan entered the pits in 32nd place, The AAA Pit Crew gave him four tires and fuel and sent him back out with a gain of eight positions, putting him in the 24th spot.

From there Ragan battled his way through traffic to the tenth place position then suddenly the leaders began to wreck ahead of him with only three laps to go. The race was going to end with a green, white, checkered finish.

When the green flag dropped once again on lap 200 Ragan fought hard to maintain his ground. He briefly dropped back to 11th place when ahead trouble began to brew once again. Ragan narrowly escaped a wreck that ended up costing several of his fellow competitors and teammates a top finishing spot and that allowed Ragan to take the checkered flag as the fifth place finisher of the Daytona 500 and the top finishing Raybestos Rookie of the race.

“The most important thing for David and this team to accomplish today was to come out and finish every lap of this race,” said Fennig. “David went out there and did his job and the guys here in the pits did their jobs and they all did them well. I am very proud of what we accomplished here and I look forward to doing it a lot more this year.”

“First of all, I have to say thank you to my pit crew and my spotter, Tony Hirschman. You guys are what got me up there in the front and gave me a chance to do some racing,” said Ragan. “Second, I want to thank AAA for being such a wonderful sponsor. The support that they put behind a young driver like myself really makes all the difference in the world.

“We wanted to come here and just finish with the AAA Ford Fusion,” continues Ragan. “A top-five finish is great. We wanted to be the top Raybestos Rookie and want to be one of the top contending Roush cars week in and week out. It’s a pretty special day down here. It’s been an up and down week and that’s an understatement. All in all, it ended up a good day but we’ve still got a lot of hard work ahead. We’ve got to go to California.”

Ragan will compete next in the Auto Club 500 at California Speedway on Sunday February 25th.