Tomorrow night at Charlotte Motor Speedway, Travis Pastrana will hit the track for the first event in his new Red Bull Racing Dodge Dart Rally Car.  Pastrana and the new Dart rally car will compete with 15 other drivers including rally racing superstars like Tanner Foust, Brian Deegan, Rhys Millen and Ken Block.

This is a big weekend for both the new Dodge Dart rally team but also Global Rally Cross racing association.  Rally racing has more of a "cult following" but with the GRC guys running at Charlotte Motor Speedway right after the NASCAR Nationwide Series History 300, there could be thousands of prospective new fans in the crowd.  NASCAR is the biggest motorsport in the US and we can expect the stands to be packed with fans with the high-flying rally cars take to the track Saturday night.

The Chrysler Group has announced that for the rest of the month of May 2012, qualified customers who want to purchase a new Chrysler Dodge, Jeep, Ram or Fiat brand vehicle with financing from Ally Financial or Chase Auto Finance can do so with no payments for 90 days.  This means that if you buy a new Chrysler Group vehicle in the next 8 days, you will not have to make a payment until the end of August.

Additionally, the Chrysler Group has announced a new Military Appreciation Bonus Consumer Cash program where active military, active military reserve, retired military, and retired military reserve can get an extra$500 off of their new Chrysler, Dodge, Ram, Jeep or Fiat product in addition to the $500 "military cash" typically offered.  In other words, active or retired (honorably discharged) members of the US military who can prevent proof of their service will get a cool grand off of their new Chrysler Group vehicle.

Jacques Villeneuve, who has obtained open wheel glory in winning multiple championships in the CART and Formula One world will run two races later this year for Penske Racing in the #22 Discount Tire Dodge Challenger.  Villeneuve, who is somewhat of a road-race specialist, will compete in the NASCAR Nationwide Series at the Road America 200 at Road America in Wisconsin on June 23^rd and at the NAPA Auto Parts 200 presented by Dodge on August 18^th which will take place in Montreal at the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve - a course named after Jacques Villeneuve's father.

Villeneuve might be better known for his time behind the wheel of "Indy cars" but the French Canadian racer has made 7 previous starts in the ranks of the NASCAR Nationwide Series.  His most successful outings in NASCAR were at the Montreal Circuit Gilles Villeneuve in 2010 when he finished 3^rd along with another 3^rd place finish at Road America last year.  Jacques has been to victory lane at both of these tracks in his open wheel days and the venue named after his father is technically his home track.

Some die hard go-fast fans might gripe about the fact that the Dodge Ram SRT10 Quad Cab only came with an automatic transmission, but this brawny muscle truck on CollectorCarNation is an awesome display of Mopar performance in pickup form. It might look like any other Ram SRT10 Quad Cab from the picture above but anyone who tries to take this Ram on head to head will get a surprising beat down.

The standard Viper V10 has been pulled in favor of a 522 cubic inch stroker motor with a forged bottom end that churns out a whopping 712 rear wheel horsepower. Twin ball bearing Turbonetics turbochargers provide the boost while a front mount intercooler keeps things cool. The fuel system has been upgraded to handle the additional need for fuel and a Magnaflow performance exhaust system adds performance and sound. 

This past weekend marked a unique stop at Charlotte Motor Speedway for NASCAR as the Camping World Truck Series and the Sprint Cup Series each took their turn on the superspeedway for NASCAR's Sprint Cup All Star Weekend while the Nationwide Series was in Iowa. The weekend started with the Camping World Truck Series N. C. Education Lottery 200 on Friday, and ended with the Nationwide Series Pioneer Hi-Bred 250 on Sunday while the Sprint Cup drivers ran two short races on Saturday as part of the million dollar Sprint All Star Race.

For Friday's N. C. Education Lottery 200, 4 of the 36 trucks in the field were Ram brand vehicles.  Camping World regulars Parker Kilgerman, Jennifer Jo Cobb, and Clay Greenfield qualified in the 14^th, 25^th and 33^rd spots, respectively.  These three Ram racers were joined by Sprint Cup driver Brand Keselowski who started in 9^th place.  Greenfield ran into steering issues just 6 laps into the race to finish last while Cobb finished in 26^th, 9 laps down.  Kilgerman's drove his Mopar sponsored race Ram to a 11^th place finish while Brad Keselowski was the best finishing Ram, coming just short of winner Justin Loften en route to a second place finish.  Kilgerman moved up one spot in the standings to 5^th with his 11^th place finish.