Billy Johnson and Jack Roush Jr. finish 2nd in Round 9 – CTSCC at Trois Rivieres

The Roush Performance team finishes 2nd in Round 9 of the season at Trois Rivieres marking the 5th podium and 8th top five of the season.  Drivers of the No. 61 Roush Performance Products Ford Mustang, Jack Roush Jr. and Billy Johnson, started the GP3R race from the second position and immediately took over the lead due to a crash in qualifying from the Pole-sitting Mustang Boss 302R.
Jack dominated the first half of the race leading every lap and holding off many hard charging BMWs.  A yellow flag caution came out 28 minutes into the race and a mid-race rule change allowed most of the field to pit and do a driver change despite the standard 30-minute rule to maintain driver points.  When the green flag dropped again, Jack held his lead against many of the second drivers who were already in the car. 

About half way into the race, Jack pitted for a driver change and Billy Johnson took over the controls of the Roush Mustang.  Making it back on track, Billy was in 6th place and had to fight his way through some tough company to get on the podium.  As the 2-hour race went on and night fell, many cars were fighting braking problems and poor visibility of driving on a street circuit at night.  Billy exercised patience and slowly picked cars off one by one passing the No. 83 Porsche of Cosmo and Dumoulin, the point leading No. 48 BMW of Espenlaub and Putnum, and the No. 45 BMW of Borcheller and Hendricks to find himself in the 2nd position.  This intense 3-way battle allowed the No. 13 BMW M3 of Plumb and Longhi to maintain a comfortable lead. 

While reeling in the race leader, there simply was not enough time left in the race for the No. 61 Mustang to catch the BMW and contend for the win.  The checkered flag fell with Johnson and Roush finishing 2nd in one of the most challenging circuits and conditions on the CTSCC schedule.

With one round left in the Continental Tire Sports Car Championship, the championship is on the line with 4 teams mathematically eldgible to take home the big trophy.  The series heads to Round 10, the 2010 Season Finale at Miller Motorsports park where Roush Performance will be looking for their third win of the season attempting to claim the championship.   

WATKINS GLEN, N.Y. (Aug. 7, 2010) – Road racing wiz Billy Johnson was impressive as soon as he got into the CitiFinancial Ford this weekend at Watkins Glen International. In his NASCAR Nationwide Series debut, the 23 year-old showed he had plenty of speed as he put the No. 6 in the top 15 in practice. When it was time to qualify, Johnson wheeled his Ford around the 2.45-mile track in 73.04 seconds; good for ninth on the starting grid. Once the race started the team used pit strategy early in the Zippo 200, but as Johnson tried to avoid a spinning car on lap 15 he received slight damage to the nose of his Ford and was forced to pit to fix his front end. On the restart, he was caught up in a multi-car wreck ending his debut early. Johnson finished 36th. 

From the drop of the green flag, crew chief Mike Kelley had a pit strategy plan and he started to execute it on lap 10. Kelley called Johnson to the pits for fuel only hoping it would allow him to make laps on a clean track. A handful of laps later, Johnson was trying to avoid a spinning car when he spun himself. The front end of Johnson’s CitiFinancial Ford received slight damage but the young driver was able to continue on. 

After pitting under the first caution on lap 21 for tires, fuel and to fix the damage to the nose of the No. 6 Ford, Johnson was scored in the 32nd position. On the lap 23 restart, the field was getting up to speed when a multi-car wreck on the exit of turn-one collected the young driver and ended his day with a 36th-place finish.

“I am disappointed that our day ended early after the wreck on the restart,” said Johnson, who was involved in the 10-car accident. “Mike Kelley (crew chief) and our CitiFinancial team had a plan going into the race and we were starting to work on it. I spun early while trying to avoid a wreck but sustained slight damage to our No. 6 Ford. On the first caution, we were able to pit to fix the front end but that put us back in the pack. On the restart, we were three-wide and as I got through that I saw the track was blocked and wasn’t able to get through.” 

Marco Ambrose led the most laps en route to taking the checkered flag in the Zippo 200 at Watkins Glen International on Saturday afternoon. The series now heads to the Irish Hills of Michigan for the Carfax 250 at Michigan International Speedway next Saturday, August 14, 2010. 

The Roush Performance team won Round 8 of the season at New Jersey Motorsports Park.  Drivers of the No. 61 Roush Performance Products Ford Mustang, Jack Roush Jr. and Billy Johnson, started the Garden State 250 from the pole position on Saturday, July 17.  This marked Jack's 4th pole in the 8 races thus far in the 2010 Season.  Under the leadership of crew chief Quinn Conda the team continued to hold the lead for all but four laps of the 87-lap race.  It was an exciting afternoon for the Roush Performance team as they claimed their second win of the year in the Grand Sport (GS) division.

The green flag was dropped to begin the two and one half hour race featuring more than 70 Gran Sport (GS) and Street Tuner (ST) cars at the new 2.25-mile Thunderbolt Raceway course.  Starting the race from the pole position, the Roush Performance team was eager make it to victory lane having never won a race they started from the pole at.  Roush lead the first 44 laps which featured four out of five cautions in the race.

"It was hot today, which made the set-up of the car critical,” said Roush.  “I was able to manage my tires, outlast the cars behind me and check out from the field.”

While under the fourth caution, several GS cars pitted on lap 45, including Roush.  During the stop, Conda made the call for Johnson to climb in and take the wheel for the second half of the race. 

Johnson returned to the track in second and was able to regain the lead after passing Joe Koenig on the inside of Turn 1 once the green flag dropped on lap 49.  With 26 laps to go, Johnson was able to widen his lead to more than a second over Matt Plumb crossing the line in first when the checkered flag fell.  This was only the seventh time this season the winning margin was under two seconds. 

"I had two fast cars - with fast teams and fast drivers - behind me,” said Johnson after driving to victory lane.  “I managed that as best as I could and I had to work hard to keep the tires under us for the end.”

Johnson will make his debut in the NASCAR Nationwide Series August 8, at Watkins Glen, N.Y. in Roush Fenway Racing’s No. 6 Ford Fusion.

The Continental Tire Series will travel to Trois-Rivieres, Quebec August 13 where Roush Performance will be looking for their third win of the season. 

In April of 2010, Billy left his hometown of San Clemente, Ca and moved to the Mooresville/Charlotte, NC area to be closer to the Roush Race Team and to advance his driving career.

Since then, Billy has been hired as an employee of Roush Fenway Racing to further his knowledge of the sport and to learn the INs and OUTs of one of the largest and most successful racing organizations in history.

In this time BillyJohnsonRacing.com has yet to be updated but there has been some great televised battles in the Grand Am Continental Challenge series which has Johnson and Jack Roush Jr. climbing back up the points ladder after a DNF in the season-openeer at Daytona.  The past five races have looked like:

Barber Motorsports Park - 2nd

Virginia International Raceway - 5th

Lime Rock Park - 2nd

Watkins Glen - 5th

Mid-Ohio - 4th