Toyota's first season in the Nextel Cup racing circuit has been a difficult one, thanks to affiliations with new teams that haven't always turned in the best performances, but they've made a move to change that by acquiring the Joe Gibbs Racing team, an organisation that has won three Cup championships in the last seven years.
In getting JGR, Toyota also gets driver Kyle Busch, who will be moving from Hendrick Motorsports in 2008, just as JGR is moving from Chevrolet to Toyota -
http://www.carseek.com/reviews/toyota/ . On Friday, August 31st Busch told reporters that he had always been in the loop with regard to the switch, and was merely waiting for official word.
Busch, who will be joining existing JGR drivers Tony Stewart (a two-time Cup champion) and Denny Hamlin, also said that he was fine with the switch, explaining, "It's something more so that crew chiefs, the engineers and all those guys need to improve on.” He went on to add that it didn't really matter to drivers what they were driving, especially since 2008 will see all NASCAR teams with the "Car of Tomorrow" for the 2008 Sprint Cup season. He said that the bodies of various racecars are not that distinct from one another, and that it was the cars -
http://www.carseek.com - motor within each vehicle that makes the difference.
Busch's move to JGR was triggered when he lost his slot with Hendrick, because they signed Dale Earnhardt Jr. for next season.
Kyle Busch also said that when he was initially talking to Joe Gibbs Racing about joining their team, the switch to Toyota was part of their discussions, and he spoke with Mark Kronquist, JGR's chief engineer, about some of his concerns with regard to Toyota's motors, stating that they had top-end power, but not bottom-end power. He relayed that Kronquist assured him JGR's tech crew would be able to handle the shift with little trouble, and have a working system by the first of the year.
Busch, who is 22 years old, fully expects Toyota to become a solid contender in the near future.
Neither GM nor Toyota had any comments on the day of the announcement but in the following days, Jim Aust, vice president of Toyota Motor Sales, USA Inc, and president of Toyota Racing Development USA officially announced that JGR would be joining Bill Davis Racing, Michael Waltrip Racing, and Team
Red Bull in driving the Toyota Camry - "the most popular car in America" - when the 2008 season begins in February.
![JJ Yeley - Interstate Batteries/Joe Gibbs Racing Chevrolet [pic credit: GM Media/Dorsey Patrick]](http://pix.crash.net/thumbs/194779.jpg)
