Year in Review: Toyota

After a few years of talking about it and intense negotiations with the sanctioning body of NASCAR, Toyota finally announced that 2007 would mark their debut in stock car racing’s premier series, the Nextel Cup. Mixed opinions and mixed expectations ran rampant throughout NASCAR Nation leading up to the green flag of the Daytona 500 in February, but one thing everyone agreed upon was that the chore at hand would not be an easy one. Still, the teams of Michael Waltrip Racing, Bill Davis Racing, and Team Red Bull plunged ahead, determined to make their supporters happy and their naysayers think twice. Looking back nine months later, the 2007 season produced an end result of both success and utter failure.

The first eleven races of the year produced exactly ONE top ten finish for the entire Toyota brand amongst a pool of what was then seven drivers (B. Vickers’ 10th place finish @ California), but that wasn’t even the frustrating part. The biggest obstacle was no longer getting their cars to the checkered flag, but rather getting them in-line for the drop of the green flag to start the race! Jeremy Mayfield, Michael Waltrip, AJ Allmendinger, and Brian Vickers combined for a total of 31 FTQ’s (failed to qualify) during that span of 11 races. That means that on average, this bunch successfully qualified their cars for only 3 of those 11 races, while Dave Blaney, Dale Jarrett, and rookie David Reutimann combined for only 6 total FTQ’s during that time. Vickers, however, would redeem himself in the twelfth race by scoring Toyota’s first ever top five Cup finish with a fifth place run at Lowe’s back in May. The road from Lowe’s, though, was still a long, bumpy one. Fourteen drivers would combine throughout the course of the year to drive the Toyota logo, and of them, only three successfully garnered a top ten finish. Dave Blaney ended with four, Vickers had five, and Michael Waltrip himself had 2. Again, though, the real sore spot comes when you consider the fact that only three drivers actually ran in more than 20 of the 36 Cup races … Vickers, Reutimann, and Blaney – who led the team with 33 starts.

With all of this in mind, it’s not hard to see where the “utter failure” stems from in this story, so you’re probably asking yourself right about now what the hell happened to the “success” portion. The most notable success story that Toyota produced in ’07 would undoubtedly be the Talladega Fall race, in which they started five cars from the top six spots. Three of them found themselves in accidents by the end of the day, while NASCAR rookie and former Indy Champ Jacques Villeneuve backed off for a mid-field finish, but wily vet Dave Blaney held strong for a hard fought 3rd place finish. Michael Waltrip had a late-season stretch of three consecutive top 20 finishes, while Blaney had his own stretch of three straight top 15’s. Also of notable interest would be the fact that Blaney finished the year 31st in points, which will guarantee him a spot in the Daytona 500 next year.

Overall, this was obviously not the inaugural season that Toyota owners, drivers, and fans were hoping for, but the future is now looking much brighter for them. 2008 will bring the entire Joe Gibbs Racing team under the Toyota banner, Jacques Villeneuve shows promise in this sport and will get a full season of racing under his belt next year, and JJ Yeley is joining the crowd as well. I’ll cover more on Toyota’s outlook for ’08 as we move a little closer to the drop of the green flag on the 2008 season.

2007 Grade:  D+