Brad Keselowski's continued improvement this season and he's impressive performance so far in the Chase for the Sprint Cup raises the prospect of whether 2012 may be the year veteran team owner Roger Penske could win his first Cup title.
Until Keselowski's Nationwide Series championship in 2010, Penske had never won a championship of any kind in NASCAR, although he has enjoyed enormous success in open-wheel racing.
Penske, who was on hand for Keselowski's victory at Dover International Speedway, talked about his NASCAR title hopes after the race.
"You know, obviously I look up to
folks like (Rick) Hendrick and Joe Gibbs and (Richard) Childress and (Jack) Roush, the other teams that
have been so good here. We've never had
a chance to get to the top. We were
close a couple times with Rusty (Wallace)," Penske said. "This competition is just
very, very tough. A lot of smart
people. A lot of experience. I think you got to build it. I see how these other guys have done it. They haven't done it overnight.
"When you look at Brad, he and Paul (Wolfe) have been
able to attract the people that are giving us the performance on and off the
track. Certainly Mike Nelson, Tim
Cindric, the guys back at the shop, Travis (Geisler), there are so many people pulling on
this. They're maybe people no one knew
about three or four years ago, but we sure know about them in our shop. To me that made the difference. We have to put our arms around those folks
and say, 'Let's keep going.'"
