There is no doubt it has been a long and bumpy road for Michael Waltrip and the team that carries his name. Since committing to the Cup Series full-time in 2007, the organization has undergone an enormous amount of adversity and struggles. Criticism, slow race cars and controversy clouded this team’s reputation, yet over the last few months Michael Waltrip Racing has emerged as a serious organization that continues to improve each week.

A team that struggled week-in and week-out to make races and stay in the top-35, MWR faced an uphill battle with no one behind them pushing. While Tony Stewart was able to walk into an already built race shop with prepared cars and an assembled crew, Waltrip did it the hard way. By scoring the win Monday evening in the 50th running of the Coca-Cola 600 with David Reutimann, Michael Waltrip Racing is finally able to sit back and enjoy all the hard work put in over the years.

Reutimann’s win Monday evening finally gave the team something to be happy about. In its first two years of competition, MWR compiled only one top-5 and eight top-10s between three teams. The team received most of its attention from penalties, missed races and Michael McDowell’s spectacular wreck in Texas last year, yet towards the end of the 2008 season things began to come together for this team.

“It's incredible to be able to progress from where we were in '07 as a new organization, and then compete all throughout the latter half of '08 and into '09 at a level I've been really proud of,” team owner Michael Waltrip said Monday evening. “You got to be proud of the result because these things are really hard to win.  David and I both have been in position to win races before, had fate take it away from us.  So I like to think of this as payback.  David won the race, and I couldn't be happier.”

Happiness was not something that came to MWR at first. When the team attempted their first start in the season-opening Daytona 500 in 2007, NASCAR discovered an infraction and came down hard. An illegal substance was discovered in the team’s engine and Waltrip’s reputation was crushed. After that, MWR cars struggled throughout the year and were never able to fully overcome that initial setback early on.

To make things more difficult, Waltrip went into this deal building a brand new race shop, forced with the daunting task of building two style race cars (the old body style and the CoT) and also helped bring Toyota into the sport for the first time. Waltrip had his hands full to say the least.

“I tell you what, people, it's been a long road,” David’s father, Buzzie Reutimann added. “It's taken us a long time to get here.  I'm afraid I'm going to wake up in the morning and find out I'm dreaming all of this.  Wow, words can't describe how great a father would feel to see his son to win a race.  Seeing that number 00 up on top of the board, one of the greatest feelings in the world.”

Previously known as ‘The Franchise,’ Reutimann has become the leading figure at MWR. Throughout the team’s three year history, the second-generation driver has been the class of the organization.

"We couldn't find anybody else,” Waltrip said of his winning driver with a smile on his face. “Works for cheap.  Don't ask a whole lot out of anybody. So it just worked out for us.”

All kidding aside, Waltrip went on to praise his driver, saying Reutimann has always been the team’s “cornerstone”  and it is about time he gets to enjoy the success his hard work has created.

“I think David will tell you that it's been more of a family relationship for the Waltrips and the Reutimanns than owner/driver/employment,” Waltrip went on to say. “We believe in him.  We love him.  It started with Darrel.  He did a good job there. Everybody at Toyota appreciated the way he did things.  We were able to sell him into the sponsors as he progressed into the Nationwide car and into the Cup car.”

For Waltrip, this win was special in many ways. His first victory as a car owner, Waltrip felt a special connection with his driver who scored his first career victory. The owner/driver scored his first career victory for team owner Dale Earnhardt in the 2001 Daytona 500, however Earnhardt never made it to Victory Lane to congratulate his friend and driver.

“For me as an owner to get to hug my driver, that was something that I dearly missed today with not winning the Daytona 500,” Waltrip pointed out. “I was waiting for him to come hurt me because he would have hugged me in a way that hurt.  I kind of warned David, I'm feeling pretty good about this hug I'm fixing to give you.  So that hug was for David and it was also to sort of make up for something that I missed out on when I won a race one day.”

There is no doubt Michael Waltrip Racing has a lot of work to do moving forward, yet Monday’s victory served as justification for all of their hard work. Reutimann is currently thirteenth in the series standings and is a serious contender for the Chase. More strong runs and great calls from the pit box may give MWR their first Chase berth and produce more celebrations and good news at the shop.

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