ESPN Ryan McGee Blog

Wednesday morning's Los Angeles Times has a great story by Jim Peltz about NASCAR's cutting loose of its Southern roots. As is usually the case, Peltz is right on the money -- no matter how much it might pain a Rockingham, N.C., native like yours truly.

Here are the facts: Six of the 12 Chase competitors are from the Pacific time zone. Only one is from North Carolina. The 2007 season was the first season since the Cup Series was founded in 1949 that a Tar Heel native did not win a race in NASCAR's top series. Last year Dale Earnhardt Jr. was the only Carolinian to win a race. This year, so far, Brian Vickers is the only representative.

California, where we're racing this weekend, is now the dominant state in stock car racing. This year the Golden State is the statistical Sprint Cup leader, thanks to a pair of native sons -- Jimmie Johnson and Jeff Gordon -- who show no sign of slowing down. They've also won seven of the past 14 Cup Series titles.

This year they are tied in wins with Las Vegas' Busch brothers, and trailed closely by the lone representative from Arkansas and another pair of Chasers from Indiana. In all, 16 states and two foreign nations are represented in the top 35 in points.

Want to see the breakdown? I figured you would.

*A.J. Allmendinger, Jeff Gordon, Robby Gordon, Kevin Harvick, Jimmie Johnson, Casey Mears, Scott Speed
** Clint Bowyer (Kansas), Sam Hornish Jr. (Ohio), Bobby Labonte (Texas), Michael Waltrip (Kentucky), Martin Truex Jr. (New Jersey)

More Farm-yoo-lah Won

(That's how world-champ-turned-color-commentator Jackie Stewart used to pronounce "Formula One" on ABC's "Wide World of Sports.")

On Monday we told you that F1 expat Nelson Piquet Jr. will test a NASCAR truck for Red Horse Racing at Rockingham next week. It now appears he will be joined by IRL vet Vitor Meira, even though both Meira and Indy Car boss A.J. Foyt say not to read too much into it; he's merely going to The Rock to help his friend Piquet.

There's also been an addition to the second part of Monday's F1-to-NASCAR report. Michael Waltrip Racing will be testing not one, but two Formula One vets, at the International Speedway in Lakeland, Fla., the week prior to the Cup season finale at the Homestead-Miami Speedway. We already knew about Mika Salo, who hasn't made an F1 start in nine years. But now it's being reported that Italian-born Jarno Trulli, who finished second in last weekend's Japanese GP, will also be at the test. The 35-year-old is currently eighth in the World Championship standings and drives for Toyota, the same brand on the cars of MWR.

Trulli, who turned heads when he dropped in on a NASCAR weekend at Michigan in 2008, tells Sky Sports and the European F1 media that "my commitment is 100 percent to Formula One."

Occoneechee Update

I've been getting e-mail/Twitter questions about the Occoneechee Speedway in Hillsboro since I mentioned it in Tuesday's blog segment about Jim Roper, winner of NASCAR's first Strictly Stock race. Specifically, does it still exist? Sadly, no. But there's a group out there working on that.

The nine-tenths mile dirt oval in Hillsboro, N.C., hosted Cup races from the very first season of 1949 until 1968. After it was dropped off the NASCAR calendar it fell into disrepair. Like full-sized trees growing through the grandstand disrepair. But the Historic Speedway Group is slowly bringing the old place back to life, restoring the original ticket booth and starting to rebuild the track surface itself.

But for all the memorable races run at Occoneechee (pronounced Oh-koh-KNEE-chee), none can compare to the chaos that occurred when busty Hollywood bombshell Jayne Mansfield showed up to serve as grand marshal. For that story and more, visit the historical blog of the greatest NASCAR writer who ever strode across the surface of God's green earth, Tom "Pappy" Higgins.

HSG isn't alone. Another group, Racers Reunion, works to rally behind old-school racetracks and drivers throughout the nation. Another group, Save The Speedway, is dedicated to saving what I like to call NASCAR's Titanic, the North Wilkesboro Speedway, which I paid a visit to back in August.

Season's Tweetings

If this is how they roll to school down in Texas, then I'm pulling a Billy Madison and going back to the first grade: @TXMotorSpeedway Watch this rocking video of a BUS DOING WHEELIES at TEXASMOTORSPEEDWAY!