NASCAR Home Tracks

CHAMPION PROFILE: Gresham Raises Game

If there was one thing the NASCAR K&N Pro Series East taught Max Gresham, it was how to take a sharper look at the big picture.

Gresham, who had fast race cars and an ability to win races even when he first joined the series on a part-time basis in 2009 as a 16-year-old, took the lessons learned at Joe Gibbs Racing and turned them into a championship season in 2011.

Those lessons included racing smarter, not harder, and carrying momentum from week-to-week instead of just lap-to-lap.

“I really don't know where I'd be (without JGR),” Gresham said. “I didn't think coming into this thing three years ago in 2009 that I'd been the 2011 K&N Pro Series East champion. In all levels of racing and in my personal life, it's kind of made a persona for me. There's so many things I don't even realize that I've changed because of them.”

Gresham credits his work with crew chief Bryant Frazier for making the biggest impact.

“The cars were fast last year, but really the thing that changed this year was how I approached the whole deal,” Gresham said. “Bryant's won races at every level, and he helped me cap my go-go-go mentality. It was always about how important wins were – but it was also about not getting wrecked out of races by taking chances trying to win.

“I feel like I got everything out of (the series),” said Gresham, 18, of Griffin, Ga. “Last year, I had a couple of wins and poles, and this year again we won a couple more races and poles. I would have liked to get a couple more wins, too, but I felt like we always had the opportunity to go win some more.”

CHAMPION CAR OWNER: J.D. Gibbs  |  CHAMPION CREW CHIEF: Bryant Frazier  |  CHAMPION PHOTO GALLERY

Frazier brought a level of credibility to the lessons he tried to impart on Gresham. Frazier worked with Brett Moffitt in 2010, bringing Moffitt within the season's final race of winning the championship for JGR, and he also has a 1993 NASCAR Nationwide Series title on his resume.

That resonated with Gresham, who like Frazier, and Alabama native, came from the short tracks of the deep south.

“I don't think he has a limit,” Frazier said of Gresham. “This year, he grew so much in being able to be fast and take care of his equipment at the same time. In 2010, he was fast a lot but got into trouble a lot, too... Our goal was to win a championship and finish every race. There's times you may have to take a third-place car and finish third with it. You don't have to try and win a race with a third- or fifth-place car and tear your stuff up doing it.”

Gresham won two of his 12 starts in 2011, finishing in the Top-5 nine times while winning four poles and finishing outside the Top-10 only once. By contrast, he had two wins with only three Top-5s in 10 races in 2010.

Gresham only once truly employed a go-for-broke strategy. Fittingly, that came in the closing laps of the series' visit to Gresham Motorsports Park – the blistering fast half-mile his family owns and operates in Jefferson, Ga.

“There's so many of moments that were big for me, but it's got to be winning at the home track on a green-white-checkered finish,” Gresham said. “That was probably one of the coolest moments in this season for me. I know that track, and I know that when I got in the situation with Darrell (Wallace Jr.) at the end there, I knew I could get out of it – just because I knew where I was on the track and what to do.

'To win at home, in front of all the people I've been racing in front of for 10 years, I could look in the stands and I know all those faces. “That's what made it so cool, that I could do it at home and at such a high level. That was by far one of the coolest things that's ever happened to me in racing.”

What's next for Gresham's career is still to be decided, though he is actively pursuing rides in national series for next year. That's as much a reflection of Gresham's natural abilities behind the wheel as it is his maturation process.

“My family and I, we've always tried to look at where we're racing. It's not how many times you've won this or that – you can take a Major League Baseball team and go beat all the minor-league teams you want,” Gresham said. “But when you walk into the K&N Series with cars, teams and drivers as good as you or better, and it gives you a different level of respect for everyone else.

“You feel a sense of the 'wow' moment because you've beaten the best competition you've faced in 10 years. It's cool in the East series. Every week you show up and know that the guy in 10th in the standings has just as good a chance to win the race as you do.”

And Gresham was able to grab every available point to make sure that when the final checkered flag of the season flew at Dover International Speedway in October, he was at the top of his game.

The following are highlights of Gresham's 2011 championship campaign:

Gresham Brings It Home  |  Gresham Rebounds To New Hampshire Win  |  Gresham Wraps Up Dream Season