46 Facts About Casey Mears

Casey James Mears was born on March 12,1978 and is an American professional off-road and stock car racing driver.

Casey Mears has raced in IndyCar, NASCAR's three national series including 15 seasons in the Cup Series, SCORE International, and the Stadium Super Trucks.

Casey Mears moved to sprint cars in 1994 and finished third in the Jim Russell USAC Triple Crown Championship, with a win at Mesa Marin Raceway.

In 1996, Casey Mears made his Dayton Indy Lights debut at the Cleveland Grand Prix and finished eighth.

Casey Mears became just the fourth driver in Indy Lights series history to complete every lap in a single season.

Casey Mears continued to compete in the Indy Lights in 2000 and won his first race at the Grand Prix of Houston meeting in October.

Casey Mears ran three IRL events at the start of the 2001 season and attempted to qualify for the 2001 Indianapolis 500, but ultimately did not make it.

Casey Mears ended the season by filling in for injured Champ Car driver Alex Zanardi, posting one top-10 finish in four starts.

Casey Mears had five CART starts, with one top-5 finish, and three IRL starts, with no top-5 finishes.

Casey Mears made his NASCAR debut in the Busch Series in 2001 at Homestead-Miami Speedway, driving the No 66 car for Cicci-Welliver Racing.

Casey Mears drove the No 41 Cup car for two additional seasons, and won two poles in 2004.

Casey Mears came close to quite a lot of victories during this period.

Casey Mears led late in the 2004 Sirius at the Glen but got passed with 12 laps to go and finished fourth.

At Homestead in 2005, Casey Mears controlled the final 100 laps of the Ford 400, but after a yellow flag erased his 28-second lead, Casey Mears had to make a pit stop thus forfeiting the lead and with it, the win.

Casey Mears started off 2006 with a then-best career finish of second, passing Ryan Newman at the line as Casey Mears' future teammate Jimmie Johnson won the 2006 Daytona 500.

On June 6,2006, Casey Mears announced that he was leaving Chip Ganassi Racing at the end of the season to join Hendrick Motorsports for the 2007 season, to replace the departing Brian Vickers.

Once again, Casey Mears secured the win with a fuel gamble, taking the lead with five laps remaining when most of the other lead lap cars stopped for fuel.

Casey Mears stretched his fuel to the finish, running out moments after the checkered flag.

On October 21,2009, it was announced Casey Mears would be getting his third crew chief of the season starting at Talladega.

Casey Mears was released by Richard Childress Racing following the 2009 season.

Casey Mears failed to qualify for the 2010 Daytona 500, ending a starting streak of 252 consecutive races; this was Casey Mears' first DNQ of his career.

Casey Mears failed to qualify for Fontana, Las Vegas, and Atlanta.

On May 13,2010, Casey Mears was announced as the temporary replacement driver for the No 83 Team Red Bull at Dover, replacing a sick Brian Vickers.

Casey Mears returned to TBR beginning with the Lenox Industrial Tools 301 at New Hampshire Motor Speedway on June 27,2010, where he finished 29th, only two laps down.

Casey Mears finished 24th in points, his best since driving for RCR in 2009.

Casey Mears began the season on a high note with a tenth-place finish in the Daytona 500.

At Richmond, Casey Mears ran in the Top 10 for part of the race, but got into a fist-fight with Marcos Ambrose who was furious over a late racing incident.

Two days later, Casey Mears was fined $15,000 and put on probation for one month.

For 2015, Casey Mears returned to Germain for what was to be the final year of both his and GEICO's contracts with the team.

Casey Mears finished sixth at Daytona and 15th at Atlanta to open the season.

On July 14,2015, it was announced that Casey Mears had signed a contract extension with Germain and GEICO for 2016.

Team owner Bob Germain confirmed that Casey Mears had extended his contract with the team through 2018 as well.

Casey Mears had a rough 2016 season, finishing 32nd at Daytona after caught speeding in the late of the race.

Casey Mears was unlucky after being involved in a small accident which ended Mears in contention for the win at Talladega.

On February 20,2017, Casey Mears announced via Twitter that he would drive the No 98 Ford Mustang for Biagi-DenBeste Racing in the Xfinity Series for 12 races.

Casey Mears ended up running 14 races in the No 98 car with the best finish of 9th.

In 2019, Casey Mears returned to the Cup Series with Germain, driving the No 27 Chevrolet at the Daytona 500.

In 2005, Casey Mears teamed with Scott Dixon and Darren Manning in the Chip Ganassi Lexus Riley.

Casey Mears became the first ever full-time NASCAR driver to win the Rolex 24 overall.

In 2009, Casey Mears shared the No 2 Gentleman Jack Pontiac-Crawford with Andy Wallace, Rob Finley and Danica Patrick.

Casey Mears shared the No 42 Ford Raptor trophy truck, which was built by the Geiser Brothers and sponsored by Axalta, with multi-time race class winner Doug Fortin.

Casey Mears returned to the Baja 1000 in 2021, co-driving the No 77 trophy truck with Robby Gordon.

In January 2017, Casey Mears tested a Stadium Super Truck, a series owned by former NASCAR driver Robby Gordon; the Stadium Super Trucks are similar to the stadium trucks raced by Casey Mears' father Roger, though they contain V8 engines instead of V6.

Casey Mears failed to qualify for the first race's main event after finishing seventh in his heat race, but a fourth-place run in the following day's heat allowed him to compete in that evening's feature, in which he finished fifth.

Casey Mears later raced in the series' rounds at Glen Helen Regional Park and the Race of Champions.

Casey Mears later ran the Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course weekend, where he finished second in the Friday round.