Justin Allgaier (born June 6, 1986, in Riverton, Illinois), is an American stock car driver. He drives the #12 Verizon Wireless Dodge Charger for Penske Championship Racing in the NASCAR Nationwide Series. He was the 2008 ARCA RE/MAX Series Champion and the 2009 Nationwide Series Rookie of the Year.
Early Career
Allgaier began his racing career at the age of five in quarter midgets, and won over one hundred races and five championships. He began stock car racing at thirteen in the UMP Late Model Series, where he competed for three seasons. At the age of sixteen, he made his debut in the ARCA RE/MAX Series at the Illinois State Fairgrounds racetrack, driving the #99 Hoosier Tire Midwest/Law Automotive Chevrolet for Ken Schrader; he qualified twenty-ninth and finished seventeenth. He ran two additional races for Kerry Scherer and Bob Schact, with a best finish of eleventh.
2003-2006
Allgaier ran additional ARCA races in 2003, making six starts in the #86 owned by his father. He had a sixth-place finish in his second start at Toledo Speedway, and later a best finish of third at Salem Speedway. The next season, he made only five starts but had a second-place at Toledo. In addition, he was a representative of the United States in the South Pacific Saloon Car Championship, where had two top-fives. In 2005, Allgaier ran seven races in ARCA, splitting time between cars owned by Wayne Hixson and Bobby Gerhart. He won his first career pole at Springfield, setting a new track record, and had four top-five finishes. He also made his NASCAR debut in the Craftsman Truck Series, making four starts in the #63 MB Motorsports/Dave Porter Truck Series Ford. He failed to make five races and did not finish higher 26th. That year, he appeared on the Discovery Channel program, "Driver X: The Race For The Ride." The show's premise was Jack Roush searching for new talent to drive Roush Racing prepared vehicles in NASCAR's top 3 series.<ref>Gong Show page at Jayski.com Retrieved October 19, 2008</ref> <ref>This 'Gong Show' will land winner in a ride; By Pete Iacobelli, The Associated Press; NASCAR.com Retrieved October 19, 2008</ref>
In 2006, Allgaier made his first full-time run in ARCA. He failed to qualify for the first two races of the season, but he got his first career win at the Illinois State Fairgrounds Racetrack, becoming the first Springfield area resident to win in the 72 year history of championship auto racing at the fairgrounds. He made three more truck races for MB and had a twenty-first place finish at Kansas Speedway. In 2007, he won his second career race at Salem and finished fourth in points. He also won two features in a midget car at Angell Park Speedway and placed 3rd in the Chili Bowl behind Tony Stewart and J. J. Yeley.
2008-Present
Allgaier returned for another full season in ARCA in 2008, driving for his family once again. He won six races, including the final three, and won the series championship by a slim margin. He broke Frank Kimmel's eight-year streak of winning the championship in that series. He also returned to NASCAR, finishing 21st in a Truck race at Kentucky Speedway. Later that year, Allgaier signed a contract with Roger Penske's #12 Nationwide team to run four races in the final part of the year.<ref>Jayski's Developmental driver's page</ref><ref>H&R Staff and news service reports; "Riverton driver joins Penske for Nationwide"; Decatur, IL Herald & Review; Friday, September 19, 2008; pp B-7</ref> His best finish in the Penske Truck Rental Dodge was eleventh at Phoenix.
Allgaier was then signed to drive the car full-time in 2009. Because of the acquisition of Penske Racing sponsor Alltel by Cellco Partners, a joint venture of Verizon and Vodafone, their Sprint Cup sponsorship was legislated out of the sport by NASCAR's agreement with Sprint in that series to prohibit sponsorship by wireless telephone companies. This allowed Cellco to move the sponsorship to the Nationwide Series, where it is not prohibited, and Allgaier will race a full season with Cellco sponsorship for what will now be known as Penske Championship Racing (the name change was made to accommodate Verizon Wireless' sponsorship of the team, which is referred as Verizon Championship Racing, which encompasses all series of Penske). Allgaier won his first career pole in NASCAR at Memphis Motorsports Park. On March 20, 2010 Justin won his first NASCAR Nationwide Series win at Bristol Motor Speedway.
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